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Leah627
Leah627Friday, June 26, 2009 at 3:32:00 PM EDT
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I’ve always been a little skeptical of hate crime legislation. Obviously hate crimes are bad; so are plain old crimes—crimes against other humans, against humanity. Is a murder really worse just because the victim was gay, or the victim was Jewish, or the victim was Latino? Does the fact that the perpetrator gets prosecuted for a hate crime and murder really make a difference? Should it make a difference?
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Joe Solmonese of the Human Rights Campaign have been working to pass a hate crimes bill, also referred to as the Matthew Shephard Act (in remembrance of the 1998 murder of Matthew Shephard in Laramie, WY). This legislation would let the U.S. Justice Department help to prosecute hate crimes committed against LGBT people that result in serious injury or death. The timing is certainly right: hate crimes against both the LGBTQ community and minority communities, particularly Latinos, are on the rise. As I listened to a radio broadcast of Latino USA discussing hate crimes on my way home from work the other day, my head and my heart pulled in two separate directions. With murmurs of immigration reform from the White House and nearly unprecedented unemployment rates, anti-immigrant/anti-Latino groups have become more violent. This seems to call for increased vigilance and prosecution against hate. But, my head asked me, aren’t most crimes hateful, whether or not they target a specific group? And would hate crime legislation effectively deter bigots and hate groups from acting with violence?
After a lot of consideration and conversation, I came to a conclusion: hate crime legislation is necessary and should be passed. Crime, and especially violent crime, is prosecuted because it is a violation of society’s rules, an act of contempt for humanity. Hate crimes are worse—they defy the tolerance for pluralism that has been central to American principles for centuries. While the ultimate effectiveness of hate crime legislation is debatable (who knows if a threat of greater prosecution would deter perpetrators of hate crimes), any bill aimed at providing safety for vulnerable groups, which is a basic American right, should be encouraged.
Here’s a problem I ran across, though, in my consideration of hate crime legislation: to whom should the government afford protection under the umbrella of “at risk” groups? Conventional thinking makes inclusion of racial, ethnic, and religious groups obvious. Happily the latest version of Reid’s bill also protects the LGBT community, which has seen a 28% increase in hateful murders from 2007 to 2008, and which is currently experiencing its highest rate of murders since 1999, according to a recent report by the National Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs.
But what about political or other special interest groups? If a Democrat killed a Republican based on his or her political beliefs, would that constitute a hate crime? In my mind, it should. Morally, there should be no distinction between the murder of a Republican and, say, a lesbian woman, if both murders stemmed from the perpetrator’s hatred of the victim’s identity, whether it is sexual, racial, ethnic, religious, or ideological. We must examine the motivations for crimes, and, if they violate our social expectations of acceptance, or even tolerance, the crime should qualify for hate crime status. It is true that, unlike groups of a certain racial, religious, or sexual identity, neither Republicans nor Democrats have been historically demonized, victimized, or denied justice, so the cases don’t equate perfectly. There are also many fewer incidences of violence based on political affiliation compared with the thousands of crimes committed annually based on race, sexuality, or religion. Even so, just because something doesn’t happen frequently doesn’t mean that it shouldn’t be protected against.
What about women, though? As we saw recently in the media with the Chris Brown/Rihanna case and the murder of a female student at Wesleyan, violence against women remains common and disturbing. Misogyny is hate. What is the relationship between domestic violence and misogyny, and how do we understand and punish the violence perpetrated by a man against a women he seems to love as his wife yet hates as a woman? Should domestic violence be included in hate legislation? If hate crime bills become too inclusive, do they lose their distinctiveness and their ability to address hateful actions as particularly dangerous violations of our human community?
Maybe a hate crime should be defined as an act against an individual belonging to certain group or with a certain identity, but in particular committed with the intention of threatening others within that group or with that same identity.
Hate crimes laws obviously raise thorny issues, but the recent inclusion of the LGBT community among groups meriting hate crimes protection is unarguably worthy. As Harry Reid stated, “A violent act may physically hurt just a single victim and cause grief for loved ones, but hate crimes do more. They distress entire communities, entire groups of people and our entire country.” The hate crimes bill passed the House on April 29, and is expected to be considered by the Senate before lawmakers disperse in August.
Please take action with the Human Rights Campaign’s “Fight Hate Now” movement, to encourage the passing of the hate crimes bill.
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by AFY_Abby
What a terrific post! Thanks for your thoughtfulness.
Women have been explicitly targeted in order to help maintain a sexist set of class structures. I'd be all for increasing domestic violence punishments etc. The reason that hate crimes aren't defined as "the intent to hurt not just an individual but a larger identity group" is because that then puts the burden on the prosecutor to establish beyond a reasonable doubt that the attack had a certain intention. Not impossible, but one hell of a standard. The intent to perform an act is a difficult enough standard to prove for crimes like murder, but to proove a particular reason is danm near impossible.
I think the legislatures compromise takes a nice balence. The groups that are the most offen victimized are protected without allowing the concept of a hate crime to be hijacked. If someone hits me because I'm abrassive it doesn't make sense for me to be like "Oh, I see, it's cause I'm overweight. HATE CRIME. HATE CRIME!" The way the law is written it allows a very clear stand race/sex/gender/other -isms are bad.
Perhaps a combination of the two. Very clear protection for the most targeted identity groups and an additional clause that when the intent is to target a specific identity group that that crime also qualifies.
--Earl
good comments, too.