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frgsinwntr wrote:

Frazzled wrote:Oh contraire you're the one lacking empathy for all victims. How am I lacking empathy? I posted the freaking thread. I called for an investigation for hate crimes violations.

Now i'm confused... you are posting inflammatory statments like "your statistics are gak!" to people who bring up the point that transgendered people face more threats and more danger each day statistically speaking... making them more vulnerable.... With out ANY back up as to why the statistics are "gak."

What is your stance? is this a hate crime? Should it be punished more?

Because your statiustics are crap. 1 in 4 women is raped in their lifetime. How many gays are raped in their lifetime. The argument is absolute bs and just screams PC nonsense, which is why its stupid.

Mannahnin wrote:I have made a positive assertion: That minority groups who face prejudice are the victims of violent crime at a higher rate than the general populace. This is an accepted fact, and the basis of existing criminal law. Sebster has quoted a statistic that shows the average transgendered person is FIFTEEN TIMES more likely to be murdered than the average other American.

Sebster actually said (based on other people's quotes, yes, it's hearsay, but there's an exception for it...somehow)

And the fear is real, the average American has a 1/18,000 chance of being murdered, for the average transgendered person the rate is 1/12.

That would mean that the average transgendered person is 1500 times more likely to be murdered than an average American. The annual murder rate in the US is around 5.4 murders per 100,000 (which is where the 1/18,000 comes from). That would give the transgender community a murder rate of 8,100 murders per 100,000.

I find that statistic extraordinary, and given the lack of a citation, unbelievable.

You post as if you think there will never be any consequences for any of it. It seems like you think that things posted on the internet don't count. Like no one you will ever meet or have met will ever read any of it, and no one will ever draw any conclusions about you as a person from them.

Please. Get off your self avowed moral high horse. The ones arguing against hate crime legislation are arguing for more punishment and enforcement for all offenses. We want to see equal justice for all victims. You're the ones making some victims more special than others, and then trying to shout down those who disagree with you.
Sucker please.


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biccat wrote:

Mannahnin wrote:I have made a positive assertion: That minority groups who face prejudice are the victims of violent crime at a higher rate than the general populace. This is an accepted fact, and the basis of existing criminal law. Sebster has quoted a statistic that shows the average transgendered person is FIFTEEN TIMES more likely to be murdered than the average other American.

Sebster actually said (based on other people's quotes, yes, it's hearsay, but there's an exception for it...somehow)

And the fear is real, the average American has a 1/18,000 chance of being murdered, for the average transgendered person the rate is 1/12.

That would mean that the average transgendered person is 1500 times more likely to be murdered than an average American. The annual murder rate in the US is around 5.4 murders per 100,000 (which is where the 1/18,000 comes from). That would give the transgender community a murder rate of 8,100 murders per 100,000.

I find that statistic extraordinary, and given the lack of a citation, unbelievable.

Indeed. hvaing said that, murder is murder. make the world safe for everyone and exterminate the criminals.

Frazzled wrote:Why are you assuming they are more vulnerable? Thats a throw away argument. A gay man is substantially less vulnerable than my wife or children.

People who have social stigmas and have less support in society are more vulnerable socially, even if they might physically be less so. Imagine a loner nerd, who exercises regularly and even does weight lifting occasionally, but is still into all the geeky things that tend to define that nerd. Now compare him to an equally well fit captain of the local football (gridiron football for non-US posters) team. sure, in a one on one fight the two might be equally matched because of their mutual exercises.

But those who commit hate crimes don't like one on one fights. So when he bullies the other guy, he brings his friends along with him-- something that the loner does not have. And how many people are going to stop a group of musclebound football players from beating up a nerd? Or a gay guy?

Friends or social acceptance is something that, in many areas, a gay man or lesbian woman would not have much of either. They are more vulnerable because of this status, whereas your wife and children are socially protected-- it may not seem like much, but it means more than you realize... just talk to someone who had lived a normal life before being outed in the bible belt, and how persecuted, abused, and neglected they (more likely than not) were afterwards.

Chrysaor686 wrote:

Kilkrazy wrote:I assume you mean nearly every violent crime.

No, nearly every crime is perpetrated because of some form of hate.

Jay walking is caused by hatred of zebra crossings.
Falsifying immigration forms is caused by hatred of not being able to have your wife in the country.
Putting sawdust in mince for hamburgers is caused by hatred of a diet lacking in fibre.
Ripping the "Do Not Remove" labels off mattresses is caused by hatred of labels you aren't allowed to remove.

Please.

Mannahnin wrote:This is a lie. You are playing games with words. No one (or such a small percentage that they are functionally irrelevant) does drugs because they "hate sobriety." No one commits burglary because they think it will stop them being poor. Try again.

I hate sobriety, and actively seek to escape it with drugs at any given opportunity. Most habitual drug users I know (which is most of the people I know) are exactly the same way, no matter their drug of preferrence. You must not partake in regular interaction with people who use drugs, or this would be very plain for you to see. This may not be the sole motive behind drug use, but it's definitely one of them.

Also, no one is going to burglarize a house if they have millions of dollars, because that would be absolutely unnecessary. Again, not the sole motive, but one of the many. It's also the most fundamental (because solving the problem behind this motive would prevent the crime completely).

False arguments again.

1. The majority is starting at an advantage. So this cannot be placing them at a "disadvantage" unless it has actually succeeded at reducing the rate of violent crime against (for example) black people below the rate of violent crime against white people. Which is obviously not the case.
2. We HAVE strict laws against violent crime. As people have been pointing out to Biccat for multiple pages, it's not an "either-or" proposition.
3. Sebster explained very clearly why hate crimes are worse. If I am robbed at an ATM at 3am, I can choose to not go to ATMs at 3am, and my community can take what happened to me as an example and be careful about going to ATMs at 3am. If I am beaten for being gay, I can't choose NOT to be gay, nor can other gay people. The community suffers more, and can do less about it.

1.) Not necessarily. There are more violent crimes committed against straight white males than any other group of people, even if it's not an even percentage per capita. It's simply not televised as readily because the motive is assumed to be something other than prejudice, and since the percentage is lower, it seems as if the problem is less severe.

2.) We may have strict laws against violent crime, but they are not impartial. It is more acceptable for someone to beat me to within an inch of my life than it is for someone to beat a transvestite to within an inch of their life, even if both crimes are motivated by prejudice. I find that to be pretty fethed up. If you made the laws against violent crime stricter all around, then that would help to prevent any type of violent crime.

3.) You will probably not get beaten for being gay unless you are unnecessarily flamboyant (otherwise, how would a random stranger even know?), which is just as preventable as getting robbed at an ATM at 3:00 in the morning. On the other hand, there are places where I literally cannot walk the streets around here because of the color of my skin; if I travel alone in Kansas City Missouri, there is a high chance of me getting beaten, robbed, shot or stabbed because I am white. Other races of people do not have that problem anywhere around here.

biccat wrote:

Kilkrazy wrote:

biccat wrote:Like I said a few posts ago: for all non-zero A & B and P<1, P(A+B) > A + P(B).
(A = # of non-hate crimes, B = # of hate crimes, P = percent reduction in crime due to increased sentencing)

You are still making the assumption that if hate crime sentences are increased, then non-hate crime sentences are not increased. You have made this assumption the basis of your two options, and it is in your maths. It is not true.

There is another option, which is PaA + PbB

[note: i had to edit my post above because I said P(A+B) > A+P(B). This was wrong and it should have been P(A+B) < A+P(B)]

You seem to be missing the point, and that is: if increased punishment decreases crime, then an across-the-board increase in punishment will decrease crime more than a targetted increase in punishment.

Punishing hate crimes more than non-hate crimes is not better than punishing both equally. Decreasing non-hate crime through increased punishments is irrelevant to the comparison.

Your equation is still wrong. You are still missing the key point that the propensity of bigots to commit hate crimes is higher then the general propensity of the whole population to commit crimes.

The propensity of bigots to commit hate crime will not be reduced to zero at the same level of deterrence as general crime.

Melissia wrote:

Frazzled wrote:Why are you assuming they are more vulnerable? Thats a throw away argument. A gay man is substantially less vulnerable than my wife or children.

People who have social stigmas and have less support in society are more vulnerable socially, even if they might physically be less so. Imagine a loner nerd, who exercises regularly and even does weight lifting occasionally, but is still into all the geeky things that tend to define that nerd. Now compare him to an equally well fit captain of the local football (gridiron football for non-US posters) team. sure, in a one on one fight the two might be equally matched because of their mutual exercises.

But those who commit hate crimes don't like one on one fights. So when he bullies the other guy, he brings his friends along with him-- something that the loner does not have. And how many people are going to stop a group of musclebound football players from beating up a nerd? Or a gay guy?

Friends or social acceptance is something that, in many areas, a gay man or lesbian woman would not have much of either. They are more vulnerable because of this status, whereas your wife and children are socially protected-- it may not seem like much, but it means more than you realize... just talk to someone who had lived a normal life before being outed in the bible belt, and how persecuted, abused, and neglected they (more likely than not) were afterwards.

Again none of that is an actual, wait for it, crime. Its projection

None of that supports the argument that many of the "protected groups" are more vulnerable - which was the argument- than women or children.
As noted the best asnwer is actually to drop the hammer on all crimes. If all charges of murder get the death penalty, then there is no issue. Don't help one, help all.

Texas Death Row, a rising tide that raises all boats.

Kilkrazy wrote:Your equation is still wrong. You are still missing the key point that the propensity of bigots to commit hate crimes is higher then the general propensity of the whole population to commit crimes.

The propensity of bigots to commit hate crime will not be reduced to zero at the same level of deterrence as general crime.

Even granting that these assertions are true, they don't change the fact that higher enforcement of hate crimes is no better than higher enforcement of all crimes.

Whatever the reduction rate for hate crimes is by increased punishment, it cannot be higher than the reduction rate for hate crimes plus non-hate crimes if punishment is increased across the board.

If increasing punishment by 6 months decreases hate crimes by 10%, but non-hate crimes by only 1%, it's still a better crime deterrant to increase the penalty for both than it is to selectively increase the penalty for only "hate" crimes.

The only benefit of hate crime legislation is that it gives politicians cover by claiming that certain groups aren't as targetted.

"My administration reduced crimes against nerds from 5% of all crimes to 4% of all crimes"
"But overall, crime went up..."
"WE REDUCED CRIMES AGAINST NERDS!!!"

Frazzled wrote:
None of that supports the argument that many of the "protected groups" are more vulnerable - which was the argument- than women or children.

The argument that would be made here is one from systematic discrimination ending in a statement about the normative acceptability of prosecuting/persecuting/discriminating against said minority.

Frazzled wrote:
As noted the best asnwer is actually to drop the hammer on all crimes. If all charges of murder get the death penalty, then there is no issue. Don't help one, help all.

Statistically, that doesn't help in the sense of remission, it just makes the survivors feel warm and fuzzy.

Frazzled wrote:
Texas Death Row, a rising tide that raises all boats.

No, it just kills people.


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biccat wrote:
Even granting that these assertions are true, they don't change the fact that higher enforcement of hate crimes is no better than higher enforcement of all crimes.

At which point you make an argument from pragmatism; eg. "We can only enforce so many laws at so high a standard."

Frazzled wrote:

frgsinwntr wrote:

Frazzled wrote:Oh contraire you're the one lacking empathy for all victims. How am I lacking empathy? I posted the freaking thread. I called for an investigation for hate crimes violations.

Now i'm confused... you are posting inflammatory statments like "your statistics are gak!" to people who bring up the point that transgendered people face more threats and more danger each day statistically speaking... making them more vulnerable.... With out ANY back up as to why the statistics are "gak."

Because your statiustics are crap. 1 in 4 women is raped in their lifetime. How many gays are raped in their lifetime. The argument is absolute bs and just screams PC nonsense, which is why its stupid.

Who's shouting down arguments? The rate of sexual assault against women is awful. But that's no reason not to protect other people who are at risk.

Your whole argument is absolute bs and just screams bigoted, homophobic and racist nonsense, which it why it's stupid. How does that feel? Do you like having your own rhetoric used against you?

http://www2.fbi.gov/ucr/cius2009/offenses/violent_crime/index.html
http://www2.fbi.gov/ucr/hc2009/data/table_01.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_unlawfully_killed_transgender_people
http://www3.law.ucla.edu/williamsinstitute/publications/Comparison%20of%20Hate%20Crime%20Formatted.pdf

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Violence_against_LGBT_people

Wiki wrote:Violent hate crimes against LGBT people tend to be especially brutal, even compared to other hate crimes: "an intense rage is present in nearly all homicide cases involving gay male victims". It is rare for a victim to just be shot; he is more likely to be stabbed multiple times, mutilated, and strangled. "They frequently involved torture, cutting, mutilation... showing the absolute intent to rub out the human being because of his (sexual) preference".[26] In a particularly brutal case in the United States, on March 14, 2007, in Wahneta, Florida, 25-year-old Ryan Keith Skipper was found dead from 20 stab wounds and a slit throat. His body had been dumped on a dark, rural road less than 2 miles from his home. His two alleged attackers, William David Brown, Jr., 20, and Joseph Eli Bearden, 21, were indicted for robbery and first-degree murder. Highlighting their malice and contempt for the victim, the accused killers allegedly drove around in Skipper's blood-soaked car and bragged of killing him. According to a sheriff's department affidavit, one of the men stated that Skipper was targeted because "he was a [see forum posting rules]."[27]

In Canada in 2008, police-reported data found that approximately 10% of all hate crimes in the country were motivated by sexual orientation. Of these, 56% were of a violent nature. In comparison, 38% of all racially motivated offenses were of a violent nature.[27]

In the same year in the United States, according to FBI data, though 4,704 crimes were committed due to racial bias and 1,617 were committed due to sexual orientation, only one murder and one forcible rape were committed due to racial bias, whereas five murders and six rapes were committed based on sexual orientation.[28] In Northern Ireland in 2008, 160 homophobic incidents and 7 transphobic incidents were reported. Of those incidents, 68.4% were violent crimes; significantly higher than for any other bias category. By contrast, 37.4% of racially motivated crimes were of a violent nature.[27]

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Frazzled wrote:

You post as if you think there will never be any consequences for any of it. It seems like you think that things posted on the internet don't count. Like no one you will ever meet or have met will ever read any of it, and no one will ever draw any conclusions about you as a person from them.

Please. Get off your self avowed moral high horse. The ones arguing against hate crime legislation are arguing for more punishment and enforcement for all offenses. We want to see equal justice for all victims. You're the ones making some victims more special than others, and then trying to shout down those who disagree with you.
Sucker please.

No, the hatred of bigots and racists is what makes some victims more special than others. If you perceive me as being on a "moral high horse", perhaps that's because your conscience is tweaking you. I'm not shouting you down, I'm standing up to your bullying, and asking you to use rational and reasonable arguments.


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Chrysaor686 wrote:

Mannahnin wrote:You are playing games with words. No one (or such a small percentage that they are functionally irrelevant) does drugs because they "hate sobriety." No one commits burglary because they think it will stop them being poor. Try again.

I hate sobriety, and actively seek to escape it with drugs at any given opportunity.

You are playing semantic games. I've may or may not have known more drug-users and abusers than you have. I've known people who died of it. I've studied it formally in college. I've worked with addicts. You are distorting and stretching the meaning of the word "hate" to make a shallow, and invalid, rhetorical point. It's a terrible argument, and no one buys it. Please drop it. I'm not going to bother responding to it again because it's so poor.

Chrysaor686 wrote:

Mannahnin wrote:1. The majority is starting at an advantage. So this cannot be placing them at a "disadvantage" unless it has actually succeeded at reducing the rate of violent crime against (for example) black people below the rate of violent crime against white people. Which is obviously not the case.
2. We HAVE strict laws against violent crime. As people have been pointing out to Biccat for multiple pages, it's not an "either-or" proposition.
3. Sebster explained very clearly why hate crimes are worse. If I am robbed at an ATM at 3am, I can choose to not go to ATMs at 3am, and my community can take what happened to me as an example and be careful about going to ATMs at 3am. If I am beaten for being gay, I can't choose NOT to be gay, nor can other gay people. The community suffers more, and can do less about it.

1.) Not necessarily. There are more violent crimes committed against straight white males than any other group of people, even if it's not an even percentage per capita. It's simply not televised as readily because the motive is assumed to be something other than prejudice, and since the percentage is lower, it seems as if the problem is less severe.

2.) We may have strict laws against violent crime, but they are not impartial. It is more acceptable for someone to beat me to within an inch of my life than it is for someone to beat a transvestite to within an inch of their life, even if both crimes are motivated by prejudice. I find that to be pretty fethed up. If you made the laws against violent crime stricter all around, then that would help to prevent any type of violent crime.

3.) You will probably not get beaten for being gay unless you are unnecessarily flamboyant (otherwise, how would a random stranger even know?), which is just as preventable as getting robbed at an ATM at 3:00 in the morning. On the other hand, there are places where I literally cannot walk the streets around here because of the color of my skin; if I travel alone in Kansas City Missouri, there is a high chance of me getting beaten, robbed, shot or stabbed because I am white. Other races of people do not have that problem anywhere around here.

1. In most of the cases crimes against white males (particularly since most of them are commited by other white males) in this country are obviously not hate crimes. That being said, I agree that hate crimes against whites are probably underreported, and may indeed get attributed to some other cause. That being said, as a white dude I am honest enough to recognize that I am in the most advantageous position here, and not in need of extra protection.
2. I think it's pretty fethed up that gay people, black people, and other minorities are subject to these kind of hateful, awful, evil acts. I do not think it's fethed up that we as a society try to do something about that fact. I think that's extremely honorable and commendable of us, to try to do something to protect the most vulnerable and punish the wicked who do these evil things.
3. The first part of your argument I reject entirely. It's false. People find out sometimes even if the victim tried to be subtle. That being said, the idea that a person should HAVE to conceal who and what they are is possibly the most fethed up you've said.

Mannahnin wrote:If you would do us the courtesy of thinking your argument through a little more, and/or reading the thread, you might notice that why someone committed a crime and who they committed it against is routinely considered important in many different crimes. "Murder 1" is differentiated from other kinds of murders by these factors, is considered a worse crime because of these factors, and punished more harshly because of these factors.

Murder 1 is NOT differentiated by motive, but by forethought and planning. You do know the difference don't you?

I know most people only get what they know about the legal system from TV shows, but contrary to popular opinion motive is not even required to prosecute a criminal offense.

The Green Git wrote:I said it before and I'll say it again... politicians pander to special interest groups to buy votes and "Hate Crime" legislation is nothing more than that.

Mannahnin wrote:Which is a larger voting bloc? Gay people, or people who oppose legal protections for gay people? Your argument fails on its face.

Speaking of arguments that fall on their face... yours just did. Epic fail. If I am in favor of prosecuting all crimes equally I'm not opposed to legal protections for gays (or anyone else for that matter)...just opposed to EXTRA legal protections for any class. Equal protection under the law.

You claimed that Hate Crimes laws are only enacted to buy votes. This is an absurd claim, and you should be ashamed to have made it in public.

Even if you don't recognize the noble motives which prompted it; even if your own cynicism and selfishness prompt you to think of everything in terms of corruption and venality, the obvious hole in your reasoning is that you can get a lote more votes from bigots than from gay people. There are a lot more of them.

[

Mannahnin wrote:Your whole argument is absolute bs and just screams bigoted, homophobic and racist nonsense, which it why it's stupid. How does that feel? Do you like having your own rhetoric used against you?
.

I'm not the one calling people homophobes and racists because they want all crimes prosecuted with the severest punishments possible, including what you define as hate crimes. I'm not the one calling people homophobes and racists at all. But you know thats kind of par for the course.

Speaking of arguments that fall on their face... yours just did. Epic fail. If I am in favor of prosecuting all crimes equally I'm not opposed to legal protections for gays (or anyone else for that matter)...just opposed to EXTRA legal protections for any class. Equal protection under the law.

Exactly.

Frazzled wrote:[

Mannahnin wrote:Your whole argument is absolute bs and just screams bigoted, homophobic and racist nonsense, which it why it's stupid. How does that feel? Do you like having your own rhetoric used against you?
.

I'm not the one calling people homophobes and racists because they want all crimes prosecuted with the severest punishments possible, including what you define as hate crimes. I'm not the one calling people homophobes and racists at all. But you know thats kind of par for the course.

+1 frazz

Frazzled wrote:

Mannahnin wrote:

Frazzled wrote:The argument is absolute bs and just screams PC nonsense, which is why its stupid.

Your whole argument is absolute bs and just screams bigoted, homophobic and racist nonsense, which it why it's stupid. How does that feel? Do you like having your own rhetoric used against you?

I'm not the one calling people homophobes and racists because they want all crimes prosecuted with the severest punishments possible, including what you define as hate crimes. I'm not the one calling people homophobes and racists at all. But you know thats kind of par for the course.

Your failure of reading comprehension is so total that it's actually pitiable. Even when I TELL YOU that I'm just giving you your own rhetoric back, you still can't perceive your own error.

I didn't even call you a bigot or a homophobe. I said "your argument screams", using your exact words.

CadianXV wrote:Theres a psychological phenomonen (sp?) that explains why no-one intervened. Its called 'Diffusion of responsibility'. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diffusion_of_responsibility

Essentially, everyone expects everyone else to break it up. Therefore no-one acts.

In my country, it's called being a giant pussy.

The Green Git wrote:Murder 1 is NOT differentiated by motive, but by forethought and planning. You do know the difference don't you?

I know most people only get what they know about the legal system from TV shows, but contrary to popular opinion motive is not even required to prosecute a criminal offense.

Presumably we're talking about New York law here, since that's the Law and Order city where most people would get 'legal system from TV shows' information, and it does use the 'Murder 1' 'Murder 2' distinction. If we take a look at http://law.onecle.com/new-york/penal/PEN0125.27_125.27.htm. It doesn't actually require 'forethought and planning' to qualify as 1st degree murder, just that it is intentional (which does go to motive a bit), that the defendant be 18 (that's point b way at the bottom) and that it hit one of the critera in section a. None of those criteria have to do with planning, however a number have to do with whether the victim is a police officer, corrections officer, judge, or witness to a crime. They center on the fact of a characteristic of the victim (like hate crime laws), the argument for including those in the legislature is that the motive of someone attacking a cop, judge, or witness is to interfere with the operation of the justice system.

While I agree with the 'anti' crowd that hate crime laws are a bad idea and have a lot to do with liberal identity politics, I don't think that basing that opposition on the idea that they're unprecedented in the law is a good idea. Not all criminal offenses require a motive, but a number of them do, and lots of really basic laws function in a similar way to hate crimes laws by triggering different penalties based on characteristics of the victim or the actual or percieved motive of the criminal.


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Mannahnin wrote:Even if you don't recognize the noble motives which prompted it;

Which road is it that's paved with good intentions again? I forget...

Thanks, Bearers.

I absolutely appreciate that bad and stupid things can be done for noble motives. But we've been defending the concept for a while, and when tGG smeared the motives, I thought it was worth addressing.

Frazzled wrote:Again none of that is an actual [...] crime.

I'm bowing out of this one. No way I can be respectful right now.

Melissia wrote:

Frazzled wrote:Again none of that is an actual [...] crime.

I'm bowing out of this one. No way I can be respectful right now.

i bowed out and am simply following now also... Man is fighting the good fight... but most of his points are never addressed properly imho

Hello all. This is my first post in Dakka (I'll probably do more of it now that Warseer seems dead) and I had to chime in. Someone mentioned earlier about hate crimes punishing someone for "racist thoughts". That's a false statement. Hate Crimes were made to punish you for acting out those thoughts. They were created (Hate Crimes) to help prevent violence against African Americans after the Civil War. They have evolved since then to encompass other racial and social groups.

The idea behind them is that many people who did kill African Americans would not other wise commit the crime of murder. Their hatred drove them to violence. Similar reason behind why you have different degrees of murder.

Yes, there have been situations where the Hate Crime statute has been abused. But in most...and I do mean most cases, someone is charged with a hate crime for a reason.

The Green Git wrote:Speaking of arguments that fall on their face... yours just did. Epic fail. If I am in favor of prosecuting all crimes equally I'm not opposed to legal protections for gays (or anyone else for that matter)...just opposed to EXTRA legal protections for any class. Equal protection under the law.

Just quoting this because I don't want to go through several pages picking out the "why not just make all crimes more harshly punished?" lines.

To draw on what Sebster said: the idea of punishing crimes based on the motive isn't just about reducing crime (harsher punishments aren't even all that good at reducing violent crime, since it generally takes place when the perpetrator is impaired due to emotional or instinctive responses to the situation, leaving the potential consequences of their actions completely out of mind), it's making the statement that certain motives are more antisocial or deleterious to society than others. For example: two people are engaged in a dispute over money or somesuch, one snaps and shoots the other, and gets, say, ten years in prison for it, because that's what's been judged a just penalty for murder given the circumstances; for contrast, say someone discovers that Bob in accounting is secretly gay, and so hides in the parking lot and shoots him while he's walking to his car, would the ten years the first person got for killing someone over a legitimate dispute (if not one that would justify murder) still be a just penalty for a crazed gunman killing a stranger? If ten years was considered just for the first circumstance, but not for the second, unilaterally increasing the penalty would then make the punishment for the first case unjust, while still doing nothing to differentiate the second case as worse.

BearersOfSalvation wrote:
Which road is it that's paved with good intentions again? I forget...

All of them?

I wish Australia would legalise execution for murderors and sterilation for rapist and pedofiles.

It may seem inhumane but if people are killing and/or sexual assaulting/Abusing people why should they have a fairer sentence then those they have harmed?

The higher you raise the penalties for crimes, the more willing someone will be to flee and/or fight back. If you'll be put to death for killing someone in a botched robbery, what's to stop you from opening up on cops that come to arrest you, or killing any witnesses? At that point it's literally them or you, and people have much fewer qualms about killing when their life is on the line.

Sir Pseudonymous wrote:The higher you raise the penalties for crimes, the more willing someone will be to flee and/or fight back. If you'll be put to death for killing someone in a botched robbery, what's to stop you from opening up on cops that come to arrest you, or killing any witnesses? At that point it's literally them or you, and people have much fewer qualms about killing when their life is on the line.

I understand were your coming from but if you can deteir people from commiting crimes then isn't that better then punish the people after they have already commited the crime.

Most people who are accused of murder don't necessarily mean they end up at the chair.

Yes thier are people who may take things to the extreme but aren't most people who commit serious crimes taking extremes?

Monster Rain wrote:Yeah, maybe I'm dating myself here but the Beemer was for a time the archetypal "Upper class white man's" car.

Sorry man. I thought that much of what you wrote was pretty reasonable and well said. I can see your point of view clearly; however, I still wonder why the perceived benefit shouldn't be available for everyone.

Cool, sorry if I felt like I was hassling you into responding.

Thing is, I don't think there is a benefit available to everyone.

Once you reach a certain point, increasing the punishment of a crime doesn't have any further impact on the crime rate. In the criminal's mind, 3 years jail serves exactly the same disincentive as 10 years jail.

I thought this was a really good point.

And I think it's really the point where we go from having overwhelming support for hate crime laws, to having very little support. I think almost everyone is on board with the idea that spraypainting swastikas on the side of a synagogue is really a crime on a different level to spraying a tag on some random fence. The problem comes when people try to expand that out to every crime where the victim is part of a minority.

I could be misreading this, but it seems like you're saying it's more of a gesture by society to show its disapproval of Hate Crimes and not actually be a deterrent. This is perhaps a more honest approach and one that I suppose makes more sense to me.

It isn't a hollow gesture, as much as recognising that more severe crimes demand more severe penalties, even when those penalties are unlikely to reduce further instances of the crime. We would punish a rape and murder with greater sentences than we would punish just rape, simply because the former is more abhorrent.

Similarly, we would punish spray-painting a swastika on the side of a synagogue differently than we would punish spray-painting a tag on some random fence.


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The Green Git wrote:Equal justice under the law is a core tenant. IMHO it should not matter why someone committed a crime or who they committed it against. Murder 1 is Murder 1. Rape is Rape. Apply the standards equally, let the case be argued entirely on the merits of THAT CASE and let the jury hand down the punishment that they see fit.

I said it before and I'll say it again... politicians pander to special interest groups to buy votes and "Hate Crime" legislation is nothing more than that.

In making your argument above you seem entirely unaware of the idea that a hate crime could actually have a component that seperates it from regular crime, the additional terror put through the minority community.

Don't just come in here and dump your little pet theory, without bothering to read the thread. It's really quite ignorant.



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Frazzled wrote:Wow. On no spectrum can you say your average man is more vulnerable than a woman or a child. Anything else is PC special interest nonsense.

Nonsense. A transgendered person is far more likely to be the victim of murder.

You can pretend victimisation has something to do with being smaller or less protected, but the simple fact is no person is tough enough or well armed enough to defeat any and all attackers. You enter society, you place trust in society that someone isn't going to attack you while you're looking the other way.

This means the absolute, primary determinant of whether or not someone is likely to be a victim is how many people out there wish to do them harm. Which is why minority groups like homosexuals and transgendered people are many times more likely to be assaulted or killed, despite being stronger than your daughter.


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Frazzled wrote:Your statistics aint gak. How many gay men are murdered? How many children?
How many women in the US are raped? How many gay men?
Nonsense.

Are you actually claiming that gay or transgendered people aren't attacked more frequently than other people?

If I was to demonstrate otherwise would you concede this point, and admit you were completely wrong?


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Chrysaor686 wrote:While I understand that Hate Crime laws were designed to combat prejudice, they do not function fairly. I could get stabbed for simply being white, but I guarantee that the perpetrator wouldn't see any extra sentencing because of this. It places the majority at a clear disadvantage, which makes little to no sense. It wouldn't be all that difficult to enforce strict laws against any form of violence. Why should impartial violence be deemed more acceptable?

Do you think spraypainting a swastika on the side of a synagogue should be punished differently to spraypainting a tag on someone's fence?

sebster wrote:Cool, sorry if I felt like I was hassling you into responding.

Nah, you had a thoughtful and reasonable post that I should have responded to. I had meant to get back to it when I had more time but I didn't want you to think I was ignoring you.

sebster wrote:It isn't a hollow gesture, as much as recognising that more severe crimes demand more severe penalties, even when those penalties are unlikely to reduce further instances of the crime. We would punish a rape and murder with greater sentences than we would punish just rape, simply because the former is more abhorrent.

I think this is where the disconnect is. I'm talking about the same punishment for the same crimes. Rape would be punished one way, rape + murder would be punished in another. I'm not even opposed, per se, to Hate Crime legislation. I just find it illogical, that's all. I say that as someone with friends of several races and sexual orientations and as half of an interracial marriage.

If my wife, who is Native American, and my brother who is white, were both murdered under similar circumstances I would find it unjust if the punishment of their killers was different based on their race. I hope that makes sense.

Monster Rain wrote:If my wife, who is Native American, and my brother who is white, were both murdered under similar circumstances I would find it unjust if the punishment of their killers was different based on their race. I hope that makes sense.

Yeah, and I agree with you that that is hate crime done wrong. If I kill a guy because he beat my highscore in Asteroids, then it shouldn't matter if he was white, black, gay or whatever.

But if I killed a guy because he's gay, it is different.

EDIT - I mean, don't you think there's something particularly odious, and particularly worse about the murder of James Byrd Jr, or Matthew Shepherd?