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 Cheesecat wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
The question is how you identify a member of a subculture group.

By the way they dress and there interests.

And who determines that?

I don't wear a tie with my Dress Uniform unless it's mandatory, while others do. Does that make one of us a protected group?

The law is ridiculous. It provides extra levels of protection under the law to some, but not all. Everyone should be equal under the law. Not the other way around.

 djones520 wrote:

 Cheesecat wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
The question is how you identify a member of a subculture group.

By the way they dress and there interests.

And who determines that?

I don't wear a tie with my Dress Uniform unless it's mandatory, while others do. Does that make one of us a protected group?

The law is ridiculous. It provides extra levels of protection under the law to some, but not all. Everyone should be equal under the law. Not the other way around.

Oh it's just how I determine it because fashion and interests are important to subcultures, like punks, hippies and hipsters are quite distinct from each other in terms of interests and fashion.

So... your saying that if I went out one day dressed "regularly" and got mugged, a person gets prosecuted one way, but if I were to go out the next day wearing super tight jeans and get mugged, the person gets prosecuted more harshly, and you call that justice?

I call that a joke.

But it leads to more labelling and stereotyping of people. Surely, we can all agree that's good.

 djones520 wrote:
So... your saying that if I went out one day dressed "regularly" and got mugged, a person gets prosecuted one way, but if I were to go out the next day wearing super tight jeans and get mugged, the person gets prosecuted more harshly, and you call that justice?

I call that a joke.

By your thinking it was wrong to specially target the Ku Klux Klan for lynching black people.

By my thinking?

That is not at all where my thinking leads.

The hipster's assailant would be prosecuted just as harshly as the assailant of the "regular" person under todays law. Equally. That is how it should be. You shouldn't prosecute someone with more punishments because they beat someone who wears a differant type of clothes then someone else.

 djones520 wrote:
So... your saying that if I went out one day dressed "regularly" and got mugged, a person gets prosecuted one way, but if I were to go out the next day wearing super tight jeans and get mugged, the person gets prosecuted more harshly, and you call that justice?

I call that a joke.

I'd call that someone too dumb to learn from day 1, and not hang out in the same place he got his ass kicked the day before...

As far as I'm aware this is just being piloted. I welcome it, actually. I think it protects freedom of expression. It might sound trivial, but I happen to think that people should be able to dress how they want without being targetted for violence because of it. It's a very real problem, especially up in the industrial north where I grew up. A lot of my mates regularly got beaten up for looking alternative when they were walking the streets. A good mate of mine got his head stamped on and his jaw broken in two places simply for wearing 'metal' clothes. In fact, this new scheme arose partly in response to a very similar incident, in which a goth girl got kicked to death trying to prtect her boyfriend, who was also pretty badly injured.

Gonna agree with Albatross here, I mean, no offense to the guys that seem to disagree with this new policy, but knowing enough people who have had the crap kicked out of them just for not dressing in 'normal' clothing (which round these parts is a pair of Kappa trackie-bottoms and a fake Adidas/TapOut!/UFC/other chavvy brand hoodie), you soon welcome the introduction of subculture hate-crime as a good thing.

I understand the issues of defining 'subculture', but the girl in the news story what stamped to death just for dressing differently, no other motive, didn't get mugged for money or her phone, didn't have gang connections, just in the wrong place at the wrong time. I guess that deciding whether it's a hate-crime comes down to whether there is a motive or not. I mean, if it had been a mugging or other crime, then it may not necessarily be a hate-crime (money/etc more important factor than race/gender/age/subculture), but if there really is no other motive than race, sexuality, clothes, hairstyle, etc then I think it classes as a hate crime.

 Leigen_Zero wrote:
I understand the issues of defining 'subculture', but the girl in the news story what stamped to death just for dressing differently, no other motive, didn't get mugged for money or her phone, didn't have gang connections, just in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Well, there's your problem. You guys really need to enact some second degree murder laws to have something to charge those guys with.

 Seaward wrote:
Well, there's your problem. You guys really need to enact some second degree murder laws to have something to charge those guys with.

They do - manglaughter, wounding with intent to commit grievous bodily harm etc. both of which carry heavy custodial penalties, but a lower standard of proof (i.e. not intent to kill for manslaughter, and intent to wound for the second)

 Dreadclaw69 wrote:

 Seaward wrote:
Well, there's your problem. You guys really need to enact some second degree murder laws to have something to charge those guys with.

They do - manglaughter, wounding with intent to commit grievous bodily harm etc. both of which carry heavy custodial penalties, but a lower standard of proof (i.e. not intent to kill for manslaughter, and intent to wound for the second)

Hold the phone. There's laws already on the books under which you could prosecute someone for kicking someone else to death?

In this thead: Folks repeat the debate over whether hate crimes laws serve a useful societal purpose or are redundant and represent an attempt to introduce "thought crime".

Wiki wrote:Penalty-enhancement hate crime laws are traditionally justified on the grounds that, in Chief Justice Rehnquist's words, "this conduct is thought to inflict greater individual and societal harm.... bias-motivated crimes are more likely to provoke retaliatory crimes, inflict distinct emotional harms on their victims, and incite community unrest."[13]

As Ouze described, the idea behind hate crimes laws is that crimes directed at a person because of what they are (black, muslim, jewish, gay) rather than because of personal animus or other factors, are more damaging to society. They represent an implicit threat to all members of that sub-group, detracting from their well-being and promoting division and mistrust between different elements of our society.

 Seaward wrote:

 Dreadclaw69 wrote:

 Seaward wrote:
Well, there's your problem. You guys really need to enact some second degree murder laws to have something to charge those guys with.

They do - manglaughter, wounding with intent to commit grievous bodily harm etc. both of which carry heavy custodial penalties, but a lower standard of proof (i.e. not intent to kill for manslaughter, and intent to wound for the second)

Hold the phone. There's laws already on the books under which you could prosecute someone for kicking someone else to death?

It's not specifically for "kicking someone else to death" in all likelihood.

And again: "hate crime" laws aren't there for prosecuting someone. They're for increasing the penalty.

Increasing the penality not really being a factor in this case, as murder already has the maximum penalty, but it could matter in other assaults. Also, looking at it this way and tracking it may allow the police to figure out of there is any sort of pattern to certain violent crimes. If members of a given subculture are being specifically and frequently targeted, that information may be useful to investigators.

 Cheesecat wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
If Goths are more likely to be attacked than people wearing jeans, perhaps that is a fact we ought to know so that they can be better protected.

Don't some goths wear jeans? Also is there any stats that show goths get attacked more than others as I found a lot of people in my home town tend to leave the metalhead, punk, emo and goth community alone as many people find them scary looking (yes, I know it's anecdotal evidence).

Well, it would appear that the Manchester police are now attempting to collect such statistics, which will aid them in determining whether there is any sort of trend and whether members of any particular subcultures/social groups are being targeted for violence disproportionately. If so, then that's useful information for the police.

 Kanluwen wrote:
It's not specifically for "kicking someone else to death" in all likelihood.

And again: "hate crime" laws aren't there for prosecuting someone. They're for increasing the penalty.

Prosecutions in the United States for many crimes already allow leeway in terms of sentencing based on motive or whatever the hell else one feels like bringing up.

You want to increase that leeway? Fine, I'm all for that. Setting aside a special set of motives that you deem to be so heinous they deserve extra-super-special penalties just because you're pretty sure it's a PC thing to do? Come on.

That's not the reason.

He knows that. Although I expect you're not addressing him, just clarifying for other readers.

 Mannahnin wrote:
Well, it would appear that the Manchester police are now attempting to collect such statistics, which will aid them in determining whether there is any sort of trend and whether members of any particular subcultures/social groups are being targeted for violence disproportionately. If so, then that's useful information for the police.

OK that's good to hear, after reading more posts on this topic I think calling crimes where the motive was to attack people because of there subcultures or alternative lifestyles a "Hate Crime" is a good thing, even if it doesn't make much a difference I can't see it introducing anything negative

to the UK.

This personally feels like a very poor way of trying to make it look like the police and trying, why don't they actuallt catch the person/people that done this.

If you attack a black person or a Jewish person then you get charged with racially aggravated assault. So what the police and the law should be doing is introducing "belief" aggravated assault.

Still seems odd that goth clothing is worthy of a beating as opposed to dismissive laughter. Any one got more info on this?

That is what makes it a hate attack.

 KalashnikovMarine wrote:
Still seems odd that goth clothing is worthy of a beating as opposed to dismissive laughter. Any one got more info on this?

Again, in my experience it was pretty common. Basically, growing up in a town like mine (post-industrial, deprived, non-cosmopolitan) and being into alternative music and clothing meant almost literally running the gauntlet. You had to earn it. Every single one of my friends was attacked multiple times for dressing in goth/metal clothes when I was around 15-16 - even girls. Not sure why. Probably boredom and the fact that goths and metallers are usually pretty pathetic specimens, sad to say. They never inspire anywhere as much fear as they think they do. Quite the opposite. If only I knew then what I know now!

 Kilkrazy wrote:
That's not the reason.

It sort of has to be, due to the inability for anyone to find another that makes any sort of sense.

 Seaward wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
That's not the reason.

It sort of has to be, due to the inability for anyone to find another that makes any sort of sense.

You are aware that this pilot scheme is a result of a set of real-world incidents and situations, as opposed to handed-down liberal dogma, aren't you? Or am I crediting you with too much?

Because if you aren't, that basically means you haven't paid attention to any of the other posters on this thread, read the article, done any research, and have basically just read the thread title and gotten yourself all upset because founding fathers etc.

 Albatross wrote:
You are aware that this pilot scheme is a result of a set of real-world incidents and situations, as opposed to handed-down liberal dogma, aren't you? Or am I crediting you with too much?

Well, you could never credit me with too much.

Your statements aren't mutually exclusive, by the way. Just because so-called "hate crimes" have occurred doesn't mean the thinking on them by the guys in this thread isn't dogmatic PC bs. Tribal beatdowns and fear of the Other have been a thing since we crawled out of the mire, and they're not going anywhere no matter how much your heart may bleed. It's why we have laws on the books to deal with people acting like idiots to each other.

Studying crime patterns and the like by the police? Fantastic, I have no problem with that. That's not ultimately what it comes down to, though.

 Seaward wrote:

 Albatross wrote:
You are aware that this pilot scheme is a result of a set of real-world incidents and situations, as opposed to handed-down liberal dogma, aren't you? Or am I crediting you with too much?

Well, you could never credit me with too much.

Your statements aren't mutually exclusive, by the way. Just because so-called "hate crimes" have occurred doesn't mean the thinking on them by the guys in this thread isn't dogmatic PC bs. Tribal beatdowns and fear of the Other have been a thing since we crawled out of the mire, and they're not going anywhere no matter how much your heart may bleed. It's why we have laws on the books to deal with people acting like idiots to each other.

Studying crime patterns and the like by the police? Fantastic, I have no problem with that. That's not ultimately what it comes down to, though.

Just a few questions, why not have certain legal protection for subcultures and alternative people? Like is there anyway that implementing this it will make the UK worse off? If not, then why not have it?

 Cheesecat wrote:
Just a few questions, why not have certain legal protection for subcultures and alternative people? Like is there anyway that implementing this it will make the UK worse off? If not, then why not have it?

Why does a member of a certain subculture deserve to have a crime committed against them less than a person who is not a member of that subculture? If you wind up paralyzing me in a beat-down because I'm black or gay or a Goth or whatever, why do you deserve a longer sentence than if you wind up paralyzing me in a beat-down because you wanted my wallet? If I were the victim in the latter circumstance, I'd want you to go away for just as long as the guy in the former.

 Seaward wrote:

 Cheesecat wrote:
Just a few questions, why not have certain legal protection for subcultures and alternative people? Like is there anyway that implementing this it will make the UK worse off? If not, then why not have it?

Why does a member of a certain subculture deserve to have a crime committed against them less than a person who is not a member of that subculture? If you wind up paralyzing me in a beat-down because I'm black or gay or a Goth or whatever, why do you deserve a longer sentence than if you wind up paralyzing me in a beat-down because you wanted my wallet? If I were the victim in the latter circumstance, I'd want you to go away for just as long as the guy in the former.

I think the idea is if there's punishment for attacking someone because of there, race, ethnicity, religion, beliefs, etc that it'll help reduce that behaviour and hopefully make for a less hateful society.

 Seaward wrote:

 Cheesecat wrote:
Just a few questions, why not have certain legal protection for subcultures and alternative people? Like is there anyway that implementing this it will make the UK worse off? If not, then why not have it?

Why does a member of a certain subculture deserve to have a crime committed against them less than a person who is not a member of that subculture? If you wind up paralyzing me in a beat-down because I'm black or gay or a Goth or whatever, why do you deserve a longer sentence than if you wind up paralyzing me in a beat-down because you wanted my wallet? If I were the victim in the latter circumstance, I'd want you to go away for just as long as the guy in the former.

Simply because judiciary punishment isn't only about punishment of the deed, but also about reinforcing social norms. And what you want is only one need that the judiciary system aims at fulfilling.

In Law school we were told that sentencing serves 3 general purpose ; discouraging actions that goes against social norms, satisfying the need for retribution of the victim and his relatives, and reinforcing (or enforcing) the respect of the judiciary system. I'm sure you could find some others to fit in there too.