The House of Representatives voted to extend hate crimes protections those who are the victims of crimes motivated by gender, gender identity, and sexual orientation. Here’s a quote from the New York Times:
By 237 to 180, the House voted to include crimes spurred by a victim’s “gender, sexual orientation or gender identity” under the hate-crime designation, which now applies to crimes spurred by the victim’s race, religion, color or national origin.
“The bill is passed,” Representative Barney Frank, a Massachusetts Democrat who is gay, announced to applause, most of it from Democrats.
Similar legislation is moving through the Senate. But even assuming that a bill emerges from the full Congress, it will face a veto by President Bush on grounds that it is “unnecessary and constitutionally questionable,” the White House said before the House vote.
The House did not pass the bill by a margin wide enough to override a veto, which requires a two-thirds majority. The Senate is not expected to do so either.
Debate over the legislation has been spirited, and while some of it has addressed whether the bill is really necessary, the arguments have also been colored by issues of conscience and notions of personal morality.
Representative Steny Hoyer of Maryland, the Democratic majority leader, said the House vote represented “a statement of what America is, a society that understands that we accept differences.” Civil rights groups have long urged that people who are attacked because of their sexuality be given additional protections.
But Dr. James C. Dobson, founder of Focus on the Family, a conservative lobbying group, told listeners to his radio program that the bill’s real purpose was “to muzzle people of faith who dare to express their moral and biblical concerns about homosexuality,” according to The Associated Press.
I have no idea what these conservative lobbying groups and right wing Christian activists are talking about. For example, I found this site, which makes the following claims.
Today, conservative groups and lawmakers warned that the measure undermines freedom of speech.
They say it could lead to arrests of Christians who speak out against homosexuality.
Conservatives also say the bill would make homosexuals more important than other Americans — because crimes against them would have harsher penalties than crimes against others.
Well folks this is false (I thought lying was in the 10 Commandments.), and it reflects a basic misunderstanding of hate crimes legislation. Hate crimes legislation does not curtail freedom of speech, so if the conservative Christian activists want to have public protests denigrating women, gays, lesbians, and transgender people, they can do so. However, if they commit a crime in the process of their “protest” and that crime is motivated by bigotry, they could get a harsher sentence. But they have to commit a crime. So they can say God hates women and gays all day long, but if they decide to go and beat up a women/gay man/lesbian/transgender person while yelling I hate bitches, fags, and dykes. The prosecutor will now have the option to take on a hate crimes charge to the assault.
It is also ridiculous to assume that this makes “homosexuals have more rights than others.” Why? Because the legislation targets all crimes motivated by gender, gender identity, or sexual orientation. Crimes against heterosexuals (and men), however rare they are, would also be covered. The identity of the perpetrator is also irrelevant. LGBT folks could commite hate crimes against other LGBT folks and be prosecuted for hate crimes, and the same could be said for men and heterosexuals.
What matters is the motivation of a crime. People will still be entitled to believe hateful things, but if they commit crimes motivated by bias, then they will have a harsher penalty.
Google “pedophilia recidivism” and it’s the first link.
The problem was more along the lines of “crashed my browser.” :-\
I also think it’s worth pointing out that the same is true of other folks we habitually disagree with here. Daran, for one.
—Myca
will shetterly Writes:
October 18th, 2007 at 8:04 am
Oh, man, I can’t say, “But they started it!”
*g*
Fair enough. Sorry about that. Apologies from Myca and Sylphhead for “lies” and “weaseling” would be nice, but not necessary. Let me try again. Sylphhead wrote, “the legal arm needs this extra weapon.” I do not think the law needs any “extra” weapons.
Everyone should be treated equally.
Well, until homosexuals are “treated equally” in society, respected equally in society, and are equally threatened by violence in society, in other words, when heterosexuals are threatened as much as we are with violence because of what their sexual orientation is, you can’t say that. We aren’t treated equally under the law in the first place. When it comes to violence the scale is tilted toward us, but for some reason you don’t want see a need for creating a balance or an equalizer, even if the equalizer just gives me the chance to say to an attacker
“THERE ARE LAWS AGAINST YOUR GAY BASHING AND HATEFUL VIOLENCE AGAINST GLBT PEOPLE AND IF YOU ATTACK ME YOU WILL PAY THE EXTRA PRICE!”
Whew! That made me feel safer just saying that! But you don’t care about that bit of discouragement I might have to stay alive with, do you, Will?
It’s not how often we agree, it’s what we agree on. I don’t really care if somebody agrees with me on 90% of issues if the remaining 10% on which we disagree are very important. Of course we don’t all have to agree on everything, but to me, if that 10% disagreement is on the best mechanism for infrastructure maintenance, that’s hella different than if that 10% disagreement is over whether people are truly human if they’re not white.
Bjartmarr:
1. Do you really mean I should prove that bank robbing laws are effective before we can discuss whether hate crime laws are effective?
1.a. Since you think extra penalties are useful, would people be less likely to rob banks if there was a “bank hatred law” that could be added to the crime?
2. I do believe ineffective laws are a waste of time, and have said as much.
3. I believe you are making your statements from faith.
Mandolin,
3. It’s because I thought my first statement said that. I didn’t realize people also wanted the “yes” or the “no.” I thought my statement only allowed for one interpretation, and if there’s only one interpretation, there’s no weaseling possible.
5. a. While I would like a radical restructuring of society, my distaste for hate crimes, thought crimes, and unequal treatment of people under the law applies to our existing society.
b. I don’t deny racism, but I look for classism first. Other people look for racism first. If classism explains everything, I don’t add extra charges. If classism does not, as in Jena 6, I agree that there’s racism at work.
6. Always glad to participate in a discussion where people are engaging in the subject!
Julie, there are already laws against beating and killing people. I will repeat my request: Where is the evidence that adding hate crime laws to the charges that already apply will make anyone safer?
I think some people are mixing the logic behind affirmative action with the logic behind hate crimes. Affirmative action helps groups that have been discriminated against. I approve of this. There is plenty of evidence that it’s effective.
But hate crime laws simply add extra penalties to things that are already crimes. No one has yet offered any evidence that those extra penalties make anyone safer.
mythago, it’s precisely because I believe everyone is human that I want all humans treated equally under the law.
Okay. Enough from me. Folks are welcome to answer, but if I don’t reply, it just means I feel I can’t rephrase the situation in any meaningful way.
Sure.
I actually don’t remember the conversation about Cheryl going quite like you describe it, Mandolin; I had recalled the issue about Cheryl running for President being that she’s kind of a jerk, not that she’s transphobic.
I think that not voting for a candidate because she’s transphobic is a perfectly reasonable position. What’s sad is that probably all the candidates for president are transphobes of one sort or another, so if you’re going to vote at all, there’s not really a non-transphobic option.
A P.S. to Bjartmarr: I don’t think I should let this go unaddressed: “The best way for you to get out of answering the above question (which, AFAIK, does not have a non-bigoted answer)”
Suggesting that anyone who disagrees with you is giving a bigoted answer is like saying anyone who does not support burning pedophiles alive must want to rape children. It’s the logic of the White House’s resident: support spying and torture, or you are on the side of the terrorists.
The question is simple: where is the evidence that hate crime laws make people safer?
And I suppose there is a related question: if you believe the most effective laws are the harshest ones, why not have the death penalty for everything that’s illegal?
Will, what Bjartmarr (and I, in passing) were asking is why your test for hate crimes requires a deterrent effect, but you’re not applying a similar test to (for example) laws against bank robbery.
If only hate crime legislation must pass this test, then Bjartmarr is right in calling your position bigoted.
Of course, feel free to prove me wrong by providing links to the doubtless many places you’ve spent time railing for effectiveness tests for laws against murder, assault, shoplifting, armed robbery, etc . . .
—Myca
Myca, I’ve already said that I’m against all ineffective and all redundant laws. I mentioned drug use and sex work as examples of behavior that should be legalized and regulated. I noted earlier a redundant penalty that I oppose: The charge for attacking a cop and for attacking anyone else should be the same.
If you struck down bank robbing laws, it would become legal to rob banks. To the best of my knowledge, there’s no redundancy at work there.
But if you struck down hate crime laws, it would still be illegal to hurt GLBT folks, as well as folks of other races, religions, etc. because ASSAULTING AND MURDERING PEOPLE IS ALREADY ILLEGAL Hate crime laws simply add an extra penalty based on the intended victim.
The question is not whether having bank robbing laws stop people from robbing banks. The question is whether the redundancy of hate crime laws help stop people from committing “hate crimes”.
Again, if you just like the idea of greater punishment based on the intended victim, say so. I disagree because I believe the law should treat everyone equally.
Well, at some point, I’m just going to have to drop out of this discussion, because I think you believe laws are a more useful way to address social problems than I do.
I think the mistake you’re making is in imagining that I think of these things in a binary, ‘either legal or illegal’ way.
There are degrees of punishment, and it’s worth asking whether a lesser punishment would have the same deterrent effect as a greater one. But, of course, you’re not asking those questions, except in one case.
The fact that you want to use an effectiveness test when it comes to hate crimes but not when it comes to other crimes (“The question is not whether having bank robbing laws stop people from robbing banks.”) says a lot about your mindset.
As I asked before, and as I’ll ask one last time . . . please show me where (if ever) you’ve spent time requiring other laws to meet the same litmus test you’re requiring hate crimes to meet.
It’s that ‘special’ test that Bjartmarr finds bigoted, and I agree.
Ah, yes. Treating everyone equally. Your law, Will, in its majestic equality, prohibits rich and poor alike from begging on the streets and sleeping under bridges.
—Myca
Okay, Myca. You’ve been ignoring a lot of what I’ve written, so it’s way past time to stop. I shall try very hard to make this my last post:
“There are degrees of punishment, and it’s worth asking whether a lesser punishment would have the same deterrent effect as a greater one. But, of course, you’re not asking those questions, except in one case.”
Read what I’ve written in this thread about cops, the drug war, and sex work laws. What you have just said is what you call a lie.
“The fact that you want to use an effectiveness test when it comes to hate crimes but not when it comes to other crimes (”The question is not whether having bank robbing laws stop people from robbing banks.”) says a lot about your mindset.”
Read what I’ve written. You brought up the bank robbing analogy, but it’s a false analogy. You refuse to acknowledge that hate crime laws are in addition to existing laws, not instead of existing laws.
“As I asked before, and as I’ll ask one last time . . . please show me where (if ever) you’ve spent time requiring other laws to meet the same litmus test you’re requiring hate crimes to meet.”
Extra penalties for cops. Drug laws. Sex crime laws. I’ve said this many times in many ways: Ineffective laws are not good laws. They are expensive. They only appeal to people who enjoy the idea that criminals are suffering.
“It’s that ’special’ test that Bjartmarr finds bigoted, and I agree.”
So everyone who does not agree with your solutions to a problem is a bigot? I wish I had realized this much sooner, because it would have saved us both a lot of time.
Out of curiosity, who do you think was the bigot, Malcolm X or Martin Luther King? They had different solutions. Or when Malcolm X became El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz and changed his views, did he stop being a bigot, or did he become one?
“Ah, yes. Treating everyone equally. Your law, Will, in its majestic equality, prohibits rich and poor alike from begging on the streets and sleeping under bridges.”
I quote Anatole France, too. But that’s not my law. I have often noted where the law fails. The drug war, for example, has a clear racial bias. Making assumptions about my views on other subjects based on my beliefs about hate crime laws only shows that you like to make assumptions.
And besides, I’m a socialist. I’m very concerned about the rich and poor. The subject in this thread is whether hate crime laws are good. I say there’s no evidence that they’re effective, and they discriminate based on the victim, so they’re bad. You say you like them, but you don’t say why they’re good.
And that’s probably as good a place to stop as any.
Will
O.K. Will said something that I’m not sure was addressed:
Someone might read a few of my books, notice that I usually have sympathetic gay characters, and decide that I am gay and should die. They might plan my death, come to my door, and shoot me when I answer it. It would be premeditated murder.
Someone else might read some of my comments, notice that I think hate crime laws are a form of thought crime laws, and decide that I am anti-gay and should die. They might plan my death, come to my door, and shoot me when I answer it. It would be premeditated murder.
In the first case, the killer would face hate crime sentencing. In the second, the killer would not. I would be just as dead. The only difference is that the sentence would be greater in the first case.
So should a hate crime statute provide special protection to one specific set of beliefs regarding sexual orientation, or should it apply equally to any crime committed on the basis of the victim’s perceived attitude towards sexual orientations?
Sure we can: everyone should be treated equally. I’ll acknowledge some need for occasional exceptions. But I don’t think homosexuality is one of them.
This is true, but sort of a non sequitur in this thread, don’t you think? Hate crimes are CRIMINAL penalties, and the criminal laws don’t discriminate against homosexuals the way that civil laws and regulations (e.g. marriage laws) do.
Hate crime legislation will do absolutely nothing to cure those civil disparities.
yes (not legally, but practically speaking)
Say it? Sure. But of course you’re not just SAYING that, you’re asking that it be backed up by the full force of the U.S. Government.
So if you mean “do we think you should be able to say that and have it be true:” No, i do not.
I’m not Will. But do I care about you? [shrug] Sure–as much or as little as anyone else I don’t know. I care about all criminal victims, and I care about all accused defendants. I heartily support many methods to reduce crimes against all (or portions) of our society, including some methods specifically targeted to reduce crimes against gay people or groups. I just don’t support this one.
You are trying to phrase the issue as “support hate crime legislation or I will be beaten up!” I resent that framing, because it’s a false choice.
There are MANY ways to provide you protection from being beaten up OTHER than hate crime legislation. It’s as invalid as if I said “either support warrantless searches or admit that you want terrorists to kill us all.”
Myca, regarding other crimes, you seem to have a core argument that if we dislike quality A about a new idea, we can’t/shouldn’t support existing structures which possess quality A.
Am I correct?
Because while that’s an interesting response, it’s also a bit of a sound bite. Explaining why it might be acceptable in certain cases to focus on deterrence, while in other cases we focus on perceived deterrence, while in other cases we focus on punitive issues, or a combination… do you seriously expect someone to explain the justification for all of the criminal code, and each and every bite with which they disagree?
In any case, it’s a bit disingeneous. We are discussing hate crime legislation, right? Not other criminal legislation.
So: what evidence is there that it actually works?
And if there’s no or limited evidence that it actually works, what basis do we have to believe it would work, rather than not work?
And in a general sense, should we support new legislation based on such a belief?
I find it exceedingly odd that some folks here don’t appear to see the difference between a new legislative act and an existing one, with years of precedent. Different mindsets, I suppose. But the simple answer to this question:
Because those two groups are disssimilar in a significant way. For example, I think it is perfectly reasonable to treat “existing legislation” and “proposed legislation” as two disparate categories. Why do you disagree?
Myca wrote:
I don’t think this is a fair test.
1) Will is only one person. It’s not reasonable to expect him to give equal time to every issue.
I do think it’s reasonable to apply this sort of analysis to society as a whole, or to huge organizations that cover an entire issue area thoroughly. Possibly it’s also a fair analysis to apply to folks who comment on issues full-time, like pundits and Senators.
But to apply this logic to critiquing ordinary individuals implies that if I want to speak out on issue “A” because it’s unfair, then I must also speak out on issues “B C D E F G H I and J” which are unfair in the same manner, or be branded a hypocrite.
2) Hate crimes are controversial in a way those other crimes are not. This means that there are two legitimate reasons Will might talk more about hate crimes than other areas. First, because they’re talked about more, they simply come up in conversation more. Second, because unlike the laws regarding different kinds of murder, robbery etc., there’s some chance that speaking out against hate laws might actually contribute to making it less likely they’ll be enacted.
I don’t agree with a lot of what Will is saying, but I think the critique you’ve set out against him here doesn’t hold water.
* * *
Will, if a well-designed study showed that hate crime laws do have a measurable deterrent effect, would that cause you to drop your opposition to hate crime laws?
Yeah, that’s probably a good point, on the one hand. It is unreasonable to say that unless you talk about X, Y, and Z, your comments on A, B, and C are worth disregarding.
On the other hand, I think that a big part (in fact the huge, majority part) of why hate crime legislation is ‘controversial’ in the first place is because of racism, sexism, and homophobia . . . so I think it gets held to standards no other law, proposed or passed (and hate crimes have been established law in the US for almost 40 years) gets held to.
I think it’s worth examining that double standard.
It’s like the folks who will rant on end about how they ‘don’t have a problem with gay people, they just wish they weren’t so blatant about it in public.’ I’m not sure it’s out of line to ask them how often they rant the same rant about straight folks kissing in public or whatever.
—Myca
Wow.
In my fifteen-odd years on the internet, I have never had someone twist my words quite that stupendously before. Congratulations, you win first prize.
RonF, thanks for bringing that up. I’m always glad to assume silence means the people arguing with me realize that I have triumphed (*g*), but I would prefer to hear, “Darn, you’re right,” or “I disagree because….”
Sailorman, much agreement. An additional question for Julie: Why would saying, ““THERE ARE LAWS AGAINST YOUR GAY BASHING AND HATEFUL VIOLENCE AGAINST GLBT PEOPLE AND IF YOU ATTACK ME YOU WILL PAY THE EXTRA PRICE!” give you any more protection than saying, ““THERE ARE LAWS AGAINST VIOLENCE AND IF YOU ATTACK ME YOU WILL PAY THE PRICE!”?
Amp, yep to “Will, if a well-designed study showed that hate crime laws do have a measurable deterrent effect, would that cause you to drop your opposition to hate crime laws?” I’m a libertarian democratic socialist. That means I balance my libertarianism with my socialism. It’s why I support seat belt laws and motorcycle helmet laws: they save lives and they save taxpayer dollars, and since the roads are paid for by the public, it’s proper for the public to set the rules.
Sailorman:
Hallelujah, you understood my question. :)
I don’t disagree that it’s reasonable to treat existing legislation and proposed legislation differently.
(The “bank robber” scenario may be confusing you a little, as it is indeed an existing law. The reason I used it was because trying to shift the focus away from laws that people disagree on (like prohibition and the death penalty) and towards laws that everybody agrees on (like bank robbery) in order to clarify that my objection wasn’t about whether Will does or does not like the law in question. I didn’t mean to imply that existing and proposed legislation must be treated the same way.)
My point is that we currently do not require that proponents of proposed legislation (of any kind) prove that it “work” in order to enact it. It might be a good idea to do so, but we don’t. Therefore, requiring that proponents of pro-minority legislation (but no-one else) prove that their laws “work”, is inherently anti-minority.
Myca, to help you understand where I’m coming from: I completely support gay marriage and have done so for as long as I can remember. Or, to be more precise, I think the state should not be marrying anyone; the state should be providing civil unions to adults of any sexual orientation. Only religious groups should marry people, and they should use their own rules of marriage without state interference. (I’m a unitarian universalist. UUs were the first church to marry GLBT folks. If, say, the Catholics want to be bigots about marriage in the Catholic church, that’s their business, so long as people are free to leave the Catholic church and marry elsewhere.)
Bjartmarr, you’re the one who wrote “The best way for you to get out of answering the above question (which, AFAIK, does not have a non-bigoted answer)…” If you didn’t mean to imply that anyone who did not answer it as you wished was a bigot, I am sorry, but that is what I inferred from your parenthetical. And, on looking at it again, it’s what still seems to be implied.
Bjartmarr, hate crime laws in the US began in 1969; see here. We’ve had them for a long, long time. But where’s the evidence that they help?
Effectiveness is one of the arguments people make when they pass laws. They may be wrong, but they consider effectiveness both when they start laws and when they end them. Note, for example, Prohibition. They tried it, it did not help, and they ended it.
I understand where you’re coming from, and it’s a position I basically share (I, too, am UU, as much as I identify with any religion). A lot of my negative reaction to your position on hate crimes has been because it’s sounded as if (for example) you were coming to the gay marriage issue and saying “I think the state should not be marrying anyone, therefore, I oppose gay marriage.”
I share the principle, but the fact is that the state does marry people, and to apply the ‘the state should not be marrying anyone’ principle to just this one situation and not the vast majority of cases is homophobic.
Similarly, on hate crimes, there are a number of principles which would make hate crimes unworkable, if they were applied across the board . . . but they’re not applied across the board. Across the board, deterrent effect has never been the litmus test for criminal law.
That’s my problem.
—Myca
Myca, I like consistency. If the state is going to call the legal joining of adults “marriage,” yes, every adult should be able to marry freely. The reason I think it makes more sense to call what the state does “civil union” in every case (whether hetero unions, GLBT unions, or unions no one has imagined yet) is that increases the separation of church and state: the state gives civil unions; the church marries. Practically speaking, they are very different: the state’s union is purely about legal status. Separating the functions gives religious bigots less to argue about, and that’s always a good thing.
But with gay marriage, I would be content with either solution: everyone can “marry” freely under the state, or everyone can freely get “civil unions” under the state. The point in either case is full equality under the law.
As for the assumptions you’ve been making, well, that’s just because you’ve been making assumptions.
And you did notice my recent citation of Prohibition as being a very famous law that was repealed because it did not work? Effectiveness does matter.
There have been recent controversies in the Chicago area over the last couple of years where the hate crime legislation that we have appears to be prosecuted asymmetrically. No, I don’t have cites, nor the time to dig them up, so treat this as anecdotal.
There are statutes on the books in Illinois which state that any crime where racial animus is a contributing factor is a hate crime. It quite properly defines racism as a scalar quantity, not a vector one; it doesn’t matter whether either the criminal or the victim is black or white. There were a couple of cases where a black perpetrator committed a crime against a white victim and various witnesses stated that the black perpetrator said things before and during the crime that showed racial hatred towards whites. However, the Chicago police and the prosecutors would not charge and prosecute it as a hate crime. These instances made the front page of the Chicago Tribune, and no satisfactory explanation was ever given by either the cops or the D.A.
So when I read the comment that Will made that I quoted, it piqued my interest. If a couple of gay guys beat up a straight guy on Halstead Street (a little versimilitude for the locals) and during the act one of them said “Damn breeder!”, would that be a hate crime under what you propose?
Is it proper to create hate crime legislation that creates a specific protected class? One that would make it a hate crime for a white man to beat up a black man while screaming “Damn n—-r”, but would not apply to a black man beating up a white man while yelling “Damn c—–r”? It seems to me that comments like Julie’s lean in that direction, although I don’t know if she meant to go that far.
And, would it be Constitutional?
Because to my mind, it is neither proper nor Constitutional for there to be laws making “HATEFUL VIOLENCE AGAINST GLBT PEOPLE” especially illegal, unless the laws equally protect straight people against hateful violence from GLBT people. The fact that the incidence of the latter may well be less than the former is immaterial, as that simply means that the penalties will be assessed in the proportion to which the problem occurs. It’s not a zero sum; all violence against GLBT people that can be shown to be based on animus towards their sexual orientation or practices would still fall under the coverage of the law regardless of how much such violence occurs against straight people.
Oh, and when it’s proposed that “GAY BASHING” be illegal, I hope that what’s meant is some form of physical violence; we’re not talking about a restriction on free speech here, are we?
All I can say at this point is that any citizens that are more susceptible to attack, like GLBT people and police officers, should have an extra protection or discouragement thereof. It’s pretty obvious to me people care more about police officers than they do GLBT people in that both groups are more susceptible to attack, and it’s because people don’t really care. If your folks here that are against us having hate crimes laws that make it tougher on those that want to attack us, and I also consider any want for bringing violence to a certain group to be premeditated, fine, you just don’t care about GLBT people, I can accept that reality.
Julie, I’ll number these so they’ll be harder to skip:
1. You keep saying “protection,” but you haven’t offered any evidence that hate crime laws provide any. Wouldn’t you like to know whether “protection” is effective?
2. Since you like extra penalties for attacks on cops and GLBT people, are you satisfied with the current levels of extra penalties?
3. Do you think cops and GLBT folks should have the same additional laws, or should one group get more additional laws than the other? If so, which?
4. How many hierarchies do you want in the ways that the law values people?
Author: will shetterly
Comment:
Julie, I’ll number these so they’ll be harder to skip:
1. You keep saying “protection,” but you haven’t offered any evidence
that hate crime laws provide any. Wouldn’t you like to know whether
“protection” is effective?
Julie Z: And why is it so darned important to know that right now. We need it now, and you want to stand around speculating about whether it works or not while many are dying or being put in hospitals. Thanks for the help!
2. Since you like extra penalties for attacks on cops and GLBT people,
are you satisfied with the current levels of extra penalties?
Julie Z: Hell, I don’t care if they just CALL IT “extra penalties,” anything will help right now. You try living your life in “fear times ten” and we’ll see how much more extra penalties YOU want?
3. Do you think cops and GLBT folks should have the same additional
laws, or should one group get more additional laws than the other? If so,
which?
Julie Z: I think that because the police are even more of a target for being killed and because of their putting their lives at risk for your hide and mine that the penalty should be stiffer for killing a cop than a transwoman like myself.
4. How many hierarchies do you want in the ways that the law values
people?
Julie Z: It’s all about other groups having special or extra that bothers you, isn’t it, Will? Tell me something, Will, who is it that’s shooting at you and targeting you for violence? It sure ain’t no gay basher, KKK dude, a Nazi bigot, or a Bible thrasher, and for the cops, every gang banger and murderer on the street.
Oh well, after all, it’s not your problem, crack open a beer and turn on the tube, it’s football Sunday, it’s a wonderful life!
You seem to be resting on the same issue that people have recently addressed here. But In my opinion, it’s perfectly valid to have a “topic of dicussion” (hate crime laws) without being required to discuss every other related topic (other laws.)
Anti minority?
How the heck do I know which laws out of all laws I’d oppose and which I wouldn’t, seeing as we’re not talking about them? How do you get off on a claim that the defining thread of the laws which I (or anyone) like/dislike is minority status, especially since most people have given a variety of reasons OTHER than “we dislike minorities” to support their views against hate crimes?
Comment 218 isn’t fair in my opinion. But you are getting fairly close to suggesting that any dislike of hate crime laws is inherently anti-gay. And that’s simply ridiculous.
Perhaps I’m misreading you. Would you like to clarify your position a bit? Because if you plan to claim that I can’t disagree with you regarding hate crimes without being anti-minority, it’d be good to get that out in the open.
Are you incapable of seeing the pretty important difference between police officers and other people?
Just to name three differences out of many, police officers 1) occupying their status as volunteers; 2) are state agents; 3) are saddled with greater responsibilities to others than is the average citizen. We don’t give cops special protection because they’re better than “normal” people (feel free to become a police officer if you want those benefits). We give cops protection because we want people to be police officers.
Fuck you. Really. Fuck you.
Because unless I’m mistaken, you just accused me of “not caring” about a group of people who I DO care about, and who includes some of my closest family members and good friends.
Aaaand, you made that accusation just because you’re not able to convince me that you’re right about a topic on which reasonable people often disagree. Which… I don’t give a shit of you’re gay or not, but that is WAY over the line. SO fuck off.
Julie.
1. You do realize you just made Bush’s argument for the war on terror? Don’t worry about whether it’s effective. Don’t worry about whether it weakens individual freedom. Just do it, or you’re evil!
Oops. Just realized that might be a very weak argument with you. Do you support Bush’s War on Civil Liberties, er, Terrorism?
2.Well, when we couldn’t get fire insurance because the word was out that the Klan would burn down our home, I lived in a great deal of fear. But I don’t believe extra penalties for attacking or killing people who worked for civil rights would’ve made any of us safer.
And what I always admired about people like Quentin Crisp was that they didn’t let themselves live in “fear times ten.” Once you start thinking that way, you can never be “too safe.” You just get more afraid, and soon you’re living inside gated communities and fearing everyone who’s not just like you. (I don’t know if there are any GLBT gated communities, but it’s the next logical step for Log Cabin Republicans and other GLBT folk who are ruled by fear and can afford to buy a home.)
3. Do you want different levels of “protection” within the GLBT community? I could see an argument that society is least accepting of Ts, then Gs, then Ls, and then Bs, and the law should reflect that hierarchy. Would that make you feel safer?
4. Actually, it was the KKK that put the word out they would burn us down. They never showed up, but we still couldn’t get fire insurance, and I still remember the phoned-in death threats and Dad showing me how to carry the shotgun to him if he needed it.
I have been beaten and called a faggot, but the exact expression of it was “hippie-faggot,” if I remember correctly. Still, being beaten and not knowing whether you’ll be killed isn’t fun.
A teacher made me sit out recess in the hot sun because I told her I didn’t know who made the earth and I didn’t care. Not much of a psychological scar created by a Bible thumper, but the fact I remember it says it’s a small one.
Cops have made me nervous ever since my hippie days. There are some great cops out there, but the police can create problems for anyone who questions authority. When I was arrested for having hash in the car entering the US, a federal offense, my first thought was that it was planted, but it turned out to have been lost by a previous passenger.
Gang bangers are scary to everyone, even or especially other gang bangers. That’s why they act and dress that way. I’ve often lived and walked in neighborhoods where there are gang bangers. I’m always extra-cautious around them, because people who believe in assault and theft frighten anyone with a brain.
Also, is it football Sunday? I’ve never been much for team sports.
Sailorman, over the line. Actually, most of your post is over the line, but I’m copying out this bit. Dial down before you post again on this thread.
That is so condescending, Will.
Julie writes:
You know, as I said much earlier in this thread, I’m borderline on the hate crimes question myself. I wrote:
Plus, as I mentioned in comment #88, hate crime laws as they’re currently written raise some concerns about due process.
Admittedly, I don’t outright oppose hate crimes legislation, but I come close.
But I don’t think that my reasons for (almost) opposing hate crime laws are founded in bigotry; nor do I think that opposition to ineffective criminal laws, or worries about new laws bringing about new abuses by the system, are necessarily just pretexts for bigotry. I think these are legitimate concerns.
Mandolin, sorry if it sounds that way, but it’s true. He’s been one of my heroes for most of my adult life.
I know that fear can be impossible to live with. I have enormous sympathy for people who live in fear. One of the reasons I hate war and capitalism is they create enormous stress, and PTSDs are horrible, horrible things.
But fear can make people call for terrible solutions, too. If we let fear rule us, the Bushes of the world win.
Of course it is. And I don’t want to discuss every other law here: that would be ridiculous.
Er…well, I guess you would read them and think about them and then decide your opinion of them. I don’t see what this has to do with anything we’ve been discussing.
It’s not about what you like. It’s about what you require to be proven as a prerequisite to enaction.
Er. No, actually, I’m not.
There are plenty of reasons why a reasonable person could oppose enacting hate crime laws. However, “because the proponents haven’t proven that they work” is not one of them. Unless, of course, we habitually apply that same test to all laws, which is fine…but, as a society, we don’t.
It’s kinda like how Bush will say, “Border fence? Okay. Abstinence-only sex ed? Sure! Global warming legislation? Well…you guys haven’t PROVEN that it works; I can’t support it.” (And no, I’m not saying that anyone here is “like Bush”.)
It’s tempting to interpret my objection as an assertion that we shouldn’t take laws’ effectiveness into account when deciding if we like them or not. But that’s not it at all: it’s about whether proof is required, not about what we do once we have the proof.
I think I’ve been clear to the point of ridiculousness here. I’m not sure how I can make it any clearer. It seems a very obvious, uncontroversial concept, and I am truly at a loss as to how to simplify it any further. I will ask you to go back to the paragraph that starts with, “There are plenty of reasons…” and make sure that you understand what I’m saying, and that I’m not saying that we should enact laws that we know to be ineffective. Because if you don’t understand (not necessarily agree with, but understand) that point, then I can see how everything I’ve said would just be a whole mess of confusing for you.
Bjartmarr, maybe you’re behind in reading: I’ve mentioned Prohibition several times. It’s only the most famous example of a law that was ended because it was not effective.
And Bush is having trouble getting his big fence because of the question of effectiveness. “Abstinance-only” appears to be going down in flames at last. Why? Effectiveness. It may not matter as much as you or I would wish, but it matters.
Laws about drinking and premarital sex are not effective because an awful lot of people enjoy drinking and screwing outside of marriage. (Sometimes at the same time.) Unless you are saying that people enjoy committing ‘hate crimes’ as much as they enjoy those things, I don’t get the ‘effectiveness’ argument.
Amp, I’m also not seeing your argument that hate crimes are probably unnecessary. The example of burning a pile of trash on the lawn has already been given. If I spraypaint “Die blogger” on your car, that’s, what? Vandalism?
The point of hate-crime laws is that there are acts whose intent is not simply to do something already criminal (such as steal money); they’re to harm and intimidate people we don’t like, because we perceive they belong to a group we despise. The KKK didn’t just burn crosses to threaten the particular black family on whose lawn they burned it.
mythago, apologies if I’m not following your point. Do I remember correctly that you’re Canadian? Then you might not know about the US experiment with Prohibition. The US laws about drinking and premarital sex have become much, much looser over time because the old laws were not efficient.
The Hillside Strangler terrorized everyone in Los Angeles. Serial killers often intend to terrorize everyone. Should criminals who terrorize everyone face greater sentences than criminals who only target a smaller group?
will, I’m not Canadian, but I’m still wondering why you think people are as attracted to hate crimes as they are to drinking.
Should criminals who terrorize everyone face greater sentences than criminals who only target a smaller group?
False dilemma. But you knew that.
mythago, I’m afraid I’m not parsing your first question. I was only pointing to drinking laws as examples of laws that were changed because they weren’t effective. Several people claimed laws aren’t judged by their effectiveness. While they may not be judged by effectiveness as often as I wish, laws are judged by effectiveness. Sometimes they’re repealed, and sometimes they stay on the books but fall into disuse.
And as for what you say is a “false dilemma,” if a crime should have an extra penalty because it is intended to terrorize people in a particular group, shouldn’t a crime have at least an equal penalty when it is intended to terrorize everyone?
You’re strenuously avoiding looking at why particular laws aren’t effective.
if a crime should have an extra penalty because it is intended to terrorize people in a particular group, shouldn’t a crime have at least an equal penalty when it is intended to terrorize everyone?
So a hate group that intended to terrorize every black person in America should have a worse penalty than the Hillside Strangler, since he only terrorized the population of Los Angeles?
mythago, no strain, it’s easy! (*g*) But I still don’t see where you want to go with the effectiveness thing. Really, just point me to a study that concludes hate crime laws reduce the number of hate crimes, and if the methodology seems sound, my opposition to them will disappear.
Can you think of a hate crime intended to terrorize every black in America? All the hate crimes I can think of have been regional. Though it’s true that people outside of a region get to worry that the criminals will travel.
mythago, no strain, it’s easy! (*g*)
Glad to hear it. I’d be happy to continue the discussion when you’re interested in arguing in good faith, instead of pretending ignorance whenever an inconvenient point is raised.
mythago, I am trying to argue in good faith. I feel like I’m a unitarian talking to a trinitarian, and the trinitarian is saying, “But God’s tripartite nature is clear in the Bible!” and I’m saying “Where?” and the trinitarian is saying, “It’s clear! Tripartite nature! Won’t you argue in good faith?”
And the little *g* was meant to say that it seems like the trinitarian is now saying, “You’re strenuously avoiding recognizing God’s tripartite nature!” And I’m still going, “But where is it in the Bible? I honestly don’t see it, so tell me where you do.”
All I want is some evidence that since hate crime laws were enacted in 1969, they’ve made anyone safer.
Willie: All I want is some evidence that since hate crime laws were enacted in 1969, they’ve made anyone safer.
Wow! You are full of false delemmas, bad analogies, and circular arguments. You’re a real pro at it, Willie. Just remember one thing, and that is that you are not the one in danger of attack because of what and who you are. Therefore, anything that “might’ help us be safer is better than nothing at all. Since the only people that would be punished by a hate crime law are those that attack people for their race, sexual orientation, or like in my case, their gender ID, why are you so damned against it? Will the law make YOU any less safe?
Even if the law is a feel good law it’s better than nothing as well. If you have something against any comfort the law may give us then you are only showing us that you could really care less about our worries or our safety.
So when you see the day when gay men or GLBT people in general going out to beat up and murder heterosexuals then you can come talk to me, but until that day comes you will lose the argument or any of your circular debates that are ridiculous to say the least. We have to worry about being attacked for our sexuality, you don’t. That is the difference and that is the reason for needed hate crimes laws. If another bastard murders another one of my transgender girlfriends I want the creep to feel the extra sting in his ass when he hears “twenty five” more years added to his sentence. And if you don’t like that, tough beans, Willie! I like it fine!
Just heard the news, the hate crimes bill was ditched until next time, but we will be back in full force after we get rid of the saddle waxer we have for a so called president at this time. The right wing presidential debates have made it obvious that they think this country is a theocracy, but they will find out that Bush’s and KKKarl Rove’s tricks won’t be working so well for them this go around.
Mandolin Writes:
October 20th, 2007 at 9:09 am
Aaaand, you made that accusation just because you’re not able to convince me that you’re right about a topic on which reasonable people often disagree. Which… I don’t give a shit of you’re gay or not, but that is WAY over the line. SO fuck off.
Sailorman, over the line. Actually, most of your post is over the line, but I’m copying out this bit. Dial down before you post again on this thread.
He just had to show me how he hasn’t the knowledge to debate correctly without initiating direct insult, which brings his knowledge in other areas into question.