Sorry Gadarene, your math is erronious.
There are more white people than blacks, so more should be killed. But they should also be killed mostly by whites, by the same ratio. Thus the correct comparison is whites-killed-by-blacks to blacks-killed-by-whites.
Think about it.
No one seems to have addressed my idea that all crimes are, at a basic level, hate crimes. Was the assassination of RFK any less a hate crime than the assassination of MLK, Jr.? Wasn’t the assassination of RFK an act of intimidation towards uppity, rich white people?
Perhaps I’m a little slow, but, while I agree that motives matter, I still think a murder is a murder is a murder, and was caused by hate.
As far as vandalism goes, if it is an act of intimidation against a particular group, couldn’t gangs be brought up under hate crime legislation? Clearly their ‘tags’ are meant to intimidate non-members of the gang, and to mark territory.
Intimidation: What about street ‘preachers’ who hang out outside haunted houses on Halloween, handing out Chick comics, yelling about sin, fire, brimstone, etc.?
Okay. All else being equal (which it obviously isn’t), if there are eight times as many white people than black, then eight times as many white people should be the victims of homicide. All else being equal, too, white-on-black homicide should be eight times more common than black-on-black homicide. To the extent that this is what you’re saying, I agree wholeheartedly–leaving out the aforementioned socioeconomic noise.
But comparing white-on-black and black-on-white simply isn’t correct, because the proportions are unequal. If you want to see whether black people kill white people out of proportion to their own population, you compare black-on-black and black-on-white. If you want to see whether white people kill black people disproportionately, you look at white-on-white and white-on-black. At no point that I can see can you directly compare white-on-black and black-on-white without adjusting for differences in population size.
If Polecat had been talking ratios, I’d be more inclined to accept his argument. He wasn’t, though; he says that blacks kill whites more than whites kill blacks, “even though whites outnumber blacks.” That shouldn’t be even though; that should be because.
More blacks kill whites than do whites kill blacks because there are more whites to kill, period. In the same way, more whites kill whites than blacks kill blacks. Comparing black-on-white and white-on-black in the way that Polecat does leads to specious reasoning.
Rawk, thats because hate crimes have absolutely nothing to do with hate. I think that the terrorism though, instead of elevating a crimes punishment should be a seperate crime.
Getting in on this one late in the game, but …
As I understand hate crimes legislation, Jodi, it’s all about enhancing penalties for existing crimes. For instance, here is a link to the hate crimes bill that will be debated by the Texas Senate this spring. http://www.capitol.state.tx.us/tlo/77r/billtext/SB00087I.HTM
That’s a bit of a stretch of the “intimidation” rationale, I think. There is an important difference in intimidative effect between the message “I hate everyone else!” and “I hate Elbonians!” Also note that in your street preacher example, his conduct is pure speech–no underlying crime, no enhanced sentence via a hate crimes act.
And yes, most (not all) crimes are motivated by some form of hate. But not all kinds of hate are equal. Are you really contending that a killer/vandal/burglar motivated by hate of a specific, unique individual is equally as harmful to society as one motivated by hatred of an entire class of people? Isn’t the latter a lot more likely to repeat the crime?
Yes, I’m aware that the ‘preacher’ analogy is a bit weak. Just trying to find out where the line is drawn between speech/intimidation.
Minty: It seems to me that general xenophobic acts (the tagging of territory) are just as intimidating as specific exclusionary acts, such as a cross-burning in a predominantly black neighborhood or spraypainting swastikas or what have you.
I think that any time people don’t respect other people as simple human beings, it’s a problem for society, regardless of if an individual or group is regarded as subhuman. I’m not even going to try to ‘quantify’ hate and its harm to society at large. Seems like a mighty, mighty slippery slope to be heading towards.
(Warning: Devil’s advocate approaching) Do we then, having quantified hate, further graduate the levels of harm in terms of which groups are the most oppressed? “Hmmm, the latest polls seem to show that Elbonians are not nearly as oppressed as Mesopotamians. Increase the penalty for a crime against Mesopotamians, bring the Lugians down a notch, and put the Elbonians on top.”
This is a very simple math issue, and I urge you again to think it through. Considering the possibility that you will not do this, I’ll give you an example:
Suppose a country has 1,000,000 people in it - 900,000 whites and 100,000 blacks. Let’s further suppose that, for each of these groups, 1 murder is committed for every 1,000 people. If all murder victims were evenly distributed by race, what would be the result?
The 900,000 whites would commit 900 murders. Of these, 9/10 of the victims, or 810, will be white. 1/10, or 90, will be black. Remember this number. Whites killing blacks; 90.
The 100,000 blacks will kill 100 people. Of these, 9/10, or 90, will be white. 1/10, or 10, will be black. Blacks killing whites; 90.
IOW, the numbers of blacks killing whites can be compared to the number of whites killing blacks without regard to the relative size of the two groups. LonesomePolecat threw in the fact that “whites outnumber blacks 8 or 9 to 1”, and it was equally meaningless when he did it. It shouldn’t be “even though” or “because” whites outnumber blacks - this fact is simply irrelevent.
All of the above should not be construed as an endorsement of the LonesomePolecat method of determining racially biased crimes. Actually, as pldennison promptly pointed out, most crimes are not racially motivated, even when perpetrated on members of a different race. To use the example given above, if blacks perpetrated murders at double the rate of whites, or one per 500, they would kill 180 whites (and 20 blacks) even if the murders continued to be evenly distributed by race. (In general, the assumption that crimes could be assumed to be evenly distributed by race of victim is not a valid one. Most victims will be of the same race as the perpetrator, for practical reasons. This would have to be accounted for, and would make the conclusions more tentative). But it is true that the fact that more violent crime is perpetrated by blacks on whites in this country than by whites on blacks is not merely a result of the difference in population, as you suggested.
Izzy: I got hung up on the “even though.” I think you made it clearer; thanks.
(See? It’s posts like these that make you a non-ad hominem conservative!)
Hate crimes are there to stem organized hate group’s activities. The Supreme Court has ruled that First Amendment concerning speech and conduct does not extend to violence, so the arguments about ‘thought crime’ are irrelevant. The courts have consistently ruled that motives of thought inherent in hate crimes do not violate free speech. You cannot direct someone to assault, shoot or kill another, and when one acts upon it, claim free speech. When violence is committed, particularly murder, all factors leading up to it, including the mindset fo the murderer, can and are considered.
This distinction appears specious. The intent to intimidate is exactly the same. The effects are exactly the same. Why should this superficial distinction be recognized by the law?
First of all, thanks to Gadarene for restarting my heart after I’d seen Polecat’s quote attributed to me.
Jodi I understand your position. However, what you are suggesting would take legislative action anyhow. My understanding of the process is that we (in essence) hire (elect) our legislators to enact legislation, which would include enacting laws about criminal behavior and the appropriate range of sentences. We then hire (elect) our prosecutors to enforce the laws, with the police force backing them {investigation services, etc). We also hire (elect) our judicial branch, in part, to interpret the laws and to make decisions on punishment after conviction under the guidelines of the legislation looking at both extenuating and mitigating factors.
So, it seems to me to be a more practical solution to specify a different crime for such behavior, rather than making the law for say “destruction of property” range from 0 - 20 years. Your scenario leaves the ‘enforcement’ aspect of this legislation up to one person - the judge. Whereas if we enact specific legislation, then many more people are involved - the police must first see that there is hate motivation, the prosecutor then must agree that is was a motivator, the jury had to believe too. To me, this would make it less likely to be a single person’s vendetta or quirk.
The motive in a crime is often a crucial element in the prosecution. Murder for hire for example, is often considered more seriously. Arson for profit is another example.
I also object to the statement that all crime is in essence ‘hate crime’. Not true (from my experience of working with convicted felons). Other motives include: Money, specific animosity, revenge, boredom, drug addiction, greed, and a whole host of others. While much attention here has been focused on the physical attacks, much of the actual criminal behavior has been more of the ‘intimidation’ factor (burning of crosses on some one’s lawn for example), where it is much more clear that the intent is to cause fear.
My point was that this distinction already is recognized by law. AFAIK, a person who calls for the murder of all Blacks or Jews is protected by freedom of expression protections. What you are doing is protecting this when it is only speech, but not protecting the same thing when it is a byproduct of a crime.
I firmly disagree. Hell, some crimes you don’t even have to know you’re commiting the crime. An example is vehicular homicide. You’re out driving drunk and kill someone that you didn’t even see. Where’s the hate there?
Even murder need not, and often is not, motivated by hate. Greed and fear are two other common motivators.
Sua
Two things:
First, with respect to Mr. Maeglin (;)) and the others, I don’t think this “intimidation of others” argument is particularly good or necessary. The implication is that a hate crime shouldn’t be prosecuted as one if the beating, etc., isn’t publicized. If others don’t know of the crime, they can’t be intimidated, right? I prefer the simple concept that our society believes that crime motivated by racial/sexual/ethnic hatred is particularly heinous and deserves a greater punishment.
We do this all the time - we look at motivation all the time, and we have decided as a society that certain mindsets are deserving of more punishment.
Second, intimidation speech loses it protected status as it goes from the general to the individual, and from the hypothetical to the actual. So if you hate all black men, but you beat up this one black man, the free speech protection is trumped by the “clear and present danger” (to use one formulation) your idea represents when it is put into practice.
Jodi re-reading your posts, I don’t think we disagree. I would be equally content with group hatred being considered an exacerbating factor in the penalty phase as a hate crime being considered a separate crime.
Sua
SuaSponte,
With regard to your first point - I agree with you about the free speech aspects of it. But I would disagree with using it as a justification for a new category of crime. I think racial hatred may be more heinous than some other motivations and less heinous than others. I don’t see why there needs to be a special category of heinous crime singled out by law for this particular motivation. Maeglin had brought a new perspective to the debate (for me, at least) and I was responding to this.
I’m not sure I understand your second point at all, in the context of my posts. The whole point of the Maeglin rationale is that you are being punished extra for the intimidation of members of the same ethnic group who were not direct victims. With regards to them, the intimidation is both general and hypothetical. Are your words to be taken as an adjunct to your first point, in which you disputed this rationale entirely? If this is the case, we are talking past each other.
Yeah, it should be taken in adjunct, and I agree we are probably talking past each other. Once thing that confused me in your post I was responding to was that I wasn’t sure which example of mine you were talking about.
And I’m starting to agree that hate crimes shouldn’t be considered separate crimes, but instead an exacerbating factor, kinda like if you commit a crime while carrying a gun (even if you don’t use it), they tack on a couple of years to the sentence.
Sua
Not if the call is made in such circumstances as would tend to incite listeners to an immediate breach of the peace. You can say “All blacks should be killed off.” You cannot say, while pointing, “That n----- over there, HANG HIM!”
The fact that a person does not succeed in murdering another because he has poor aim or no skill with poisons does not completely vitiate his offense. Whether or not the crime is publicized enough to cause a certain threshhold of damage os only marginally relevant. If a murder happened in your community, I don’t think it would take a rampant press to disseminate the information that the black victim was draped in the confederate flag and was chewing on his own testicles.
I also agree that crimes motivated by racial/sexual/ethnic hatred are more heinous by definition. But this argument is simply not good enough for many people, especially those with the mistaken belief that their hatred is protected even after the commission of a crime. This makes social harm argument necessary.
MR
The fact that a person does not suceed in murdering another because he has poor aim or no skill with poisons does not completely vitiate his offense. Whether or not the crime is publicized enough to cause a certain threshhold of damage os only marginally relevant. If a murder happened in your community, I don’t think it would take a rampant press to disseminate the information that the black victim was draped in the confederate flag and was chewing on his own testicles.
I also agree that crimes motivated by racial/sexual/ethnic hatred are more heinous by definition. But this argument is simply not good enough for many people, especially those with the mistaken belief that their hatred is protected even after the commission of a crime. This makes social harm argument necessary.
MR
Again, are we saying that legal double standards are desirable?
No one disagrees that motive is part of the sentence (when it can be determined BARD). Hate speech might be part of that motive. I don’t have a problem with that…that is, moving it from involuntary manslaugter to murder one or something. But to make a whole new crime out of motive is, to me, flat-out wrong.
Again, is it illegal to say what it would be illegal to do? I think we’ve greyed on this area as a nation and it disappoints me greatly. There are unfortunately cases which are still deemed constitutional to ban expression.
There isn’t a good reason to allow hate speech all on its own, I agree, but there is even less of a reason ( a negative reason, if you will, less than none :)) to disallow it. These sort of clarifications eat away at constitutionality.
[aside]I find it amusing that the slippery slope argument takes a beating when its used to stop new regulation(gun threads, for example), but not when its used as “Well we already do something like it anyway? Why not continue down the slide!”
Let this thread be a lesson to all: the slippery slope is everywhere 
Don’t be too quick to dismiss a slippery slope argument…[/aside]