# why is it that African Americans never seem to be charged with hate crimes? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [April 26, 2012, 12:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-it-that-african-americans-never-seem-to-be-charged-with-hate-crimes/620002 "2012-04-26T12:10:15Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 5\ **Page:** 8
**Author:** ![Farmer\_Jane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Farmer\_Jane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Farmer_Jane)\ **Post date:** [May 14, 2012, 12:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-it-that-african-americans-never-seem-to-be-charged-with-hate-crimes/620002/141 "2012-05-14T00:29:43Z")
> [@Kobal2](#): > > I see what you mean, but I don’t think they’re getting a free pass based on their ethnicity. I don’t know if it’s a ‘free pass’ so much as it is a ‘we don’t give a f—’. In states where hate crime laws have been enacted, should prison gang members get harsher sentences when they commit race-motivated crimes? Or for being a part of a certain race gang? I mean, you can be in jail, do something stupid and then get more time tacked on, right? > [@](#): > > It’s just that the facts that gangs \*are \*for the most part segregated along ethnic lines (mainly because the neighbourhoods they hail from are) ; and gang violence can erupt for a whole slew of reasons, makes it hard to determine whether a given action was racially motivated, or simply gang identity motivated, or “business”, or something else. I think the ‘hate crimes’ determination can be pretty subjective. I can really hate someone and then call them the n word while I’m punching them in the face, but it’s possible I punched them in the face because they made me angry for cutting ahead of me in line or something. But if the ‘n-word’ is caught on tape, someone may mistake that punch as racially motivated. I have seen kids get beat up for being part of the wrong ‘crew’ at school, and said ‘crew’ was race-based. One of my students gets picked on for being white (well, light-skinned - he’s half Puerto Rican but is pale as a sheet). Actually, a couple do. I’ve also noticed that teachers get angry at the words ‘beaner’ and ‘nigger’ not the term ‘whitewashed’ or ‘cracker’. My new boss (white, female) would definitely send a kid home if they called a black person the n-word, but no one has been sent home for calling anyone a cracker or saying they’re going to ‘beat that white boy’s ass’. Ironically, most of the staff where I work is ethno-centric and insensitive to race issues. They’ve just been conditioned that the n-word is _the worst thing ever_. When you start questioning people’s motives, it gets more and more subjective. Sure, it’s part of the police’s job to question motives, but how do we really know that xyz crime occurred just because abc person doesn’t like blacks/whites/gays/women/etc.? The burden of proof has to be strict. Sometimes it’s very obvious. Matthew Shepard’s case was obvious.\* Treyvon Martin’s case isn’t as obvious (er, well…depends who you ask). Also, imho of course, I think it deepens racial tensions. The OP posted about a crime that occurred with a black mayor in charge, and there was also discussion of Black Panthers and the Obama administration and etc. The Youtube videos of violent mobs and voter intimidation is disturbing. So it’s very easy to say, “Well, of course you don’t think so, you’re _black_!” or “You have white privilege!” or \_\_\_\_\_\_. I really don’t think that many people care about black on black crime or black v. Hispanic crime or whathaveyou. I don’t think people care if a Vietnamese gang beats up a Latino kid. They’re thugs anyway, right? But when a white person is involved - be they the victim or the perpetrator - I think people care. And that really, really sucks. \*To me. The MS case was a defining moment in my growing-up years. ---
**Author:** ![Farmer\_Jane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Farmer\_Jane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Farmer_Jane)\ **Post date:** [May 14, 2012, 12:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-it-that-african-americans-never-seem-to-be-charged-with-hate-crimes/620002/142 "2012-05-14T00:31:18Z")
> [@Ibn\_Warraq](#): > > To a certain extent, but the Aryan Brotherhood is also allied with the Mexican Mafia(La Eme) against other Hispanic gangs. Sure, but that’s not how they started (that I know of). > [@](#): > > In fact, since you mentioned the Bloods and the Crips, it’s worth noting that many of the members of both gangs are Latinos. I know. That’s why I was kind of excluding them. > [@](#): > > Real life is far more complicated than the movie _Colors_. I’ve never seen it. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [May 14, 2012, 12:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-it-that-african-americans-never-seem-to-be-charged-with-hate-crimes/620002/143 "2012-05-14T00:49:05Z")
I don’t know about the specific statutes involved here, but the original conception of a hate crime has to do with the fact that a particular crime was intended to have the effect of intimidating an entire race of people in an effort to dissuade them from exercise their constitutional rights and living freely in society, not just the one person who was victimized. That’s why in 1965, a white person burning a cross on the lawn of a black family in rural Alabama would have been a hate crime, but not vice versa. Simply showing that racism was somehow implicated somewhere in the course the crime shouldn’t be enough. ---
**Author:** ![Chen019](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f19dbf/32.png) [@Chen019](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chen019)\ **Post date:** [May 14, 2012, 4:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-it-that-african-americans-never-seem-to-be-charged-with-hate-crimes/620002/144 "2012-05-14T04:52:45Z")
> [@Oldeb](#): > > Can you not find a real case? [Cause this isn’t one.](http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/2010/07/14/the-new-black-panther-party-is-the-new-acorn0.html) > > [Seriously](http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=128647537).[Despite what Fox](http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0710/39861.html) [tells you this](http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/243545/yes-black-panther-case-small-potatoes-abigail-thernstrom#) [was not a big deal.](http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/07/25/ftn/main6711575.shtml) > > The “whistleblower” for this story was J. Christian Adams, a W. Bush political appointee and GOP activist Bartle Bull was a civil rights attoney and he said it was the most blatant example of voter intimidation he’d ever seen. There are numerous examples of black hate crimes being downplayed or ignored in the media. And I think it comes back in part to the explanation I gave above. Blacks are seen as societal victims of white oppression, so aren’t given moral agency to be judged by the same standards as whites. ---
**Author:** ![Oldeb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/ea666f/32.png) [@Oldeb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oldeb)\ **Post date:** [May 14, 2012, 5:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-it-that-african-americans-never-seem-to-be-charged-with-hate-crimes/620002/145 "2012-05-14T05:42:40Z")
> [@Chen019](#): > > Bartle Bull was a civil rights attoney and he said it was the most blatant example of voter intimidation he’d ever seen. [Media Matters on Bartle’s Bull.](http://mediamatters.org/blog/201007080022) Would you care to point out what’s incorrect in that link or any of the previous six cites I’ve provided on this case? > [@](#): > > There are numerous examples of black hate crimes being downplayed or ignored in the media. And yet the best you can do is one lone New Black Panther Party member who wasn’t even charged. In 2010 there were [6,628 criminal incidents](http://www.fbi.gov/news/pressrel/press-releases/fbi-releases-2010-hate-crime-statistics)classified as hate crimes. That’s just over 18 per day. Very, very few of those received national coverage. Of those that did most received little attention from the general public. Do you have any evidence that there was a statistical bias in under-reporting hate crimes committed by Blacks versus those committed by others? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-it-that-african-americans-never-seem-to-be-charged-with-hate-crimes/620002.md?page=7)