My views on 'hate crime' as an enhancing status in sentencing.

The law normally has a low tolerance for the notion that someone can use a 'provoked' defense to an assault charge. Words spoken by the victim whether they involved a proposition for sex or not, are not normally a valid defense to a criminal charge Why not just say 'No thanks, get lost!'

You can't punch someone who calls you a liar either, even though it is likely true that if they had not called you a liar, they would not have been punched. We expect more self restraint in the face of 'provocation'

 

Well 'restraint' is a subjective word isn't it. I'd tell the homo to get lost, but there are others whose tolerance is lower, and would act instinctively. They might well regret it afterwards, but two wrongs don't make a right. If I remember rightly there's a law against unwanted interference when in the course of one's business called 'importuning', and if it's still on the legislature (and in these loony days of over-the-top PC, I'll be surprised if it is) then the homosexual should also be prosecuted for infringing it.

 

LOL. No it is not illegal to proposition someone for sex under normal circumstances. Men have a very long history of propositioning people for sex, and women are much more likely to since the 1960's. If someone's 'instinct' is to swing on someone who asked them for a date or for sex, then they need to be charged and convicted - every time.

 

I think you're missing my point, which is the difference between a male propositioning a female for sex, and a male propositioning another male for sex? Excuse me I've gotta run to the bathroom!

 

I am missing a point that does not exist. You have two parties. One is asking for consensual sex. The other is responding with a yes or a no or a maybe. The question is normally legal (assuming legal age of consent) regardless of gender, or orientation and all those answers are equally legal regardless of gender or orientation ( assuming legal age of consent) Under no jurisdiction is a fist in the face a legal reply.

 

How do they have more rights? White people are also protected by hate crime laws - but it doesn't mean hate crime laws aren't stupid.

 

Swing on someone?

 

Well thank God for that! I honestly didn't know what you were going to tell me there. Although I would have been truly shocked if you had said that it only protected certain races etc. It seems like it is poor terminology from Wikipedia - "group" to me refers to a certain race or religion. What you quote above are what I would call "social categories."

 

This all stems for a hypothetical offered in post #23 that suggests if words ( an unwelcome homosexual proposition) precipitate a violent act ( a punch) , then the blame for punch moves from the man who swings to the man who speaks. So far I have discussed crime of bias ( read hate crime) as a non-precedent setting legal concept and I still hope to write a defense of 'crime of bias' inclusion or hate crime inclusion under aggravating factors for sentencing so that at least you can see this from a broader view than an anti-pc framework. At least that it is not an unreasonable effort at dealing with a serious law and public order enforcement problem. There is good public policy objectives behind this idea. My goal is not to convert, but to move the needle a little

 

Yeah it was just your 50 year old terminolgy that threw me! To "swing on someone!" Translation to current colloquial equivalent: To "HIT on someone!" But I'm sure you knew this!

Actually I was never seeing it from an anti-PC framework. Just an anti-LOGIC framework.

Unreasonable? More like unnecessary and unfair. Unfair to the victims and victim families who don't get equal justice to other people even though the circumstances are identical to another case, the only difference being that they were not victimised because they belonged to a certain social group.

I'm sure that you remember saying that over in the baker thread! I don't think the needle moved a great deal did it? Oh well, it may be different this time around.

 

Those laws should be tried in the Supreme Court. They also commit racial and gender discrimination as well.

 

Because when they told you that they just wanted equal rights, they were lying.

 

It's an issue of Orwellian mind-reading. Somehow it's "worse" if you murder someone because of their race than it is because you hate people in general.

That's not at all coherent.

You can't legislate against what thoughts a person has in the commission of a violent crime. You legislate against the act and punish according to the act. We already do this - equally.

This is basically thought crimes legislation.

 

Before I do any more work. I need to know if there is a philosophical barrier to this notion of aggravating facters or enhanced penalities to which I referred earlier.

Here is the list for reference.

• Premeditation
• Poisoning
• Murder of a child
• Murder of a police officer,[47][48] judge, firefighter or witness to a crime[49]
• Murder of a pregnant woman[50]
• Crime committed for pay or other reward, such as contract killing[51]
• Exceptional brutality or cruelty
• Methods which are dangerous to the public,[52] e.g. explosion, arson, shooting in a crowd etc.[53]
• Murder for a political cause[47][54]
• Murder committed in order to conceal another crime or facilitate its commission.[55]
• Hate crimes, which occur when a perpetrator targets a victim because of his or her perceived membership in a certain social group.

So which of these are problematic by the same standard you are applying to the last? When I read the phrase 'belonged to a certain social group' that sure sounds like code for 'PC' if I ever heard any. Its not like there is not that same sense that some victims are more important than others, and some crimes more worthy of special mention on this list already. if Hate crimes is the ONLY one that troubles you, then you might reexamine if your standard is less philosophically rigid that you are portraying.

 

Read the thread. Nothing new in ascertaining and proving what criminals were thinking in deciding what crime to charge them with and how to sentence. The whole concept of establishing an intent or motive in court to their criminal conduct is literally centuries old. The law is full of instances in which what you thought and what you felt is relevant to how you are treated. The difference between an accidental shooting and a murder turns a relatively minor 'thoughtless crime', into a very major 'thought crime'. Same bullet hits the same body organ and the victim is just as dead, but attorneys spend a lot of time proving what the accused was thinking that day and the days prior.

 

In the case of a homophobic assault, for example, both parties could be white? What point are you making exactly?

 

You really are fixated on the affects of this bias crime stuff on the inalienable right of homophobes to gay-bash guys who come on to them. this is a small sliver of cases that hate crime status encompasses.

 

Actually, most of them! I hadn't paid any attention to them before now because I was focusing on hate crime. The list is ridiculous and most of it I wasn't aware of.

How is it any different to the below quote from Wikipedia? Did the Wikipedia article sound like "code for PC" to you?

Enhanced sentencing for killing judges, emergency service workers and witnesses would certainly suggest otherwise.

 

No, in the case of a black supremacist hate attack on a white guy. The black guy should get no more sentencing than a white guy who killed a black guy in order to steal his wallet.

 

Its a solid reply that does show patterns of reasoning. It is not easy to pigeon hole or subject to a cliché . I retract the charge of 'anti-pc'. Your skepticism is broader.

 

Can you rephrase?

 

I submitted it as an example of principle, not how ****ing commonplace it is.

 

Sorry but I don't want to get into unlikely hypotheses, and 'exceptions to rules' in the case of zillion-to-one possible scenarios. I write posts on a messageboard, not theses.

 

Sure but you realise that the black supremacist would be charged under hate crime laws don't you?

 

I can't be bothered to analyse it.