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A crime against a member of a protected group is not prosecuted as a hate crime if it is commited for other reasons, even if, as you say, the perpetrator does hate that group.
That's my point. The assessment of "hate" lies in the specific crime commited, so why can that only apply to specific groups?
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Originally Posted by nvxplorer
No there isn't a fine line. John Wayne Gasey and a KKK member act on very different motivations.
I don't want to get caught up in the specifics of the example. The broader point is about the possibility of pretty much any group being hated. If there are no members of that group that are victimized for it, then it's an irrelevant discussion, but why preclude anyone from the possibility of being a member of a hated group?
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Nobody is precluded from being the victim of a hate crime. If somebody killed someone because they were white, I would think if I were the prosecutor, I'd charge them with a hate crime. Everybody has a race. It's not like white is some natural and special state of being, although too many people act and talk as though it is.
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Originally Posted by Rggr
That's my point. The assessment of "hate" lies in the specific crime commited, so why can that only apply to specific groups?
I don't want to get caught up in the specifics of the example. The broader point is about the possibility of pretty much any group being hated. If there are no members of that group that are victimized for it, then it's an irrelevant discussion, but why preclude anyone from the possibility of being a member of a hated group?
"Equal Justice Under the Law" is a fine statement of a ideal judicial system but through out our history and in many parts of the country, this statement is FALSE. Until the 1960s it was false for black Americans especially in the South. Even today that old South rises again in places like Jena Louisiana. Remember Ruben Hurricane Carter? He didn't get a fair trial and he lived less than 20 miles from New York City. A majority of Latinos consider this statement to be a joke and do not trust our police, lawyers and courts. There are someplaces gays might get a fair hearing but there are far to many places where they know they won't. Sometimes even Whites get a little dose of this judicial misfireing. O.J. was was glad this statement was false when that jury bought the fact that the bloody glove didn't fit.
That's my point. The assessment of "hate" lies in the specific crime commited, so why can that only apply to specific groups?
It can apply to anyone the law deems necessarry to protect.
Quote:
I don't want to get caught up in the specifics of the example. The broader point is about the possibility of pretty much any group being hated. If there are no members of that group that are victimized for it, then it's an irrelevant discussion, but why preclude anyone from the possibility of being a member of a hated group?
The only preclusion is societal, not legal. Everyone is protected in several ways: Race, color, religion and now sexual orientation.
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