re: #230 torrentprime

I’m going to share the pro-hate crimes party line on this one. I have to preface it with saying that I’m not totally sold on it yet, but it needs to be shared.

One of the offered justifications for hate crimes law is that the effect - the actual crime is different.
The two scenarios are different: When a white man is attacked and beaten up, the absence of group bias means the crime could have been caused by the “normal” reasons for assault: alcohol, money/robbery, personal beef, etc. When 2 black men are beaten up in a white neighborhood but hood-wearing men, a message is sent (and this is where the word terrorism comes in) that [minority] isn’t welcome or safe. A gay man getting beaten up by a crowd of men screaming “faggot!” doesn’t have the same effect on a community that a non-bias crime does.

(Don’t jump me too much; just sharing the arguments I’ve heard)

I hear you. But it’s wishful thinking, and (imho) like most race/creed/etc. based device, the cure is worse than the disease.

So let’s say my black friend was beaten up by 2 white guys, as you say. The fact that the 2 white guys get an extra ___ years in prison isn’t going to diminish the terrorizing effect of the crime. If it would, we should just convert all sentences into their current ‘hate crime’ maxima and then we’d deter all sorts of crime, not just those that qualify for hate.

The terrorizing effect is only lessened when the penalty seems severe enough to deter future instances of the crime. Which is sort of the point of all crime penalties…isn’t it?