HATE CRIMES --- HATE SPEECH
Or, should we say ..... "Thought Crimes."
Neal Boortz
November 11, 1997
One of the newest buzz phrases for the liberal intelligencia of late has been "hate crimes." On November 19, 1997 Bill Clinton addressed the issue, saying that we needed to expand federal authority in the area, particularly in relationship to hate crimes against gays and handicapped people.
Yes, once again, the man who told us that "the era of big government is over" calling for yet more Federal involvement in our lives .... and, in this case, in our very thought processes.
If there is a problem here crying for a federal solution, let us first try to determine just what the problem is. What is a hate crime? How does a hate crime differ from a regular ordinary, run-of-the-mill every day crime? If a person is killed in a hate crime is he more or less dead than someone simply killed for their money or car? Does the family of the person killed in a carjacking take comfort in the fact that at least it wasn't a hate crime? Is the person who kills out of hate or prejudice any more dangerous to our society than a simple predator who kills for drugs or to get someone else's property?
There is one thing that differentiates a regular crime from a hate crime. That would be the state of mind of the person committing a crime. In other words . the thought processes of the person committing the crime.
The crime is in the action taken against a person or property, not the "why" behind the action.
Face it .... what we are seeing here is a codification of political correctness.
Let's change the verbiage a bit. We're not really talking about hate crimes here. We're talking about thought crimes. In the minds of the proponents of hate crime legislation, a random act of violence against an individual takes on increased seriousness if certain thought processes are involved. If the thought process are not politically acceptable, It becomes a hate crime. We have a thought crime piggybacking on a crime against a person or property. A person is being punished, or is having the punishment increased, depending on what they were thinking.
A big problem with hate crime laws is that they create different classes of victims. If someone attacks me because they want my car, and I'm murdered, the punishment may be less and the category of crime would be different than if someone attacks a gay man and murders him because they don't like gay men. In both cases, murder committed, man dead. But my murder is somehow less egregious than the murder of the homosexual. Somehow, and I hope you'll excuse me for this insensitivity, but I just don't see it that way.
In a society where equal protection under the law is supposed to be the noble standard, there is no room to create different classes of victims. Hate crime legislation places a different government-assigned value on the life, liberty and property rights of people based on their color, religion, sexual orientation, national origin physical ability or whatever.
Clinton says "All Americans deserve protection from hate."
What? Do we suddenly have another right here? The right to be protected from hate? Let's add this to the right to a job, the right to a living wage, the right to a condo, the right to breast implants and the right to a satisfying sex life.
It is so nice to know that I now have the right not to be hated, and that Bill Clinton is ready to bring the full force of the Imperial Federal Government of the United States to bear on anyone who dares to dislike me. After all, I "deserve" it. The next time someone says they hate me, what should I do? Should I swear out a warrant? Is it a federal crime, or just a local ordinance? How will the person be punished? Can I sue them? What if someone just says they hate my show? Do I deserve to be protected from that?
Let's try to get just a bit serious here. Hating me is not a violation of my rights. I have no right to be loved. I have no right to be liked. I have not right not to be hated. It is not the role of the federal government to keep me from being hated .. Or to protect me from hate. It is the role of government to seek to apprehend and prosecute those who deprive me of life, liberty or property, whether it's out of hate or just a desire for my stuff. The offender should be prosecuted for the crime they have committed. (Followed by, in all probability, a slap on the wrist and a few minutes of community service.) What they happen to think about me is absolutely beside the point.
Remember, too . in the midst of all of this discussion on hate crimes . there seems to be a new definition of "hate" coming from the left. We are used to hearing a lot about hate crimes. Now we add the category of "hate speech."
Clinton has used this "hate speech" phrase quite a bit, particularly in reference to people who are critical of his Presidency. Clinton, of course, is particularly upset with talk radio. (I take that as a point of pride.) Talk radio is an element of the media that is not permeated with left-wing extremists suffering from obsessive-compulsive-compassion disorder. . Clinton as much as blamed talk radio for the failure of his grand government takeover of health care. The new word, then, for talk radio is ... Hate Radio!
Listen to liberals who are under fire from the right. Instead of responding in a logical and rational manner to the criticisms that are being brought, they talk about "hate speech."
It is easy why they chose to hide behind this "hate speech" nonsense. How convenient .. Someone criticizes you or a program you support. You are faced with the task of responding to the criticism. Responding might require an exercise in logic .. something liberals are particularly bad at. So, if valid points are brought up --- points that you don't particularly want to deal with, just brand the comments as "hate speech" and proudly proclaim your determination not to respond. How noble and wonderfully sensitive it sounds "I won't dignify that hate speech with a response."
We are coming to the point where any conservative principal or statement is simply dismissed, both by the liberals and their dog washers in the media, as being hate speech. Once you've called it hate, you no longer have to deal with it. It is all too simple.
With the big push in Washington to deal with "hate crimes," and Clinton's pronouncement that all Americans deserved to be protected from hate .. How long is it before dissent to the Washington Status quo will, in and of itself, become a crime?
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Now ... go ahead and print this out and share it with your friends. Send it by e-mail all over the internet ...to elected officials and porn stars .. anybody. Just be sure you tell em where you got it. From Neal Boortz at boortz.com.
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