You seem to be having a difficult time understanding why the community feels
more threatened by some types of cime than by others, and why it wishes to
exercise a greater caution in protecting itself from the mindless hatred of
virulent racists.
Of course the community feels more threatened by some types of crimes than others. That's why there are already sentencing ranges and enhancements in place which do NOT depend on trying to punish the general thoughts of a person, but only punish the specific thoughts relevant to the particular victim and crime.
Frankly, I don't see much difference between a racist and a sociopath. Or if I do, the racist is generally less dangerous because he or she is more likely to be deterred by the threat of punishment.
There was a man in, as I recall, San Francisco a few years ago who targeted lawyers. Killed a number of them before being caught. I don't see any protection in your hate crimes legislation protection lawyers. Or celebrities, who are often targets of violence. You are proposing to select certain groups for protection from hate, but leaving other victims of crimes of hate totally unprotected. That may be PC thinking, but it's not, IMO, right thinking. If a person targets his victim because they hate the victim because he or she is black, or is old, or is female, or is a lawyer, or is a postal worker, or is an ex boss, or is a business competitor, I do not believe it is justice to make some of those victims more valuable and others less valuable because of certain attributes of the victim.
What you don't seem to understand is that in this country we don't punish people for what they think, but for what they do. It's different in China, for example, where mere membership in the Falun Gong, for example, is punishable. That's the direction hate crime legislation would be taking us -- mere membership in, say, the KKK would become first an offense enhancement, but eventually would become a punishable offense in itself. There are already some advocates of exactly that approach. While you haven't yet gone that far yourself, I am disappointed to see you supporting the theory that supports that attempt. |
