This is for topical issues effecting our fair world... you can quit snickering anytime. Note: It is the desire of the leadership of SFDebris Conglomerate that all posters maintain a civil and polite bearing in this forum, regardless of how you feel about any particular issue. Violators will be turned over to Captain Janeway for experimentation.
But calling this a hate crime is really stretching the term.
Why have said category?
Because hate crimes aren't crimes targeted at individuals, they're targeted at groups. When you beat up a Jewish man and leave him bloody in the streets of Austin, it is not because he slept with your girlfriend or his dog barking next door annoyed you, you did it as a message to all the Jewish people who see him that they are unwelcome, and should expect more of the same. And if there's one thing we hate it's that demographics of society be scared into not shopping or patronizing bars.
Okay, why cannot be treated like regular crime regardless of motivation?
I'll use small words this time.
The hate crime isn't the murder, in my example, the hate crime is a separate offense. It is the racial intimidation in the statement you made. Not all murders are political statements, but some are, that's why hate crime exists.
But calling this a hate crime is really stretching the term.
Why have said category?
Because hate crimes aren't crimes targeted at individuals, they're targeted at groups. When you beat up a Jewish man and leave him bloody in the streets of Austin, it is not because he slept with your girlfriend or his dog barking next door annoyed you, you did it as a message to all the Jewish people who see him that they are unwelcome, and should expect more of the same. And if there's one thing we hate it's that demographics of society be scared into not shopping or patronizing bars.
Okay, why cannot be treated like regular crime regardless of motivation?
I'll use small words this time.
The hate crime isn't the murder, in my example, the hate crime is a separate offense. It is the racial intimidation in the statement you made. Not all murders are political statements, but some are, that's why hate crime exists.
Of course the problem is the judicial system doesn't have mind-reading technologies that allows them to determine your motivations, so per your example, you may have just killed that Jewish guy because he slept with your wife. But because the court sees you, a non-Jew, kill a Jew, they assume that your motivations were anti-semitism because they don't believe you when you say he slept with your wife. Thus, purely because the guy was of some differing ethnicity, you are given a harsher sentencing than if you killed a guy of the same ethnicity.
This whole situation is really a shame though. Soon you will probably see Chuck's videos being banned in Europe because he occasionally makes jokes and expresses opinions that are "hateful" towards certain groups.
But calling this a hate crime is really stretching the term.
Why have said category?
Because hate crimes aren't crimes targeted at individuals, they're targeted at groups. When you beat up a Jewish man and leave him bloody in the streets of Austin, it is not because he slept with your girlfriend or his dog barking next door annoyed you, you did it as a message to all the Jewish people who see him that they are unwelcome, and should expect more of the same. And if there's one thing we hate it's that demographics of society be scared into not shopping or patronizing bars.
Okay, why cannot be treated like regular crime regardless of motivation?
I'll use small words this time.
The hate crime isn't the murder, in my example, the hate crime is a separate offense. It is the racial intimidation in the statement you made. Not all murders are political statements, but some are, that's why hate crime exists.
For the sake of all organized societies i reject the legitimacy of the concept.
Being serious for just a little bit... I've seen this case -- and Germany's laws against Holocaust denial -- presented on YouTube as evidence for "the Jews controlling everything." The argument usually goes, "you know who's in charge by who you can't criticize," "there must be a reason people are not allowed to say XXX," etc.
I'm also old enough to have seen Warsaw Pact nations break apart after the authoritarian government that insisted they get along wasn't there any more; sometimes cleanly, sometimes not. When the wall came down it was like the cap coming off the bottle in Yugoslavia, and old hatreds bubbled up.
I suppose all this is just to say that I'd rather people be relatively free to say what they want, because not allowing can put the issues off for a while, but it won't solve a problem. I'd rather we get it out in the open. Think blacks are inferior? That all you want for Christmas is white genocide? Think the Holocaust was faked? Want to put a crucifix in urine? Want to burn a Koran? Think the left-handed are all sinister? Think the Earth is flat? I don't want any of that to be illegal to say or do. It's the old maxim, "I don't agree with what you say, but I'll defend to the death your right to say it."
If freedom of speech is good for us as a species, I think it would speak well of us. If it isn't, then we probably deserve the consequences anyway.
Last edited by Darth Wedgius on Fri Mar 23, 2018 4:11 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Okay, screw you Google Chrome App. Or server. I don't know which is locking up from my big reply, but I'm already cranky as hell and this makes it worse. *grumble grumble* I'll save it as a draft and post it tomorrow at home.
"No folly is more costly than the folly of intolerant idealism." - Sir Winston L. S. Churchill, Princips Britannia
Administrator of SFD, Former Spacebattles Super-Mod, Veteran Chatnik. And multiverse crossover-loving writer, of course!
Admiral X wrote:Wonder if they'll go after the Monty Python crew Ex Post Facto...
I picked up John Cleese's autobiography before Christmas. He actually discussed the problem with people taking increasing offence with everything and that he was warned away from performing at university campuses for that reason.
Both Ricky Gervais and Jonathan Pie have been wading into the argument as well. I hadn't realised that the judge presiding over this case had decided that context and intent was irrelevant.
Agent Vinod wrote:
For the sake of all organized societies i reject the legitimacy of the concept.
We have a custom about honesty, Vinod, your posts indicate you've never believed in an organized society xD
It is, of course, entirely up to you if you believe there needs to be a counterweight to philosophies that express "the existence of other peoples" is a political statement.
