Outrage Over House Passage of Gay Hate Crimes Provision

Is being legislated here. Acts of terrorism against a particular group of people should be persecuted as acts of terrorism against the United States. The only way you can honestly convict someone of a hate crime is if they admit it was based on sexual orientation or color of the victims skin etc etc. People use insulting words when they're angry. It doesn't mean that the insults were the motive of the crime perpetrated.

The point at the end very subtly but in a insightful if untintentional way, answers the question the OP begs.

First, it's a red herring. Free Speech is not endangered by this, because it's crime that puts the crime in " hate crimes ". Without some criminal activity, the activity is not a hate crime .

This distinction intimates the point of the hate crime. What ever you do illegally, if the intent is to single out a ethnic or racial group (or whatever object of hate is topical), it is also a hate crime. This should not attempt to be an inclusive category, for reasons some bring up about equal protection.

That does not change the fact that were their not hate motivations in society ( racism or what have you) any crime done because of these motivations would not have happened. This is actually a preventative law , compared to many.

Interesting to me, is that they bring up the Freedom of Religion (red herring) because they want to continue to rationalize their hate speech (which is not a crime, unless they advocate violent overthrow of government I guess) against various groups not yet specially protected by law or convetion.

If I bit the red herring bait I might be concerned because I would fear crossing that line complaining about religion . I do not have that fear, since I do nothing criminal along with my "hate speech". Actually, I already get this label frequently, and my target is already "protected" groups. This would be a different story if I was also commiting a crime.

There is a difference between attacking someone out of jealousy or a drug deal gone wrong and attacking a homosexual because he is homosexual. When you attack a black person because he is black, you are attempting to incite fear into a group of people instead of just attacking one person.

Similarly, when someone drags a gay guy behind his truck because he is gay, he is attempting to drive fear into the hearts of homosexuals. This cannot be allowed.

That is why there is a difference between a typical crime and a hate crime (I don't like the phrase hate crime, I think we need to come up with a better phrase). A typical crime affects several people yes, but hate crimes attempt to incite fear into a large group or community. There really is a difference.

If a black guy killed a white guy and pronounced that he did it to strike fear into the hearts of all whites, I'd have no problem charging him with a hate crime.

"This also sets us on a slippery slope toward serious infringements of the freedom of speech and freedom of religion ."

Only if your religion teaches that you should run up to someone on the street whom you perceive as "effeminate," beat him up and scrawl the word "faggot" on his chest. Or if your religion teaches that you should toss a molotov cocktail through the window of the local synagogue and spraypaint some swastikas on it's walls. Or that you should grab a black man and lynch him, and burn a cross on his lawn.

If you are not engaging in hatefulness against groups of people, then you are in no danger from hate crimes legislation. Since Jesus commanded us to love one another, I cannot imagine how hate crimes legislation could possibly infringe upon religious freedoms.