Box Turtle Bulletin

I don’t see any reason gay men can’t commit anti-gay crimes, so why not lesbians?

Priya Lynn

I can’t imagine why anyone would think its impossible for lesbians to be anti-gay or gays to be anti-lesbian and committ an assault on that basis.

Erin

My thing with hate crimes is, it should be about motive. That was the way I always understood it. Animus toward a certain group can be a unique motive. Whether or not those crimes should carry more severe penalties than other serious assault charges, is something about which I’m not completely sure how I feel. The need for federal legislation came about because in many jurisdictions, police, prosecutors, and judges would downplay the seriousness of assaults and ignore their true motive because they too experienced bias toward the victims. There should be a more serious charge for someone who targets someone because they belong to a certain group than if someone loses their cool from a circumstantial provocation, who wouldn’t have otherwise attacked the victim in question. We already differentiated between certain kinds of motives in violent crimes. I see no reason we can’t add animus to the list of criminal motives.

In this case, from the info given, there’s simply no evidence of this kind of motive. The victim claiming the suspects shouted slurs is not good enough evidence. It’s possible the attackers had no way of knowing his sexual orientation or they knew but shouted slurs as the most hateful thing they could think to say in their anger. I disagree with the commentator in the article who said this case shows a problem with hate crimes as a class of criminal motive.

Hyhybt

It feels almost staged.

WMDKitty

This isn’t passing the smell test.

If true, however, yeah, that’s one sticky wicket. (And I’m not at all sure which side I’d come down on, though I do think that these women should be held fully responsible for assault and battery EITHER WAY.)

Andrew

I’ve said it a million times here – hate crimes laws are unnecessary, unconstitutional, and an intrusion on everyone’s freedom to think for themselves.

Assault is assault. This is ridiculous. A court is now going to have to parse what their motivations were when they beat this guy? It doesn’t fking well matter. They beat him. And if it had been a Puerto Rican dude, or a Latvian dude, or a woman in a wheelchair… or someone who looked just like them, they’d have used whatever terminology fit the occasion.

Because violent speech is as often a by-product of the assault rather than the precursor for it. Someone assaulting you wants to hurt you, and they’re happy to do it with their mouth while they’re doing it with their fist. I’ve seen people who don’t really care about gayness use it as a bludgeon not because they hate gay people, but because they knew it would get under the target’s skin. This is not what hate crimes laws were intended to address — those were crimes intended to instill fear in an entire community that is not being served (for reasons of local bias) by local law enforcement. All of which is a stretch, and which I suspect doesn’t work out the way it’s intended to.

I’m not prepared to lose my right to freedom of speech and freedom of thought so that we can try to feel like we’ve somehow solved the problems in our society. This doesn’t solve anything.

MsRowena

Did someone let a libertarian in the room? We all know what sell-outs they are, lol! I smell a libertarian. You know it takes weeks for that odor to fade……..

Priya Lynn

Andrew said “Iâ€™ve said it a million times here â€“ hate crimes laws are unnecessary, unconstitutional, and an intrusion on everyoneâ€™s freedom to think for themselves.”.

And I’ve pointed out a million times why you’re completely out to lunch.

Samiimas

It’s a hate crime. If they’d beaten up a fellow lesbian because they hated lesbians it’d also be a hate crime. A self-hate crime, but a hate crime.

Jim Hlavac

Oh, Andrew here is not out to lunch. He’s very right. If I’m beaten up because I’m a gay man it’s a “hate crime” and if I’m beaten up for being a European-heritage man it is not a “hate crime.” If I’m beaten up for being a perceived hetero white man, well, I don’t stand a chance of extra protection, nor the perps extra punishment. But I’m still beaten up. What do I care the motives of those beating me up? And why is my gayness more important than my ethnic or racial heritage? If I’m walking down the street with my hetero brother, and we’re both assaulted together, then the attackers are committing a “hate crime” against me, but not my brother? I’m more special for some reason? The perps deserving of more punishment for beating me than beating my brother?

Equality before the law is the goal, not some are more special than others. What’s even stranger, with these hate crime laws, is that white men can be charged with a hate crime for beating up a black man, but a black man can’t be charged with a hate crime for beating up a white man — even if racial difference is the motive. And hetero men can be charged with a hate crime for beating up a gay man, but it seems that gay men can’t be charged with a hate crime for beating up a straight man. Stranger too, if I’m beaten up and the perps don’t yell “fag” or something, then no hate crime is committed, but I’m just as beaten up as if the word was screamed repeatedly -and so the perp gets 1 year in jail for not saying “gay” but two years if he does?

Equality doesn’t allow for some to get extra special protections, and we’re all about equality, right? And that’s supposed to be whether we’re Libertarian or socialist or whatever, right? And maybe, as a few here said, there’s a smell to Libertarians, then under their own logic, should I expect their support for extra protections, and you all get extra punishment for beating me up as a Libertarian?

Palmer

The original purpose of hate crime enhancements was to bring punishment of the offenders back into line with what was normally considered a just sentence. All too often judges and juries would either convict bashers and murderers of lesser crimes or minimize the sentence imposed. By adding the charge of a bias crime additional time would be added to imposed sentence.

Priya Lynn

Jim, hate crime laws don’t give anyone special protections, it protects all equally. Hate crime laws protect the gay community if a gay is assaulted for being gay and in the exact same way protect the heterosexual community if a heterosexual is assaulted for being heterosexual – everyone is protected in exactly the same way.

Timothy Kincaid

Hate crimes laws apply to everyone equally. Just like marriage laws. Nominally but not in reality.

They never were intended to.

The purpose was, setting aside my cynical notions about pandering, was to elevate things like cross-burning from arson to something bigger. I don’t think they are effective and find them at heart to be the antithesis of what the constitution seeks to provide.

They are but one more bad policy that I oppose generally but end up saying “if you are going to have this stupid law, yes among the categories of protection you have to include orientation.”

I do however support hate crimes tracking.

Priya Lynn

Jim said “Whatâ€™s even stranger, with these hate crime laws, is that white men can be charged with a hate crime for beating up a black man, but a black man canâ€™t be charged with a hate crime for beating up a white man”.

That is false. You need to educate yourself about hate crime laws. A black man most certainly can be charged under hate crime laws for beating up a white man if he did because the victim was white – works exactly the same way in reverse.

Regan DuCasse

Everyone, everyone please: every single time this issue comes up, the most IMPORTANT factor keeps getting ignored time and time again over the emotional aspects of the crime itself.
The results of violence, injury to the victim and the perpetrators have a different definition when it comes to THEIR VALUE worthy of JUSTICE.

Have you noticed how few crimes committed against gays and lesbians receive the SAME JUSTICE as a crime of similar result and intent?
The very people who claim gay people are a diminished and unworthy group, ALSO feel that are deserving of diminished justice after the fact.

Or more severe punishment because they are more suspect than other victims OR perpetrators.
Have you not seen how low the sentences used to be for those who perpetrated a crime against a gay person, and how HIGH the sentences are for gay people convicted of crimes?

On some comment threads generated by anti gay articles, it would be easy to see what kinds of JURORS the usual posters would make. That is to say, their hate and bias against gay people as well as that of a judge, weakens the integrity of fair JUSTICE after the fact, regardless of the motive for the CRIME.

The reason why the Matt Shepard case was watched so carefully, was to see if the jury and judges would come to a reasonable and fair conclusion.
Because usually they DON’T.

Because these people involved in this case are ALL gay, it’s actually more reasonable to conclude that this situation was about heightened hostility towards a person perceived as WEAK, not just gay. Which is actually the value of a typical victim as easy prey.
Similar to how GANGS operate, the hate crime enhancement might not be necessary here if it’s understood by the judge AND jury exactly what the motive was.
Had women who weren’t lesbians ganged up on a man, who wasn’t gay, it would be ordinary assault and battery.
Since anti gay slurs were involved in this assault, it’s definition as a hate crime applies and that’s the only reason why.

The hate crime enhancement is still very necessary because anti gay sentiment colors the judgement of law enforcement officers, judges, juries and investigators, NOT just perpetrators.
Look at how the case of Lawrence King is discussed. In the court of public opinion HE is more guilty of causing his own murder, than his killer is. LK is less sympathetic than his killer. In ANY OTHER crime, how can such a response be so reversed?
In WHAT other universe does the victim of FIRST DEGREE MURDER get so little sympathy except because they are gay?
Since when is a perpetrator the victim in any other crime scenario that doesn’t involve a gay person?

THAT is ONE difference between any other assault or murder victim. Gays get less sympathy, therefore, the enhancement of hate crimes laws is to assure they DO get the same sympathy and proper justice for the same crime result.
Because of that, and how hard justice does come down on lesbians, there won’t be any sympathy for THEM. And whatever they can throw at them and make stick, they will.

Eric in Oakland

One thing that everyone should keep in mind about true hate crimes is that the entire community is victimized. The specific target is incidental, because they would have attacked anyone in the hated group. It is a type of terrorism that is designed to strike fear into the target demographic. Consider the lynchings and cross burnings once common in the south. A single incident may have physically harmed only one person, but the main purpose was to strike fear into the hearts of the entire minority community and sympathizers.

Zach

If motive/intent should not be a consideration when it comes to the severity of sentencing for a crime, I wonder whether all these anti hate crime laws folks spend the rest of their time arguing for the repeal of laws that establish different degrees of murder.

Erin

Big thumbs up to the last three comments, although I think, just like any other crime, there should be good evidence not just of guilt but of the nature of the crime. I don’t think the victim saying he heard slurs should be good enough evidence, unless of course the perps admitted they for some reason targeted for being gay and no other reason or witnesses saw that there was so prior confrontation between attacker and victim, but they heard slurs. What I’m seeing here is that there is not enough evidence to show the criminal intent fits a hate crime. So no Andrew, this is not a case that proves your point, and your point ignores the arguments of myself, Regan, Eric, and Zach about criminal motive, bias in law enforcement and the justice system, and hate crimes as a forum of terrorism targeting historically hated and disenfranchised groups. I agree with the existence of hate crime as a classification of criminal motive, but I believe that motive should be proved with the same level of scrutiny in the court of law, that other crime degrees and motive establishments get.

fannie

The newspaper’s framing of this incident seems to be trying too hard to contort this incident into a “can a gay person commit a hate crime against another gay person?” narrative.

But, from the article:

“[The attorney for the women] said the alleged victim was the aggressor and used racial slurs: ‘He provoked them.'”

Without knowing additional details, the question asked seems like it could have also been, “Can a white[?] man commit a hate crime against black women?”

Timothy Kincaid

fannie,

Unless speech is now a hate crime, then your question is irrelevant.

In theory, hate crimes are physical crimes that include group-based negative comments, not the comments themselves. Otherwise they would be violation of constitutionally protected free speech.

Perhaps this was a hate crime against the man because of his race. Because if the assault was race-motivated, as their defense claims, then it works both ways. That is what supporters of hate crimes assure us.

If there was racial tension, then the black women may have committed a race-based hate crime against a white man. Which would be unique; I don’t think I’ve seen that prosecuted before.

andrew

Priya, I’m delighted that we can now shorthand our disagrements :)

My assumption is that there is someone like you to argue the opposite side, thank goodness.

I believe what I believe, but I also know that this is a grey world, not black and white, and I’m grateful that many approaches come down somewhere inbetween.

So: I’ll keep agitating my point of view, and please please please continue to make your case. Hopefully someone smarter than either one of us will figure out the best way forward.

As to the rest – I offer the following caution. You trade a little piece of free speech when you criminalize thought, one of many forces eroding that freedom. You can punish crimes for the assaults they are. You can’t get your freedom of speech back.

Oh, and Rowena, why don’t you go soak your head until you have something worth contributing? The only stink is someone with nothing to say but nastiness. (enjoyin’ my freedom of speech stylin there heheh)

Ryan

Andrew, we have *always* had to “parse what their motivations were” when assault occurs. That’s why prosecutors charge people with First Degree murder, manslaughter, second degree battery, etc on down the line. No speech is being criminalized. No thoughts are being criminalized. We pay attention to motives when violent crimes occur because we’re trying to assess the threat the perpetrator poses to society. If I shoot my neighbor because he slept with my boyfriend, that’s a crime of passion and I’m less likely to do that again. If I shoot my neighbor because he’s a Jew/Christian/African American etc, that’s a Hate Crime subject to stronger penalties because I am a greater threat to society.

@Jim Hlavac, you’re flailing around creating confusion where none needs to exist. You appear to have bought the GOP line on Hate Crimes hook, line, and sinker. If you and your straight brother are beat up on the street, the perpetrator will not get punished more for beating you simply because you happen to be gay. There’s literally nothing in Hate Crime legislation that says minorities are “more special” than others and that crimes against them are punished more severely automatically. And as Priya Lynn pointed, out *of course* a black man can be charged with a hate crime for assaulting a white person. You are raging against legislation that flat-out doesn’t exist. Please stop watching Fox News and listening to Limbaugh. They’re lying to you. Next you’ll be talking about pastors getting arrested for saying homosexuality is a sin.

Adam

The principles here seem straightforward:

1) Of course gay people can perpetrate anti-gay hate crimes. To hold otherwise is to deny the obvious reality of self-hate; and

2) The social harm at which hate crime legislation is aimed is intimidation and marginalistion of a protected group. That is a different crime to the assault visited upon the particular individual in question, and it ought to be tried and punished as a different crime.

As to the facts of this particular case, though, it’s difficult to tell because the motivations of the women aren’t uncontestedly apparent. It’s not per se a hate crime if you beat up a member of a minority: you need to have as your object the intimidation or marginalisation of the members of that minority.

Erin

Ryan answered quite well for what I was going to say to Andrew. No one’s thoughts or speech are being punished. The violent crime is being punished. Thoughts can’t be proven. Speech can serve as evidence of motive, as it does for all kinds of other non-hate crime cases. Your points about criminalizing thought and speech are fallacies.

andrew

Ryan, Adam, and Erin I hear that argument, but it does not apply the way you suggest.

“Degree of criminality” is predicated on intent. That is, did the person intend to commmit the crime at hand. Because we know that “hitting someone with your car by accident” and “intentionally lying in wait and then driving over them” are two entirely different things – they speak to the degree to which the person was responsible for their actions. It is in that context that we include self-defense, insanity, and the degrees (manslaughter, 2nd degree, 1st degree, willful indifference)… but they speak to the SPECIFIC act and the ability of that person to commit the ack KNOWINGLY.

What you’re talking about is criminalizing MOTIVATION.

Irrelevent to the act, if the MOTIVATION is subject to government approval, then, ergo, merely having that opinion becomes criminal.

Now you’re out of the realm of the specific act and well into situations that could have NOTHING to do with the act itself. The mere holding of an idea or an opinion – even if it cannot be proven to be directly related to the crime in question – now subject the defendant to increased punishment.

Let’s create a scenario:

I have posted something on a fictitious website that constitutes suspect language – something about illegal immigration, gender equality, sexuality, or something else.

Later, I’m in a bar. Two people spill their drink on me, and I assault both. One has a characteristic that is related to my posting, while the other does not.

I am now charged with a hate crime in one assault, but no hate crime in the other.

That does two things – it means that the identity of the victim suddenly puts them in a position to receive more favorable redress with the government than someone else who does not share their identity. I hit two people in a bar fight, but only one of those is a felony, while the other is a misdemeanor. That’s a violation of the right to equal protection of one of the victims.

It’s also the criminalization of my imaginary posting on the fictitious website which was a totally separate act, and which may have had no relation to the assault. And that’s an erosion of my First Amendment rights. I have the right to say hateful things. I don’t have the right to assault someone. Why I assault someone doesn’t matter except with respect to intent… was it in the heat of passion, or did I lie in wait?

You can’t legislate morality. And you can’t legislate that everyone like everyone else. That’s why you legislate BEHAVIOR.

More importantly, don’t be so quick to sacrifice your freedoms for an ounce of protections. The protections are transient and depend on the good will of police, prosecutors, and juries… but those freedoms are gone forever.

Neon Genesis

Christians have committed hate crimes against each other for centuries so I don’t buy this notion that it’s impossible for someone within the same group to commit a hate crime against the group they belong to.

Ryan

Andrew, the scenario you weaved only exists in your head. In reality, if you beat up two people for spilling a drink on you, you would not be charged with a hate crime for either one of them, regardless of their characteristics. Because your motive was not based on an attempt to intimidate, harass, or injure a specific group of people. And of course, prosecutors do indeed parse motivation when charging someone with a crime. It’s not merely “accidental” or “on purpose” that determines what a person is charged with. If you kill someone “in the heat of the moment”, you’re liable to get charged with something less than if you plan it out, even though in both cases the murder was intentional. They often add charges if you “lie in wait” for your victim. According to you, that would be a thought crime.

Andrew

Ryan, I thought i was including all degrees of intentionality in my argument, but perhaps that was not clearly stated. Yes. Accidental. Self-defense. Insanity. Heat-of-the-moment. First Degree. Lying in wait.

But those relate to the intentionality of the crime: was the crime intentional, and to what degree?

As for “existing only in my head”, I watched a heckler at a restaurant in Delaware get pulled out of a restaurant, and learned that he was later charged with a felony because the misdemeanor of distubing the peace received a “hate crime” add-on )because it was directed at a gay person, even though content was not expressly anti-gay). The charge was bumped to assault based on bias, even though no assault occurred. I was absolutely flabbergasted. And shocked over the fall-out. The talk all over town was about “special rights” for gays, and in this case, it was hard to argue with that, and it set gay rights back in the public discourse doing us absolutely no favors. In getting satisfaction, the complaintant in the restaurant cost our local LGBT community huge points with the community at large, over nothing. This is not what HC laws were intended to do, but it’s what they can be misused to achieve.

The law of unintentional consequences does not follow conveniences. You cannot say that the hate crimes law precludes my scenario, and that a prosecutor could not try to make that case (especially during a re-election campaign). It’s an entirely plausible outcome, it just doesn’t bode well for the concept of HC laws. Inconvenient doesn’t make it either false or impossible.

Interesting article on abuse of hate crimes laws in LA here http://www.skeptictank.org/gen1/gen00502.htm

When Topeka elected to stop prosecuting domestic violence under a turf battle with another agency, people advocated going after DV as a “hate crime” (and because it is gender-based, it surely qualifies, no?)

Here we see a push to make “abuse of our troops a hate crimes law” http://www.causes.com/causes/417163-make-abuse-of-our-troops-a-hate-crime/actions

It’s a nasty little can of worms with good initial intentions that quickly morphs into a tool to stifle unpleasant speech, from whatever side proposes it. It’s the ultimate argumentative weapon: silence your opponents by criminalizing their content. And in case you haven’t been paying attention, it’s been a card played on us, with opponents to gay rights claiming that pro-gay arguments are “hate speech” against religion, and convincing electorates that ministers will be arrested at the pulpit (this happened in Sweden, by the way, over an anti-gay sermon, so not without precedence).

Assault is assault is assault.

Burning a cross on someone’s lawn is an implicit threat (thereby categorized as assault), not to mention arson of a standing structure, and, of course trespass. It doesn’t require “hate crimes” . All it takes is a prosecutor willing to take on the case.

In the meantime, quit trampling on my Constitution. If I’m really worried about “hate speech” directed at my community, I can always exercise my 2nd Amendment right to protect myself… and slap an NRA bumpersticker on my car, right next to the HRC one. Because I’m sorry, I refuse to play the victim here, and that’s precisely what hate crimes laws lead a community to do – think of themselves as victims.

Ben Mathis

So Regan and Priya describe exactly why hate crime laws are needed then Timothy and the libertarian crew who don’t understand how the law could ever treat people differently based on physical appearance or prejudice of the initial court system could eliminate justice just post post post away anyway.

Do you really think the time of a gay bashing (or racial based violence) happening, and the local Podunk sheriff deciding it wasn’t really a crime are totally over? Peek past your privilege for even 5 seconds and you can imagine a myriad of situations where hate crime laws allow for justice when without them the victim would be brushed under the rug.

I could have sworn there was an actual educated post on Box Turtle Bulletin in the past explaining very rationally why hate crime laws are needed, and how they do not offer any “special” rights or go against the constitution, but either I’m remembering wrong, or it was from one of the empathetic educated writers.

Ryan