A protected class is not an equal class

Dharun Ravi was not charged with fraud, larceny or assault. His “crime” was being an asshole, and because the unintended victim of his boorish behavior was gay, he could spend the next 10 years in prison.

What the jury had to decide, and what set off debate outside as well as inside the courtroom, was what Mr. Ravi and Mr. Clementi were thinking.

Had Mr. Ravi set up the webcam because he had a pretty good idea that he would see Mr. Clementi in an intimate moment? Had he targeted Mr. Clementi and the man he was with because they were gay? And had Mr. Clementi been in fear?

Without Mr. Clementi to speak for himself, that last question was perhaps the most difficult to determine, and jurors struggled with it.

If Clementi had been with a woman do you think Ravi would have been prosecuted? Maybe for invasion of privacy, but Clementi’s sexuality made it easier for prosecutors. Apparently it was the “hate,” and the target of the bias, that raised Ravi’s voyeurism to the level of a crime.

And was hate even a component? There was no evidence that Ravi was a raging homophobe. In fact, on the day Clementi killed himself, Ravi, who was unaware there had been a suicide, texted Clementi and with an apology: “I’ve known you were gay and I have no problem with it.”

Obviously Clementi was devastated when he discovered his sexual encounter with another man had been captured via webcam. But blaming Ravi for his death is beyond unfair.

Proponents have seized upon the jury’s verdict as a strike against bullying, but we’re talking college students here. Where does it end?

Could I be next?

The folly of hate crimes legislation

More proof :

Three women identified by their lawyers as lesbians were arraigned yesterday on a hate crime charge for allegedly beating a gay man at the Forest Hills T station in an unusual case that experts say exposes the law’s flawed logic.

“My guess is that no sane jury would convict them under those circumstances, but what this really demonstrates is the idiocy of the hate-crime legislation,” said civil liberties lawyer Harvey Silverglate. “If you beat someone up, you’re guilty of assault and battery of a human being. Period. The idea of trying to break down human beings into categories is doomed to failure.” …

She said the victim, who suffered a broken nose, told cops he believed the attack was “motivated as a crime because of his sexual orientation” since the three women “called him insulting homophobic slurs.”

But attorney Helene Tomlinson, who represented Sanford, told the judge her client is “openly identified as a lesbian … so any homophobic (conduct) is unwarranted.” She said the alleged victim was the aggressor and used racial slurs: “He provoked them.”

What if they had been bi?

(via Andrew Sullivan)

Prosecuting hate speech is more dangerous than hate speech

In the UK, it’s against the law to declare homosexuality a sin.

Dale McAlpine was charged with causing “harassment, alarm or distress” after a homosexual police community support officer (PCSO) overheard him reciting a number of “sins” referred to in the Bible, including blasphemy, drunkenness and same sex relationships.

The 42-year-old Baptist, who has preached Christianity in Wokington, Cumbria for years, said he did not mention homosexuality while delivering a sermon from the top of a stepladder, but admitted telling a passing shopper that he believed it went against the word of God.

Police officers are alleging that he made the remark in a voice loud enough to be overheard by others and have charged him with using abusive or insulting language, contrary to the Public Order Act.

That first graph is so Orwell-ian it seems a parody. And who exactly are these homosexual police community support officers? I imagine if certain people held that title here I’d be charged with harassing, alarming or distressing Petty Queer Establishment types — or maybe with a hate crime against myself.

I typically eschew the “slippery slope” argument but this slope is covered by a sheet of Arctic ice.

(Anyone care to support this assault on free speech?)

my sentiments exactly

Why am I opposed to hate crimes? James Madison said it best.

The GOP’s opposition isn’t so principled, as Andrew Sullivan explains:

But what you cannot coherently hold is that there should be hate crime protections for people of faith and no hate crime protections for gays. Even if you believe, erroneously, that homoesxuality is a choice, so, obviously, is religion. The GOP’s current position – against hate crime laws only when they apply to gays (even with strong guarantees of freedom of speech and religion) – is pure animus. It’s bigotry – and it’s coming from the very top.

The top being Limbaugh, Beck, Hannity, et al.

hater

Calling someone a faggot — isn’t that hate speech?

“He was like ‘You need to respect me.’ He was in my face. He was obviously trying to intimidate me and scare me,” Hilton said. “I was like ‘I don’t need to respect you. I don’t respect you and I did say this, and I knew that it would be the worst thing I could possibly say to him because he was acting the way he was. I said ‘You know what, I don’t respect you and you’re gay and stop being such a faggot.’”

hate crimes vs. the constitution

James Madison, who initially introduced the First Amendment to the Constitution, had previously written to Thomas Jefferson on the passage of the Virginia Statute on Religious Freedom: “We have in this country extinguished forever … making laws for the human mind.” No American, he emphasized later, would be punished for his “thoughts.”

They will be if thought crimes legislation is enacted.

reading between the hate

On his cartoonishly sophomoric Fox TV show, Sean Hannity claimed that Democrats want to afford more protection to pedophiles than military service members. According to Hannity and his guest (some right-wing House member), the hate crimes bill would protect child molesters.

Ridiculous, and Hannity knows it. But “pedophile” is a Dobson/Robertson code word for “gay,” and don’t think Hannity isn’t aware of that.

It’s painful to be on the same side of an issue as these bigots, but I stand by my opposition to hate crimes on principal. And if you think it’s off-base to question the motives of certain Republicans vocal in their opposition, then you’re not reading between the lines — hell, you’re ignoring direct quotes.

was virginia foxx right?

I’m doubly conflicted about this story, but facts are never irrelevant.

Though I suspect her motives (the GOP never misses a chance to gay bait), Rep. Foxx may not have been wrong when she said:

“I also would like to point out that there was a bill — the hate crimes bill that’s called the Matthew Shepard bill is named after a very unfortunate incident that happened where a young man was killed, but we know that that young man was killed in the commitment of a robbery. It wasn’t because he was gay. This — the bill was named for him, hate crimes bill was named for him, but it’s really a hoax that that continues to be used as an excuse for passing these bills,” said Foxx.

In 2004, ABC News reported one of the lead investigators in the Shepard case dismissed the victim’s sexuality as a motive in the victim’s murder.

“If it wasn’t Shepard, they would have found another easy target. What it came down to really is drugs and money and two punks that were out looking for it,” [former Laramie Police Detective Ben] Fritzen said. …

Helping fuel the gay hate crime theory were statements made to police and the media by Kristen Price, McKinney’s girlfriend. (Price was charged with felony accessory after-the-fact to first-degree murder. She later pleaded guilty to a reduced charge of misdemeanor interference with police officers.)

Price now says that at the time of the crime she thought things would go easier for McKinney if his violence were seen as a panic reaction to an unwanted gay sexual advance.

But today, Price tells Vargas the initial statements she made were not true and tells Vargas that McKinney’s motive was money and drugs. “I don’t think it was a hate crime at all. I never did,” she said.

I don’t know if they’re telling the truth. But too often there’s a rush to judgment when it comes to hate crimes.

Last month a Midtown waiter alleged he was gay-bashed behind Blake’s, though charges were never filed.

Despite a flimsy story, some advocates rushed to exploit the allegation in an attempt to get hate crimes legislation passed in Georgia.

I’m uncomfortable with the whole idea of hate crimes, which run contrary to the notion of equality. But if special protections exist for some minorities, why not all?

I’d prefer they existed for none. Just what constitutes a bias crime? I may have been the victim of such an attack years ago, but even I’m unsure. When I share the details, some believe I was, others, not.

I don’t trust politcally motivated bureaucrats to get it right. I don’t trust gay-baiting Republicans, either.

the trouble with hate crimes

Does anyone really believe a man who calls himself Chad Michael Morrisette (no way that’s his real name) is capable of committing a hate crime?

Some WeHo residents — offended by his juvenile and unimaginative Sarah Palin effigy — say that he is.

One question: What’s his crime?

Hating Sarah Palin?

It is not illegal to hate. It is illegal to incite violence. Chad Michael is no William Pierce. He is an idiot:

“If it’s a political statement, it’s that their politics is scary to us,” Morrisette said of the John McCain-Palin campaign. “This is our palette and *this is our venue of expression.”

Now kids, how do we treat an idiot? We ostracize them, we mock them, but we never, ever call the cops. That just gives them an opportunity to play the victim, and something tells me Chad Michael enjoys a little drama.

Don’t give him the satisfaction.

*But is it art? No, it’s a mannequin with a beehive wig and a pair of eyeglasses.

The danger of hate crimes

If you approve of hate crimes legislation, you’re putting an inordinate amount of faith in bureaucrats. Do you really trust them to know what someone’s thinking before they commit a crime? And what constitutes a hate crime? Seems pretty vague to me:

Marriage is the foundation of the natural family and sustains family values. That sentence is inflammatory, perhaps even a hate crime.

At least it is in Oakland, Calif. That city’s government says those words italicized here constitute something akin to hate speech, and can be proscribed from the government’s open e-mail system and employee bulletin board. …

Some African-American Christian women working for Oakland’s government organized the Good News Employee Association (GNEA), which they announced with a flier describing their group as “a forum for people of Faith to express their views on the contemporary issues of the day. With respect for the Natural Family, Marriage and Family Values.” The flier was distributed after other employees’ groups, including those advocating gay rights, had advertised their political views and activities on the city’s e-mail system and bulletin board.

When the GNEA asked for equal opportunity to communicate by that system and that board, they were denied. Furthermore, the flier they posted was taken down and destroyed by city officials, who declared it “homophobic” and disruptive. The city government said the flier was “determined” to promote harassment based on sexual orientation. The city warned that the flier and communications like it could result in disciplinary action “up to and including termination.”

So you don’t like what someone thinks — ignore it. Don’t ban it, and certainly don’t criminalize it. Hate crimes legislation is not a slippery slope; it’s a toboggan ride down a bottomless pit greased by PC thugs.

Against hate crimes, and against the Bush veto

It’s reasonable to oppose both. I agree with Andrew Sullivan that hate crimes “undermine the notion of equality under the law.” But we already have federal laws that protect racial and religious minorities. Why not gays?

Because the fundamentalists think homosexuals do not deserve equal protection under the law. Bush’s impending veto of a bill approved by the House that would expand hate crime laws to include gays speaks not to the issue of states rights but to appeasing prejudice.

Notice the root of James Dobson’s opposition to the House bill:

Dr. Dobson called the so-called hate-crimes bill another outrageous attempt to silence opposition to the political agenda of homosexual activists.

“Including gay adoption, the redefinition of marriage, homosexual propaganda in the schools and more,” he said. “Pastors may not even be able to speak in opposition to homosexual behavior, and, by extension, heterosexual promiscuity, as prohibited in Scripture. Please help us stop hate-crimes legislation dead in its tracks.”

If he opposed hate crime laws in general, than maybe I would assume intellectual purity. But Dobson and his ilk have none. They won’t fight against laws that give special protection to Hispanics or Jews (and not Christians); when the same legislation is applied to homosexuality, they scream religious bigotry.

Again, hate crimes for all minorites, or for none. I support the latter, but that ship has sailed. For Bush to use his second veto on this law (and not for any of the wasteful spending bills that have crossed his desk) demonstrates pure cowardice. Or maybe he actually believes that homosexuals don’t deserve equal protection. Either way, a disgrace.