Let's get one thing straight. I don't hate any person because they belong to a particular group, race or religion. I try very hard not to hate any person at all, although some make this very difficult. For me the issue of hate crime legislation is not about protecting or bashing one group over another. My objection to so called hate crime legislation is a philosophical one.
The hate crime legislation movement is seeking to criminalize politically incorrect thoughts, words and deeds. It is attempting to silence any opposition to its agenda. Sure the current legislation may be appealing to a certain group of people but what about fringe elements of other groups. Are we going to pass special legislation offering special protection to every special interest group or social subset out there? Do we really want the same court system that allowed O.J. to go free and sent Martha Stewart to jail, to be in charge of judging the thoughts, intentions and motivations of our hearts?
People are constantly harping on Christians, accusing them of being too judgmental, and yet they are willing to give a judge power to incarcerate someone for a"perceived" offense. The jails are already overcrowded with real criminals, serving real time for real crimes. Do we really want to waste the additional time and resources trying to enforce legislation concerning a person's thoughts and motives? It is also hard enough and costly enough to get a regular criminal conviction, now they want to place additional burdens on the District Attorneys. Hate crime laws will be make trials longer and more costly and provide more room for errors and mistrials.
The use of legislation to police the thoughts and motives of someone and to add extra punishment for a crime based on those motives completely undermines the concept of equal protection under the law. It is an unnecessary legislation, concerned more about making people feel good about an issue than actually doing anything to solve the real problem concerning that issue.
Since you've provided absolutely no reference to the actual legislation, your abstract claims simply have no merit or grounds. You've also shown that you have little idea what you are talking about, let alone what a "hate crime" is. You've left the reader with no choice than to consider your post a rant. Why not step up to the plate and provide some palpable examples from the legislation to actually anchor what you're talking about? Do you think you can handle that? Not holding my breath.
ReplyDeleteThanks for taking the time to read the post and provide comments. I appreciate your criticism and will try to be more specfic in the future. If you would please grant me a small rebuttal. I was not referring to any SPECIFIC hate crime legislation but to the legal concept of any and all such legislation. It is a bad concept to pass legislation that targets or protects any one particular group or subgroup of our society. To offer one victim a more protected status then another injects an unnecessary inbalance in the scales of justice. Again thank for reading.
ReplyDeletefine, except:
ReplyDelete- you tweeted the article as follows: "I just posted a short blog about hate crime leg. Let me know what u think. http://bit.ly/VAKr2 ." (http://twitter.com/Whtwzrd/status/1651168459)
this was precisely at the time when a hate crime bill was being voted on. it passed in the house that day, prior to your rebuttal.
- per your rebuttal will you unequivocally state that Christians of any ilk hold no special privilege in U.S. society, including any ostensible privilege presumed in founding that society? I am defining Christian here as accepting Jesus as God.