What is a hate crime?

chicago tribune ^ | 10, 2007 | Howard Witt

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KNOXVILLE, Tenn. -- What happened to Channon Christian and Christopher Newsom, a young Knoxville couple out on an ordinary Saturday night date, was undeniably brutal. The two were carjacked, kidnapped, raped and finally murdered during an ordeal of unimaginable terror in January.

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But whether the attack was a racial hate crime worthy of national media attention is another question, one that has now ignited a fierce dispute over the definition of hate crimes and how the mainstream media choose to cover America's most discomfiting interracial attacks.

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Country music star Charlie Daniels, who lives 150 miles from Knoxville, contrasted scant coverage of the Christian-Newsom murders with the national media frenzy that erupted last year when a black woman accused three white members of the Duke University lacrosse team of raping her at a party. The white players were cleared in April after the accuser proved unreliable and no evidence corroborated a crime.

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"If this [Knoxville case] had been white on black crime, Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson and their ilk would have descended on Knoxville like a swarm of angry bees," Daniels wrote on his Web site. "I guess the lack of TV cameras discouraged them."< snip >

Authorities say the couple's assailants, some of them ex-convicts, forced their victims to drive at gunpoint to a clapboard house in one of Knoxville's roughest neighborhoods, where both victims were raped and then killed. Newsom's body, shot and burned, was found dumped beside nearby railroad tracks, while Christian, who was strangled, was found bundled in plastic garbage bags inside the house.

[Hardastarboard]

Anyone who asks what is a hate crime, or questions the validity of hate crime as a type of criminality, has committed a hate crime. I’ve reported this author to the PC police.

[Leftism is Mentally Deranged]

Hate crime laws were created ONLY to give White Christian males more prison time for crimes that they commit against non-Whites, non-Christians and women. Prosecutors and police in EVERY state know this and always comply.

[UndauntedR]

I disagree because I don’t agree with your framing.

Hate crimes (which are treated as additional crimes separate from the assault, vandalism, murder, etc) are a different beast because they are crimes which intend to cause fear in people other than the target of the crime. A hate crime, by virtue of motivation, intimidates a group of private citizens belonging to a certain category which is already subject to a Sword of Damocles.

The original crime is of course prosecuted, but any additional effects (social unrest, fear, terrorism) or intent of the crime, which compounds its abhorrence, will be prosecuted via a “hate crime”.

[Fred Hayek]

That needs to be corrected. Anything white people are accused of doing. BTW, that includes anyone of a “minority” who are off the plantation, since they are really white anyway due to the lack of proper “mindset”.

[stainlessbanner]

bttt

[stainlessbanner]

Unbelievable. No coverage.

[stainlessbanner]

Guess they were busy with Duke LAX

[RightWhale]

A hate crime is defined as an action that requires establishment of Federal police.

[Malsua]

In 90 percent of those crimes, black offenders attacked white victims

So what the article is saying is that, it happens enough, therefore it's not newsworthy, inversely, the same is true if a White attacks a black, it happens so little it is newsworthy. If that isn't blatant coddling and racism on the part of the MSM, I don't know what is.

[Altura Ct.]

“There is a discomfort level [in the national media] with stories that have black assailants and white victims,” said Michelle Malkin, a prominent conservative newspaper columnist and TV commentator who has featured the Knoxville case on her Web site. “If it doesn’t fit some sort of predetermined narrative of how we view taboo subjects like race and crime, there’s a disinclination to cover it.”

[stainlessbanner]

Not sure if you’ve been following this one...

[wardaddy]

oh yea.....it’s an abomination

and on the flip side...no stone unturned

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1850588/posts

[Muzzle_em]

I saw a clip on CNN a few weeks ago in which the DA (I think) adamantly DENIED that the victims were raped and tortured. The news story was basically saying that yes, these two were murdered, but that untrue rumors were swirling about the rape and torture.

Now, I wonder IF the DA is lying in saying that the rapes and tortures didn’t happen. If he IS lying, WHY?

[stainlessbanner]

I read the prosecution dropped some federal charges against the perps - carjacking perhaps, I don't remember.

The perps are a bunch of sickos and the media willfully glosses over the torture, rape, and murder they committed.

But the MSM will railroad college kids at Duke and dig up a Klan story from 30 years ago ad nauseum.

[Jakarta ex-pat]

Unbelievable. No coverage.

BUMP

[ExGeeEye]

...they are crimes which intend to cause fear in people

Again, claiming to be able to determine the inner thought or intent of the alleged perpetrator; to assign criminality to particular thought or intent; and weighing the actual act as being of greater or lesser evil because of that thought or intent.

ThoughtCrime.

[UndauntedR]

claiming to be able to determine the inner thought or intent of the alleged perpetrator

which is to be proven in a court of law. Graffiti on a boxcar which reads "Kevin" is a different crime than graffiti on a synagogue which reads "Die Kykes" or a swastika or "Zyklon B", etc. The latter action creates a climate of fear in a whole group of people (as opposed to actions/threats against an individual, which can be prosecuted more easily) and should carry with it a greater punishment.

to assign criminality to particular thought or intent; and weighing the actual act as being of greater or lesser evil because of that thought or intent.

Only if that thought or intent was indeed successful at terrorizing an entire group of people. The logic being that a crime which ratchets up an already existing fear causes a greater social unrest than a crime that does not and should be punished appropriately.

I think the name "hate crime" is entirely misleading as well - as it does imply what you're arguing. But it is just not the intent of these laws.

[Live free or die]

I've never believed in hate crimes and still don't.

It doesn't matter what the case is, whether its these two poor victims in this Tennessee case or anyone else victimized by whatever crime, the perpetrator certainly does not perform his actions based on love. The maximum penalty issued by our society is a relatively painless lethal injection. This is enough to eradicate the scum who did this.

What are we to do? Legally acknowledge what is already obvious to anyone with eyes? These two were victims of hatred. Hatred itself is not a crime. The statutes currently on the books are sufficient to punish the guilty. We don't need to execute them twice because of what these savages were thinking. We shouldn't care what was going through their tiny little minds as they were doing this. We're above them and we soil our own brains by trying to dissect their motives. What they did was enough for us to judge them savages and a danger to our society. They should be killed with all due process and speed. Hate legislation is not necessary.

[ExGeeEye]

...creates a climate of fear in a whole group of people (as opposed to actions/threats against an individual, which can be prosecuted more easily) and should carry with it a greater punishment.

I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree on this one. In my view, how anyone feels about a crime must never be taken into account at all, and the idea of it being used to determine the punishment for the underlying act is abhorrent to me.

[UndauntedR]

In my view, how anyone feels about a crime must never be taken into account at all

That's kind of absurd. We have a lot of good laws which do approximately this.

We prosecute criminal harassment or stalking - where we could say the only victim is a person's comfort; they're feelings.

Same with sexual harassment, racial harassment, polygamy, some drug laws - any crimes where there is no victim other than how people feel about it.

I think a lot of these victimless crime laws are to cut a problem in the bud. A stalker can turn violent, sexual harassment can turn rapist, racial harassment can turn violent, etc. Similarly, hate speech and hate crimes can encourage further violence against a group of people rather than an individual which, in the same spirit of the above examples, should be punished.

It sounds like you're coming from a libertarian perspective, which I can understand. But if someone makes you fear for your safety - directly or because of your religion, color, sexual preference - by making threats to you personally or committing or encouraging crimes against your category, then you have recourse. No one has the right to make you fear for your life.