Hate Crimes Bill Passes Senate

[panthera]

Holder says it better than I can:
WASHINGTON, Oct. 22 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- "The action by Congress today
to pass this vital legislation is a milestone in helping protect Americans
from the most heinous bias-motivated violence. Hate crimes victimize not just
individuals, but entire communities. Perpetrators of hate crimes seek to deny
the humanity that we all share, regardless of the color of our skin, the God
to whom we pray, or whom we love.

"There have been nearly 80,000 hate crime incidents reported to the FBI since
I first testified before Congress in support of a hate crimes bill eleven
years ago. The legislation is named after Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr.,
both of whom were murdered in two of the most infamous examples of
bias-motivated acts of violence, but recent tragedies like the shooting at the
Holocaust Museum demonstrate that there are still those for whom prejudice can
translate into violence. The passage of this legislation will give the Justice
Department and our state and local law enforcement partners the tools we need
to deter and prosecute these acts of violence.

"Since returning to the Justice Department, it has been one of my highest
personal priorities to ensure that this legislation finally becomes law, and I
applaud the Senate for joining the House in its vote today."

 

[rapunzel]

What is wrong with beating up on people I don't like?

How else am I going to release some of my pent up aggression? Hate is such an important part of our emotional range, just like love. If I write 'love' instead of 'hate' on my baseball bat, will that make it a love crime? What is this world coming to if people can't express their normal range of emotions anymore? All that is left now is for me to sit in a corner rocking back and forth.

rapunzel

 

[peterh770]

Sticks and stones may break my bones,
But names will never hurt me.

Be careful what you think, be careful what you say;
the po-po may come haul your ass away.

 

[sudsmaster]

This legislation is about PHYSICAL ATTACKS, not about speech, or names, or words.

Buy A CLUE!

 

[jeffg]

But we already have laws against physical attacks.

Hate crime laws can have only one conceivable purpose: to punish thought as a separate crime, and punish some Americans more severely than others for the exact same crimes. Therefore the laws are a blatent violation of our 14th Amendment, and likely violate the 1st and 10th Amendments as well. But we've become a nation of victims, so it's going to be a long time before these laws are thrown out.

 

[panthera]

Goodness.

First, let's remember that christianists can still preach our death by stoning from their pulpits every Sunday or whenever their block-head sect tortures rattle-snakes and gathers money to take away the few state-based civil rights we might have.

Second, the First, Tenth and Fourteenth Amendments override any such law. Much has been made of the situation in Canada, the US is not Canada.

Third, I drive past the place Matthew Shepard was tortured and left to die regularly when I'm in the US. My mother was chased by attack dogs when she marched in the civil rights marches in Atlanta.

This bill does nothing more than to reflect that fact that some groups of people use criminal activities - such as torturing and murdering us - to advance their goals of making all Negroes, gays, transgender and Jews remember our 'place'.

Thirty Republican senators just this week voted expressly and directly against civilian contractors who have been raped and imprisoned by their employers (American contractors, American employers) having the right to bring this to an American court. The bill passed anyway.

In North Carolina, over the last few months ten women have been murdered and the police have done diddly-squat. Why? Gosh, let's play a little game here, you get one question. What is the color of their skin?

Neither the sheriff in Laramie, Wyoming nor what passes for local law-enforcement in North Carolina give a hoot about those of us who are not white-skinned, Bible-thumping, heterosexual men. This law gives the government permission to step in and force local law officials to do their jobs.

This knee-jerk assumption that somehow this bill takes away our freedoms is wrong. Try living as a gay man in Wyoming or a poor woman in Dixie and you will see just has quickly your civil rights melt away.

Hell, in Wyoming you can still be denied housing or have your lease broken, you can still be fired from your job or suspended from school simply because some christianist asshole thinks you are gay. That's all they need, we have no rights there. None. Discrimination against us is not only legal, one week before the housing act legislation put an end to it just this week, the official position of the Wyoming chamber of commerce was to tell realtors and employers directly and specifically and proactively that it is legal and OK to fire gays and not sell or lease real-estate to them.

 

[cadman]

Speaking of pulpits.....

Seriously, Panthera, do you just like to stir the pot, or what? There are so many other positive, engaging things we could be discussing around here. The "copy/paste, wait for a lash-out, respond with lengthy rebuttal" recipe has been done to death.

 

[andrewinorlando]

The "copy/paste, wait for a lash-out, respond with lengthy rebuttal" may have been done to death, but the facts still stand and we can't "wish" them away....

 

[panthera]

Well, gosh, Cadman,

After all these years, I should think the answer would be obvious: You know anything I write is going to displease you.
So, don't read it.
É voilà, problem solved.

 

[jeffg]

Keven, every bit of what you say might be true, but it doesn't make these hate crime laws any more constitutional, or any less ridiculous. These laws put juries in the absurd position of trying to figure out not only if a defendant committed a crime, but whether he/she hated their victim when they committed it.

IMO Peter is correct on this matter. This is thought policing in one of its purest forms.

 

[jeffg]

Here's one example of what I'm referring to:

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/12/nyregion/12plumb.html

 

[panthera]

Jeff,

Yes and no. Obviously, every crime of conscious violence is hateful.
Since the Supreme Court has already found the earlier hate crime acts constitutional, I am puzzled as to why adding us and the transgender and Christians should necessarily make it now un-constitutional?

You live in a civilized state. In Wyoming or Texas or the
Carolinas and many other places, there are local law enforcement practices which basically consist of letting transgender and effeminate gay men be beaten up, raped and murdered. Even RR had to intervene in Dixie back in the early '80's when all those girls were being raped and killed and the local cops didn't give a flying, um, swordfish, because they weren't white.

The hate crimes legislation has no new provision on 'thought control', the Republicans and the christianists are still free to preach their hatred. The only difference is that now, for the first time, attacking some little wisp of a guy who can't butch it up like you and I can will have consequences, even in places where they really do hate us.

Why the thought control concern on your part? I've followed this for several months across the intelligent conservative media (Douthat, WSJ) and just don't see it?

 

[peterh770]

Thanks, JeffG, for not being a smart non-victim and not falling down the politically correct slippery slope.

 

[jeffg]

Keven, you answered your own question in the first sentence. I've had the same opinion of hate crime laws since the first ones started appearing about 20 years ago.

This new federal law creates protected classes based on gender, race, color, religion, ethnicity, national origin, sexual orientation, gender identity and disability. So who's left? Murder a hetero white male and you're looking at X years in jail. But murder anyone else and you may be looking at X+Y years. This is not how our system is supposed to work, and it flies directly in the face of why the 14th Amendment was written and passed.

 

[hunter]

Folks, just stop.

Yes, the christianists preach death to queers and other heathens.

But queers and other heathens often preach death to christianists.

Perhaps we should ALL be more Christian by not rising to the stereotypes of whatever group we belong to?

 

[panthera]

Peter,

one 'not' too many, methinks.

I think Obama is (ok, this is my wish) putting together a bunch of low-lying fruit into a nice little picnic basket he can lay in front of the Supreme Court, ultimately, and use to secure full civil rights for us. Hud, Social services, hate-crime, HIV+ immigration, ENDA, DADT and finally, DOMA are all going to going to have to be fought through that court, makes sense to build up a standard which can't be reasonably repealed.

What do you think?

 

[panthera]

Jeff,

Were that the sole motivation, yes. Unfortunately, the original basis for hate crime legislation remains - as we are seeing in North Carolina and as we saw with Matthew Sheppard.

In many places in the US, especially Dixie and Wyoming, local law enforcement will not apply the law equally to all and this is the only way for the feds to force compliance with the laws of the land.

I've lived in San Francisco and in Wyoming. Two different cultures. In California, all humans are entitled to civil rights and due process. In the Rocky Mountain West, only heterosexual white Republicans are automatically entitled to full constitutional protection. Dixie is even worse.

Suggest a better solution, please.

 

[panthera]

Ah, but Hunter,

Nobody is actually killing christianists.
Those ten young women in North Carolina, that poor transgender woman in Colorado recently, those bastard in Utah who arrested those two men for just kissing...

This is not about people being nasty to each other on the internet. Sadly.

 

[jeffg]

> In many places in the US, especially Dixie and Wyoming, local law enforcement will not apply the law equally to all and this is the only way for the feds to force compliance with the laws of the land. <

This federal law simply provides for additions to existing charges, it does not force enforcement of or compliance with any state laws.

As to what would force compliance, the only solutions I can think of would be far worse than the problem.

 

[hunter]

What I'm saying is...

...the dehumanization of each other has to stop, or we'll never be able to solve these problems once and for all.

Panthera, I certainly agree that these are deplorable crimes. I'm mixed on wheter I believe in hate crime sentence enhancers (because that is what they are).

I find it horrifying to think that people would want to kill someone else for something as minor as sexual orientation or race. (Why does Yugoslavia immediately leap to mind?).

But if we're going to break the cycle of hate, let it start with us WHILE BEING VIGILANT ABOUT PROTECTING OURSELVES FROM VIOLENCE.

One thing I have learned is this: laws don't stop violence they simply enhance the punishment when and if the person is caught. The victim of crime is still dead.

Of course, it kind of don't matter if someone kills you if you're queer, white, black, or purple, you're still dead.

 

[panthera]

Jeff,

Sorry, but that is exactly what the legislation, from the very beginning does do it makes it possible for the local people to ask for help when Sheriff Buford F. Williesnatcher in Podunkville decides one or two or ten fewer dark skinned girls is no loss to the world.

Or some asshole judge in Texas says it's oOK by him to beat up and kill gays.

This act lets the local prosecutor call in help. Let's the District Court say, wow, there - Negroes do have civil rights, too.

Have you looked recently at the upswing in violence against us and the transgendered?

 

[panthera]

Hunter, you're very right...

However, I come from well-to-do folks, I am 6'2", built, trained and was taught to shoot by my dad who taught SEAL snipers. He allowed as how my groups on surprise targets were 'adequate' to pass their marksman rankings.

Screw with little old queenly me or my darlin' and I will kill you. Dead.

But Matthew Shepard and those 10 girls weren't built like a brick outhouse and the law did ignore the matter in Laramie (remember, I live right around the corner), the red-nex bastards in North Carolina who should have been on this from the first killing don't give a rat's ass 'cause they aren't white.

We still live in a country in which gay bashing is practiced, where transgender women are raped to 'set them straight' and Negroes clearly are still open hunting season for far too many.

Not that long ago, the Larimer County Sherrif, not exactly a bleeding-heart liberal (to put it mildly) brought charges against several ranchers who were holding migrant workers hostage on their land. The DA (total Republican jerk) dropped the charges because these were good, upstanding citizens and it was all just a mistake.

There is a major difference between our desire for live and let live and the plain fact that for many people in Dixie and in the Rocky Mountain West, there just plain is no justice without federal intervention.

I don't like it. I was born and grew up in the West. I live in a country (Germany) which grants her citizens much stronger civil rights than the US does. I am absolutely not a bleeding heart liberal (remember when the blue-rinsed ladies here got so upset when I said gun control means "using both hands"?)

At the same time, I am very much afraid that we have reached the point in the US where simply asking the christianists to play nice isn't going to cut it. They don't consider us entitled to civil rights.

 

[jeffg]

Keven, this bill creates federal crimes and provides for federal charges that are completely separate from state charges. It doesn't compel enforcement of state laws, or anything specific from the states.

> Have you looked recently at the upswing in violence against us and the transgendered? <

Yes I have, and if this law was much narrower I might find some justification for supporting it. But as it is, it creates protected classes out of just about everyone, other than fat people, homeless people and Red Sox fans.

 

[hunter]

you may be right...

...but I don't like it.

Part of the problem with the nation right now is that since about 1975 we've been lurching toward civil war, mostly because of too many people (of ALL political persuasions) saying they have the one and correct truth.

How the existence of someone threatens someone else, I don't know. Should someone threaten me or mine, I will use all the powers at my disposal to keep them from harming me.

But if I don't agree with someone's position or who they are (and for the most part, I really don't care what others are or want, I am living my own life in peace and expect the same courtesy) it doesn't mean that I have to FORCE them to be what I am, or want them to be.

Unfortunately, the left and right in America any longer don't believe this. (And I'm NOT talking about hate crimes legislation here).

 

[jeffg]

> Part of the problem with the nation right now is that since about 1975 we've been lurching toward civil war, mostly because of too many people (of ALL political persuasions) saying they have the one and correct truth. <

Much or most of this polarization has been intentional.

 

[hunter]

that's true and from what I can see...

...both sides have been trying for it. Why?

(I know why, that was a rhetorical question)

 

[panthera]

Jeff,

I think we are talking past each other, here. My understanding of the previous hate crime acts as well as this one is that they do permit the feds to come in and enforce the Constitutionally guaranteed rights of all citizens?

Hunter,
I agree that we on the left can be overbearing and self-satisfied. So far, the only ones perpetrating violence are, however, on the right.

Maybe we should have just let Dixie go. The War of Northern Aggression was started by the North, the years after were ones of deep discrimination against the South. But you know as well as I do that the KKK ran frontier justice along the Front Range until the FBI cleared them out.

Hmm, let Texas go (do they even realize the other 49 states aren't nearly as in love with them as they are with themselves? Can you even imagine a native Coloradoan saying we have to stop the Lone Star State from going? It'd me more, OK, where is the water faucet for the Rio Grande...time for them to pay for our water ) and pay all the know-nothings to move to the Republic of Texas.

I've heard of worse ideas.

 

[hunter]

Not really true...

Most of the violence at things like g20 meetings are from the left. And I've heard leftists rants more than once talk about killing GWB. So I will have to disagree with you.

The danger in 'letting Texas go' is the balkanisation of the USA. No, that is NOT good, will NOT be good for the USA or its citizens, ANY of them.

No, hate crime laws are sentence enhancers. I have not read this law - so I can't comment on it exactly - but in general, hate crimes laws are a specific set of conditions (elements) such that IF a person commits a crime AND these elements are satisfied, THEN the sentence is enhanced with additional penalties, usually longer and/or a minimum amount of jail time. Hate crime laws do NOT enforce the constitutionally granted rights of all citizens, but instead punish more severely those who commit crimes against whatever protected class that the laws cover (example, there are sentence enhancers on abuse of the elderly if I recall correctly - but they aren't in particularly called 'hate crime laws' because everyone gets old). They are merely called hate crime laws because there is a specific identifiable characteristic (race, say) that may easily be seen. Unless you are doing

As for cutting off anyone's water, it's that pesky inland navicable waterways thing again that fall under federal jurisdiction. Or are you saying that control of people should be under the feds and control of resources under the states?

 

[jeffg]

> My understanding of the previous hate crime acts as well as this one is that they do permit the feds to come in and enforce the Constitutionally guaranteed rights of all citizens? <

In this case it's "all citizens except white Christian hetero non-disabled non-transgendered men". Which is why I think it's absolutely absurd.

 

[panthera]

Hunter,

I am a strict Constitutionalist. Absolutely not saying the feds should take control. As for the water, well, I was born in Southwest Colorado, so see that probably a mite bite differently than someone on the Front Range.

I hate to keep disagreeing, so will leave the discussion on the act for the moment. One of us is not quite right here, let's read up on it and then we will know.

Are you sure that the actual violence, not just talk is more on the left? I fear FBI stats. don't support that, which is not to say there aren't nuts on the left, too.

I did enough course work on Reconstruction to have majored in it, had I so chosen. Frankly, I don't believe the US has ever resolved the basic conflicts which culminated in disaster after Dread Scott. I, personally, don't think breaking up would solve things, but I also don't think that forcing Texas to stay if they really want to go (Constitutionally, they can't, all this talk about their special status is inaccurate, to put it gently) is a good thing. They are netto takers, not givers, they much resemble Poland here in the EU, way off the scale on civil rights, human rights and rights for non-fundamentalist Christians. So let them go if they want. Just, don't give them any more money and let them deal with being the northern border of Baja California...

You know, just two weeks ago my darlin' was at a Chamber of Commerce meeting at which the keynote speaker made an extra point of mentioning that it is not only legal but God's will to discriminate against gays in housing and employment. We really are under attack.