Equal justice for all is out the window...

[August]

Originally Posted by Max2147

If somebody mugs me because they hate white people, I think that's worse than them mugging me because they want my money. That doesn't mean that mugging me to steal my money isn't bad. Somebody who does that deserves to be prosecuted and punished. But I'm less scared of them than the person who mugs me because they hate me for who I am.

Hatred is a lot more damaging to our society and difficult to cure than the other things that motivate crimes.

It's not going to be cured by criminalizing human emotions.

Like I said criminal motivations are not so easily quantified. What if your mugger mainly wants money and only kinda dislikes white people? You could look at it as a hate crime while he only sees it as not crapping in his own back yard. The prime motivation was money but a sharp lawyer could make this a racial issue as well. That's not justice.

[Max2147]

Originally Posted by August

It's not going to be cured by criminalizing human emotions.

Like I said criminal motivations are not so easily quantified. What if your mugger mainly wants money and only kinda dislikes white people? You could look at it as a hate crime while he only sees it as not crapping in his own back yard. The prime motivation was money but a sharp lawyer could make this a racial issue as well. That's not justice.

Of course, there's always a chance that it will be misused. But just because it can be misused doesn't mean we shouldn't have it. There's a huge potential for guns to be misused, but our Constitution protects our right to own them.

I personally think that hatred and hate crimes are a major threat to the fabric of our society, so I'm glad that the law recognizes them as a major problem that needs to be dealt with.