3 Muslims murdered in North Carolina. Hate crime?

[TerraPrime]

Hate crime statutes don't make certain criminal acts more heinous than others. Instead, these laws address a separate component of hate-motivated crimes that are NOT present in other crimes.

If someone spray paints a smiley face on the doors of the local Jewish Temple and said "Smile!" that's a different sort of crime than spray paintin a Swastika and writing "Die Jews!" Both are vandalism. Both involve spray paints. But the impacts are, clearly, not the same. Without hate crime laws, the two would have to be treated as the same.

[Suttree]

"Hate crime" is a genuinely despicable term which implies a certain motive for an act makes it more heinous.

In addition to TP's post above, you do know there is a difference between murder and manslaughter yes?

[TeethGrinder]

In addition to TP's post above, you do know there is a difference between murder and manslaughter yes?

Yes.

Which is why I said "certain motive" not all motives.

I realize the importance of motives. But raising one (race/religion) above all/most as the term "hate crime" does is pretty disgusting IMO.

[TeethGrinder]

Hate crime statutes don't make certain criminal acts more heinous than others. Instead, these laws address a separate component of hate-motivated crimes that are NOT present in other crimes.

If someone spray paints a smiley face on the doors of the local Jewish Temple and said "Smile!" that's a different sort of crime than spray paintin a Swastika and writing "Die Jews!" Both are vandalism. Both involve spray paints. But the impacts are, clearly, not the same. Without hate crime laws, the two would have to be treated as the same.

Hardly comparable.

What would be more comparable would be a hateful message which doesn't reference a Religion or Race. Which is where my issues with hate-crimes lie.

My issue with the second message is that it implies people dying, regardless of the fact that's referenced Jews. Yet you say that a message promoting death would be the same as a smiley face without hate crimes? Take a step back and analyse that.

[TerraPrime]

Yes.

Which is why I said "certain motive" not all motives.

I realize the importance of motives. But raising one (race/religion) above all/most as the term "hate crime" does is pretty disgusting IMO.

It would be, if all religions and all sexual orientations and all genders suffer equally in terms of having crimes directed at that trait.

Or that they all have comparable historical and cultural animus aimed at them.

But they don't, so it's not.

[TeethGrinder]

It would be, if all religions and all sexual orientations and all genders suffer equally in terms of having crimes directed at that trait.

Or that they all have comparable historical and cultural animus aimed at them.

But they don't, so it's not.

And you're promoting those historical and cultural differences when you carry them on through a piece of legislation.

I'm not suggesting that killing a person out for racial motives isn't as disgusting as it gets, but when you're singling out relevant components of hate and valuing them above others I have a real problem. Hate it hate regardless of the reason - Race, gender and sexual orientation are often singled out but as guy killing his wife because maybe he hated certain things about her personality - Should that not be considered an equally heinous act, which also involved "hate".

I think it's a hypocritical legislative term which does more to promote segregation rather than prevent it.

[Suttree]

And you're promoting those historical and cultural differences when you carry them on through a piece of legislation.

Sorry but this just doesn't fly. There is a reason why we needed "protected classes" in the first place and pretending as if we still don't have a very real need for them doesn't reflect reality.

We have come a very long way in this country, largely because of the laws enacted to help speed it along.

[TeethGrinder]

Sorry but this line of reasoning just doesn't fly. There is a reason why we needed "protected classes" in the first place and pretending as if we still don't have a very real need for them doesn't reflect reality.

We have come a very long way in this country, largely because of the laws enacted to help speed it along.

Oh it absolutely does fly. Segregation promotes segregation. It highlights and values the differences in race, differences in sexual orientation, differences in gender. How can you promote equality when the very laws you're abiding are not?

I come from a different country than you and we've had our issues with sectarianism and equality. We're at the point where most of the political differences have been put behind us based on laws promoting equality rather than carrying on these maybe well intentioned but naturally divisive concepts.

[Happy Ent]

Hate crime statutes don't make certain criminal acts more heinous than others. Instead, these laws address a separate component of hate-motivated crimes that are NOT present in other crimes.

If someone spray paints a smiley face on the doors of the local Jewish Temple and said "Smile!" that's a different sort of crime than spray paintin a Swastika and writing "Die Jews!" Both are vandalism. Both involve spray paints. But the impacts are, clearly, not the same. Without hate crime laws, the two would have to be treated as the same.

Interestingly, in Sweden, if the Swastika (and crossed-out star of David) is sprayed by a Muslim, it’s not a hate crime. http://avpixlat.info/2014/11/03/klottra-hakkors-inte-hets-mot-folkgrupp-om-man-ar-muslim/ .

[TerraPrime]

I realize the importance of motives. But raising one (race/religion) above all/most as the term "hate crime" does is pretty disgusting IMO.

So what are motives, if not thoughts? It's okay to distinguish one thought from another and to assign different punitive measures to them as long as the distinction being made is not about the perpetrator's motives originating for biases against certain groups?

Hardly comparable.

What would be more comparable would be a hateful message which doesn't reference a Religion or Race. Which is where my issues with hate-crimes lie.

My issue with the second message is that it implies people dying, regardless of the fact that's referenced Jews. Yet you say that a message promoting death would be the same as a smiley face without hate crimes? Take a step back and analyse that.

You're arguing with the details, not the point.

Let's say there are no words. Let's say it's a simple Star of David, versus a Swastika. Both are just lines, right? Will the effects be the same when both appear on the doors of a Jewish Temple?

Or if you want to use words, we can choose "Go home!" - in one case it's spray painted on the doors of a Muslim mosque in a Western country, where there is anti-Islamic elements in public, and the other case is where the same words are spray painted on the doors of bar in downtown London.

There are some people out there who choose victims based on the victim's status of sex, sexual orientation, race, and religious affiliations. These crimes are not the same as random acts of violence because at the heart, crimes against victims of specific traits as a result of them possessing those traits are meant to intimidate and terrorize in addition to harming the victims themselves. It is more similar to terrorism, i.e., the goal is not to destroy a particular pizza parlor in Gaza, but to terrorize Israeli people, and the IRA setting off a car bomb was not meant to just destroy a car, but to terrorize the British citizens as well, etc.

And you're promoting those historical and cultural differences when you carry them on through a piece of legislation.

I'm not suggesting that killing a person out for racial motives isn't as disgusting as it gets, but when you're singling out relevant components of hate and valuing them above others I have a real problem. Hate it hate regardless of the reason - Race, gender and sexual orientation are often singled out but as guy killing his wife because maybe he hated certain things about her personality - Should that not be considered an equally heinous act, which also involved "hate".

I think it's a hypocritical legislative term which does more to promote segregation rather than prevent it.

You're allowing the generic understanding of "hate" interfer with analyzing a legal statute where "hate motivated crimes" have a narrow and specific meaning. If a man kills his wife because he finds out that she has been unfaithful to him with another woman, that is not necessarily an anti-gay hate crime. On the other hand, if a man kills a woman because seeing her walking out of a bar holding hands with another female enrages him, then that'd be a hate crime, whether the deceased victim is actually homosexual or not.

It is impossbile to address a social phenomenon without first recognizing that it exists. Drafting laws to ban racism in hiring people does not promote racism. Drafting laws to ban infant female genital mutilation does not promote sexism. Drafting laws to stop people from being denied housing options due to their religion does not promote religion division.

Oh it absolutely does fly. Segregation promotes segregation. It highlights and values the differences in race, differences in sexual orientation, differences in gender. How can you promote equality when the very laws you're abiding are not?

I come from a different country than you and we've had our issues with sectarianism and equality. We're at the point where most of the political differences have been put behind us based on laws promoting equality rather than carrying on these maybe well intentioned but naturally divisive concepts.

You do not "promote equality" by ignoring the specific and unique circumstances that some minority groups face, either.

And for someone who doesn't even come from a country that needs anti-discrimination laws any more you sure do seem to have a lot to say about hate crime laws. Are you by chance from Russia?

[Crixus]

It is by no means clear whether these killings were motivated by religion and it would be unproductive to assert they were.

However, it's natural that the possibility would be discussed; just like a shooting by a Muslim in the West is assessed in terms of religion.

A glowing tribute to the victims by someone who knew them: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jonathan-weiler/perfect-martyrs_b_6671508.html

[Roose Seal]

Oh it absolutely does fly. Segregation promotes segregation. It highlights and values the differences in race, differences in sexual orientation, differences in gender. How can you promote equality when the very laws you're abiding are not?

I come from a different country than you and we've had our issues with sectarianism and equality. We're at the point where most of the political differences have been put behind us based on laws promoting equality rather than carrying on these maybe well intentioned but naturally divisive concepts.

*white guy voice* "You're the real racist for talking about racism!"

[Crixus]

http://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/guns-chapel-hill-myth-american-vigilante?mbid=social_facebook

Said better than I could've done. I also agree with his point that it's hardly reassuring to imagine the motive was actually parking. 'It's OK, he wasn't a bigot; he was just angry about parking and had a gun and decided to use it. As one does.'

Really?

[Roose Seal]

http://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/guns-chapel-hill-myth-american-vigilante?mbid=social_facebook

Said better than I could've done. I also agree with his point that it's hardly reassuring to imagine the motive was actually parking. 'It's OK, he wasn't a bigot; he was just angry about parking and had a gun and decided to use it. As one does.'

Really?

The terrifying subtext behind the whole "parking" thing is that somehow it's worse to imply someone was an islamophobe (or a racist?) than to imply they could murder three people over a parking spot.

People are like "yeah sure he was a murderer, but you're going a little too far by saying he was a racist".

People are more willing to believe a man would murder three people over a parking spot than because he hated Muslims.

Being called a racist in western countries is literally worse than being called a murderer.

[Crixus]

Exactly. And being shot by a random dude is akin to a natural disaster in the US, as the article says: it's viewed as something unavoidable, that needs to be accepted because you sure as shit can't stop it. Gun violence will happen, just like tornadoes.

Fuck me.

[OnionAhaiReborn]

Declaring the crime worse, or at least worthy of additional punishment, because it was racially, religiously, or other-identity motivated is the point of hate crime laws. And, yes, in the current political climate it is more deeply troubling to consider this as an instance of anti-Islamic violence than as a lunatic's reaction to a petty neighborhood dispute. This raises the specter of bigotry-motivated violence (moreover, in the South), and that New Yorker article is rightly critical of hasty attempts to declare this incident insignificant in contrast to the significance given to Islamic terrorism, or the significance we'd give it if the identities of victim and killer were reversed.

[Drogon'sWrath]

Maybe he killed them because he hates Muslims. Or maybe he killed them over a parking spot. I have a suspicion it's a combination of the two. But whatever the case may be, the dude's nucking futs and hopefully never sees freedom again.

[Roose Seal]

Maybe he killed them because he hates Muslims. Or maybe he killed them over a parking spot. I have a suspicion it's a combination of the two. But whatever the case may be, the dude's nucking futs and hopefully never sees freedom again.

See, that's the thing: he's given the benefit of the doubt.

"he's just nuts"

if the situation were reversed, you know exactly what would happen because it happened just a few weeks ago: you'd have millions of people and corrupt world leaders marching all over the world denouncing "terrorism" with vapid fucking hashtags.

[Isalie]

Hey! Hashtags matter!

[DanteGabriel]

Sister of one of the victims disputes that the conflict was really over a parking space:

In a Friday morning appearance on MSNBC's "Morning Joe," Dr. Suzanne Barakat, whose 23-year-old brother Deah was killed allegedly by his 46-year-old neighbor Craig Stephen Hicks, disputed the initial motive for the shooting laid out by Chapel Hill, North Carolina police.

The police said earlier this week that their preliminary investigation suggested Hicks was motivated by a long-running parking dispute with his Muslim neighbors. But Barakat said she had evidence that police may not have seen indicating that Hicks had a deeper problem with her brother and his wife, Yusor Mohammad Abu-Salha, both of whom were shot dead.

"I think it's absolutely insulting, insensitive and outrageous that the first thing they come out and say and issue a statement that this is a parking dispute," Barakat said.

"I'm not sure who they spoke to, because it took me all of five minutes of talking to [Deah's] former roommate, whom they had not reached out to, to give me details, information, text messages," she said, adding that police hadn't yet reached out to her family either.

Barakat said she believed Hicks, whose apparent Facebook page showed he had strong anti-religion beliefs and identified as an "anti-theist," had been "harassing" the family since they first arrived at the apartment complex because the women wore headscarves. She said Hicks repeatedly confronted Deah and Yusor about a visitor's parking spot he said belonged to his wife and often flashed a gun at them from under his shirt.

...

Barakat also pointed out that none of the victims were parked in the spot that Hicks claimed for his family on the day of the shooting.

"To call it a parking dispute when in fact no one was parked in even in that visitor's parking spot that does not belong to him, is outrageous to me, and it's insulting and it trivializes their murders," she said.

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/suzanne-barakat-chapel-hill-police

That does seem like an oversight that the police investigating the crime have not yet talked to the roommate or Deah's family.