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[Pattern-chaser]

No, it is not a criminal offence to verbally abuse somebody. That is precisely my point. Although the level and degree of verbal abuse might reach a level where it is regarded as harassment and be against the law.

First you say something, then you seem to undo what you have said, and say something different, something that restates what I have said, and you claim to disagree with. You seem to be making my point for me.

This is not about creating trivial 'crimes', so that I can use the law against them to criminalise you. This is about abusing groups of people, because of antipathy toward the group, not toward the poor innocent individual who is unlucky enough to be your victim.

[Mo_reese]

Was the killing of United Health Care CEO Brian Thompson a hate crime?

[Pattern-chaser]

Was the killing of United Health Care CEO Brian Thompson a hate crime?

Individual cases are always difficult to handle. Because they stem from the real world, where things are never as clear-cut as they are in philosophy lectures. TBH, I don't have any clear understanding of why this man was shot, so I have no idea if it was, or could have been, a crime against groups. [I hesitate to use "hate crime", as it describes what it describes so badly (IMO).]

[Fried Egg]

No, it is not a criminal offence to verbally abuse somebody. That is precisely my point. Although the level and degree of verbal abuse might reach a level where it is regarded as harassment and be against the law.

First you say something, then you seem to undo what you have said, and say something different, something that restates what I have said, and you claim to disagree with. You seem to be making my point for me.

This is not about creating trivial 'crimes', so that I can use the law against them to criminalise you. This is about abusing groups of people, because of antipathy toward the group, not toward the poor innocent individual who is unlucky enough to be your victim.

You have deliberately dodged my point that the threshold for the level of verbal abuse to amount to criminal behaviour is different when it is considered motivated by the hate of a group identity.

We should have a level of free speech whereby people can speak critically of people, even when prejudice is a factor. People even get into trouble for their speech if it is not itself regarded as hateful or prejudiced but because it might lead others to become hateful or prejudiced.

People should be free to say things that I consider odious and misinformed.

[Pattern-chaser]

No, it is not a criminal offence to verbally abuse somebody. That is precisely my point. Although the level and degree of verbal abuse might reach a level where it is regarded as harassment and be against the law.

First you say something, then you seem to undo what you have said, and say something different, something that restates what I have said, and you claim to disagree with. You seem to be making my point for me.

This is not about creating trivial 'crimes', so that I can use the law against them to criminalise you. This is about abusing groups of people, because of antipathy toward the group, not toward the poor innocent individual who is unlucky enough to be your victim.

You have deliberately dodged my point...

No, not "deliberately". You and I are exchanging is and ought, as neither of us are happy with the status quo. It is not always clear what the point is, that is being made. Apologies if you think otherwise.

...that the threshold for the level of verbal abuse to amount to criminal behaviour is different when it is considered motivated by the hate of a group identity.

I'm not sure, but I rather suspect that this is unavoidable, given the nature of so-called hate crimes. No?

We should have a level of free speech whereby people can speak critically of people, even when prejudice is a factor. People even get into trouble for their speech if it is not itself regarded as hateful or prejudiced but because it might lead others to become hateful or prejudiced.

People should be free to say things that I consider odious and misinformed.

Now this is a rant about what *should* be. Is there a point hidden here that I am overlooking?

[Fried Egg]

Now this is a rant about what *should* be. Is there a point hidden here that I am overlooking?

The whole point of this thread is me making the case that there shouldn't be such a thing as hate crimes. I have made no bones about that.

[Pattern-chaser]

Now this is a rant about what *should* be. Is there a point hidden here that I am overlooking?

The whole point of this thread is me making the case that there shouldn't be such a thing as hate crimes. I have made no bones about that.

OK. I'm quite happy to discuss these issues with you. [I think our starting-point should be our one clear agreement: that a law protecting, say, Hindus, but not all other groups and communities, is a nonsense.] I'll try if you will?

[Fried Egg]

I can agree with that. One of my original arguments is the non-universality of hate crime law. I think all law should be universally applied and that, if one group enjoys legal protection, all groups should.

However, I still have problems with it. I don't think any group should be protected from critical (or even hateful) speech. Nor do I think that it should be possible to commit crimes against group identities. One can only commit crimes against individuals (or groups of individuals) but not group identities. An on that point I'm sure you'll disagree...

[Pattern-chaser]

I can agree with that. One of my original arguments is the non-universality of hate crime law. I think all law should be universally applied and that, if one group enjoys legal protection, all groups should.

I wonder if you expect too much from "law" — as distinct from justice — but I agree completely with your expressed sentiment. Laws apply equally to all of us.

However, I still have problems with it. I don't think any group should be protected from critical (or even hateful) speech.

Critical speech is one thing. "Hateful" speech, which is hurtful and harmful, is quite another. All of us should be subject to the former, and protected from the latter. Hate speech is *intended* to cause hurt. That is its one and only purpose. [Even when the hurt is not physical — "sticks and stones..." is a cruel proverb that carries a blatant lie.] That is why it should be prevented or punished. Criticism, justified criticism, is an altogether more beneficial practice.

Nor do I think that it should be possible to commit crimes against group identities. One can only commit crimes against individuals (or groups of individuals) but not group identities. And on that point I'm sure you'll disagree...

...until recently, I might have done. But I've been thinking...

But first, and I'll try to keep this bit brief, all human groups are necessarily "groups of individuals". There are no other possibilities. And those groups, once identified and labelled, have a 'group identity', by virtue of having been described (identified!) as a group.

If you stab me because I am male, you attack me as an individual. And I don't mean that literally, although it is literally true too. I mean that, by identifying me, and attacking me, as a member of the group labelled "male", you deny and erase my individuality. You are moving toward denying my very humanity, as you reduce me just to 'a male', any old male. I'm an example of a male, a synecdoche for all males; I'm just the unlucky one who ended up on the wrong end of your knife. You didn't attack *me*, you attacked a male, and in doing so, you knowingly and intentionally attacked all males. I'm just the male who got stabbed. I'm not "Pattern-Chaser", a person, I'm just a 'male'.

A hate crime is a crime against the individual, literally and as described above.

[Good_Egg]

Whether football-related or not, a gang can seek to make others afraid to enter their territory without necessarily thinking those others inferior.

Their opinion ("inferior") of others is not [directly] relevant here. It is their actions we judge*, yes? And if they abuse these "others" in some way, and their 'justification' for this is that they, er, strongly disapprove' of those others, that is what we must call a "hate crime" (lacking a better label).

I thought we'd narrowed it down to a question of what particular motives or types of motives should be treated as an aggravating factor that make a crime more serious.

I think we agree that verbal aggression to the victim constitutes an aggravating factor. And that the intent to induce fear in a wider group of people constitutes an aggravating factor.

Your claim seems to be that a group-prejudice motive makes a crime more serious, even if the level of intent to induce fear is exactly the same and the level of aggression is exactly the same, and the act itself (as observed) is exactly the same.

And I'm asking for a clear statement of why you think that.

If part of the motive for Alfie mugging Bruno is that Alfie counts Bruno as rich and Alfie is prejudiced against rich people thinking them to be - as a class - idle, selfish and undeserving - then that is a group-prejudice motive. Why does that warrant a more severe punishment ?

[Fried Egg]

However, I still have problems with it. I don't think any group should be protected from critical (or even hateful) speech.

Critical speech is one thing. "Hateful" speech, which is hurtful and harmful, is quite another. All of us should be subject to the former, and protected from the latter. Hate speech is *intended* to cause hurt. That is its one and only purpose. [Even when the hurt is not physical — "sticks and stones..." is a cruel proverb that carries a blatant lie.] That is why it should be prevented or punished. Criticism, justified criticism, is an altogether more beneficial practice.

This quite nicely highlights a stark difference between yours and my position. I do not think society should protect people from hate, or from being offended or upset. That it has started attempting to do so over recent decades is precisely one of the things that I think is going wrong with this country.

So why not? For one thing, the demarcation between being critical and being hateful is not always clear and much debated over. Now certainly I can agree that it is clear in some cases but even then I think that free speech should be protected within the following restrictions:

1) If I am saying something that presents a "clear and present danger" (i.e. the 1st amendment in the American constitution).

2) Libel & Slander. i.e. speech/writing that is false and damaging to someone's reputation.

Also, it is interesting that you say hate speech is something that "is *intended* to cause hurt", and yet UK hate law says that the intent of the accused isn't that important, it is how it is perceived by the victim (or any passerby). For example, I might keep asking you, with the best of intentions, where you are from but you might be offended by that and quite likely, I would end up in a lot of trouble.

So, I am not a "free speech absolutist" and I agree that a line must be drawn somewhere and people should be prosecuted for stepping over that line. But I do think that we have moved too far in one direction and that the line is not currently drawn in the right place and people are being prosecuted for saying things (or sharing things on social media) that shouldn't be illegal.

[Good_Egg]

I mean that, by identifying me, and attacking me, as a member of the group labelled "male", you deny and erase my individuality. You are moving toward denying my very humanity, as you reduce me just to 'a male', any old male. I'm an example of a male, a synecdoche for all males; I'm just the unlucky one who ended up on the wrong end of your knife. You didn't attack *me*, you attacked a male, and in doing so, you knowingly and intentionally attacked all males. I'm just the male who got stabbed. I'm not "Pattern-Chaser", a person, I'm just a 'male'.

If Fried Egg were to attack you, his motive could be classified in one of 3 ways:
a) because you're you, Pattern-Chaser
b) because you're a member of some set of individuals (males, Brits, grumpy old men, whatever)
c) not because of any characteristic you possess, but just because you're a convenient human to attack.

It seems to me that b) is necessarily an intermediate case. That a) is what b) becomes if you narrow down the group to a group of one, and c) is what b) becomes if you expand the group to include everyone.

So it makes no sense at all to me to suggest that a b)-motive is worse than either an a)- motive or a c)-motive.

Unless you hold some perverse dogma which says that groups - identifiable subsets of the set of all people - are what's important, just because they are.

[Leontiskos]

I have been pondering the concept for some time and I am becoming increasingly sceptical that the concept of hate crimes should have a place in law.

Yeah, that idea of UK "hate crimes" sounds pretty insane.

Does it transgress justice to hate someone? No.
In the worse case, what happens when one person hates another? They harm them.
Does it transgress justice to harm someone? Usually, yes.
Are there laws against this sort of harm? Yes.
So if the harm that flows from hate is already illegal, then why do we need "hate crime laws"? We don't.

Firstly, I do not think the criminality of an action should in anyway rest on the perception of the victim (or even a random passer by). It should be an objectively measurable fact.

Yes, law clearly needs to be based on public facts, not perceptions.

[Pattern-chaser]

If part of the motive for Alfie mugging Bruno is that Alfie counts Bruno as rich and Alfie is prejudiced against rich people thinking them to be - as a class - idle, selfish and undeserving - then that is a group-prejudice motive. Why does that warrant a more severe punishment ?

I don't think a search for exactly what might qualify as a hate crime, and what might not, is helpful. And yet, I cannot help but wonder if your choice, in your example, of the group "rich people" is somehow intended to demean the whole idea of anti-group crimes?

Your claim seems to be that a group-prejudice motive makes a crime more serious, even if the level of intent to induce fear is exactly the same and the level of aggression is exactly the same, and the act itself (as observed) is exactly the same.

Here is a simple black-and-white example. I am stabbed by a man-hating criminal. I was not stabbed because I was/am "Pattern-Chaser", but only because I am a man, just an example of a man. The point is that, in this case, any man would do, because the real target of the attack was men, all of them. I just got unlucky that I was the example the criminal chose to demonstrate their hate.

As well as stabbing, which is a crime anyway, I was dehumanised by my selection as an example man, denying my individuality, or my 'individual personality', if you prefer.

The comparison with an 'ordinary' crime might be that I was stabbed because I burgled their house, and stole their stuff. In that case, I would have been targetted out of revenge. I offended against the criminal, and they attacked me in return. It was *me*, "Pattern-Chaser" who was targetted because it was *me* that offended them in the first place. Many/most 'ordinary' crimes are something like this.

Yes, my example is imagined, and I made it very black-and-white to illustrate my position, but can't you see that it is much worse to be the anonymous target of an attack against a group that I happen to belong to?

[Burglary, that I just mentioned in passing, is an interesting case too. It rarely targets the actual victims, and maybe one could make the argument that it is a crime against 'those who have stuff that I don't', but that would not be fair or just, or even reasonable. The phrase "hate crime" could be used for many crimes, but it isn't reasonable to do so. After all, there is no hate in burglary. There is envy, I suppose, but not real hate. Our laws, against hate crime or any other crime, must be enforced with care and concern for all, for fairness and justice. So we have to be careful to retain justice in our actions against such crimes and criminals as burglars/burglary.]

[Pattern-chaser]

However, I still have problems with it. I don't think any group should be protected from critical (or even hateful) speech.

Critical speech is one thing. "Hateful" speech, which is hurtful and harmful, is quite another. All of us should be subject to the former, and protected from the latter. Hate speech is *intended* to cause hurt. That is its one and only purpose. [Even when the hurt is not physical — "sticks and stones..." is a cruel proverb that carries a blatant lie.] That is why it should be prevented or punished. Criticism, justified criticism, is an altogether more beneficial practice.

This quite nicely highlights a stark difference between yours and my position. I do not think society should protect people from hate, or from being offended or upset.

Yes, it shows our differences quite well. I think people deserve to be protected from hate or hatred, but not (necessarily) from "being offended or upset". I see a big difference between those two.

For one thing, the demarcation between being critical and being hateful is not always clear and much debated over.

Indeed. And so it should (be "debated over"). The judgement of criminality is often difficult, as the range of situations in which real-life crime is committed is near-infinite. But that doesn't mean that our "demarcation" is wrong, or should not be attempted. It just means it's not easy to do.



The rest of your post veers off into freedon of speech, and there are several live topics on that theme at the moment, so let's leave it there, OK?