Comments on: Hate Crime–Intentional Action and Motivations

By: Yancey Ward

Yancey Ward — Tue, 26 Jul 2005 10:28:46 +0000

I suppose one could argue that enforcing a stiffer sentence for crimes that are committed with racist motivations would marginally decrease the incidence of such crimes, thus hate-crime laws would be justified for that reason. Of course, one could then argue that if stiffer sentences really did reduce crimes committed with racist motivations, then why not simply increase the sentences for all crimes with similar outcomes (murder and assault, for example), in which case there would now be no differences in the severity of the punishments. So I think I would have to come down on the side of those that think there should be no difference in the punishments for crime based on whether the crime was committed with racist motivations or simply evil intent.

By: Manuel Lora

Manuel Lora — Mon, 25 Jul 2005 10:12:00 +0000

“Then there’s people who have been wronged – someone’s relative is killed, and they seek revenge, which is a form of hate. If they act, is that a “hate crime”?”

I don’t think that would be a hate crime at all. Revenge is totally justified as part of punishment. If I am killed, my estate (brother, for example, or son) would be entitled to at the very least kill my killer, and even demand extra compensation, perhaps determined on a case-by-case basis or via pre-determined insurance company policies, for the legal fees and other costs.

By: Manuel Lora

Manuel Lora — Mon, 25 Jul 2005 10:05:12 +0000

Let us not forget that from a libertarian point of view, a legal system exists to impart retribution to the afflicted and not to benefit some third party (“society”). Therefore, it doesn’t matter to me if someone steals my car because that person is greedy, needy, depressed, hated my Latino mustache, or wanted to rub his cheeks against my cheap car seat fabric. The retribution should be aimed at trying to return me to my prior condition. And beyond this, the punishment should also go according to the actual crime done, not the causes (for example, Rothbard/Block would argue for two teeth for a tooth).

By: tz

tz — Mon, 25 Jul 2005 08:54:35 +0000

I accept that punishment deters some crime, but it tends to be of limited effect. Even with the ultrabureaucratic and tyrannical state (or sometimes because of it) there are a lot of things which are not “crimes”, but do involve force or fraud.

(I will restate this below, but if by “hate crime”, you mean any crime whose victim is on a list of “politically correct” groups (women are not a minority), it is corruption or nonsense so doesn’t merit discussion)

And many crimes are committed without thought of punishment. If one lacks the virtue of prudence to not commit a crime on principle, one usually doesn’t have a few dregs of it left to prevent committing crime because of the practical problem – you might get caught, tried, convicted, and punished.

In the case of negligence – what about someone who acts carefully or negligently based on the race of the person who may get hurt or one of the other bases whereby things become hate crimes?

There is also a proper function of quarantine. If someone hears voices (without headphones, sort of an iPod-person) and ends up doing well intended harm, we normally want to prevent his action. If someone does harm out of hate (which may be no more willed than the person with the audio hallucinations), ought they not be isolated too?

In this case the reason for the incarceration is not punishment but quarantine. The person is a threat (as opposed to willing threats). Something is broken, and until it is fixed there is a reasonable expectation of harm.

The usual problem with “hate crime” legislation is that it doesn’t try to identify hate, but tends toward saying a crime against a PC class is by definition a “hate crime” even without any evidence. Periodically, someone brings up a gang of minority members who go to attack a member of a majority specifically because they are a member of a majority – yet that is not called a “hate crime” though the motivation is specifically hatred.

Such PC laws are nonsense, but it is hard to talk about the subject as if the laws were really to be used against people who acted irrationally on hatred.

Then there’s people who have been wronged – someone’s relative is killed, and they seek revenge, which is a form of hate. If they act, is that a “hate crime”?

By: Ashish Hanwadikar

Ashish Hanwadikar — Mon, 25 Jul 2005 05:21:35 +0000

Punishing a criminal has nothing to do with compensating the victim. In case of a murder the victim is already dead and no amount of punishment meted out to the murderer will give any benefit to the victim.

What the rest of the society is interested in is to avoid further occurences of such cases. It is only for this reason that we use criminal prosecution.

Therefore, it makes sense to punish criminals based not only on their intentions but also on their purposes!