This is the part where we still may disagree.

Hate crimes laws say that the person’s views will be used not only to establish the person’s motive and intent (where they are relevant), but as a reason for extra punishments. That’s wrong. It has a chiling effect on freedom of conscience. And that, it may be said, is the purpose of “hate crimes” laws: sometimes you can get their advocates to admit that they want to intimidate people from expressing certain views. That’s not right.

I still maintain that, in murder, the same thing is done. The purpose of a prosecutive to establish motive and intent is so that extra penalties (murder vs. manslaughter) can be given. So what I’m saying is I don’t want to punish the person for having certain thoughts, except when they use those thoughts in the commission of a crime such as homocide or other physical crimes.

Where I do agree with you is that it shouldn’t make a difference if the thoughts had to do with racial, sexual orientation, financial, or family motives. Again, have any thoughts you want. But if these thoughts are motives to commit a physical crime, then extra penalties are justified.

So, I would favor generalizing hate crime laws to a similar way that we separate murder from manslaughter.

murder is punishing thoughts, in addition to the crime of homocide…

Not quite. Again, and as you point out:

…one’s political and social views can be their motivation…

A murder conviction punishes the person’s degree of intent to commit the murder. To convict someone of murder, you must show that their behavior was intentional. As a supporting piece of that, you must show their likely motive. I agree that the criminal’ssocial and political views may be relevant in terms of their motive.

BUT – once you have completed the process of establishing the person’s motive and intent to murder: the person’s social and political views should play no further role. Given, say, that you and I both committed murders with equal degree of intent, it should make no difference that one of us had a financial or family motive (say) and the other had a racial motive (say). If we both murdered with full intent, we have both terrorized the community and deserve heavy punishment. If other factors are equal (number of murders, prior record, etc.), our punishments should be equal.

Hate crimes laws say that the person’s views will be used not only to establish the person’s motive and intent (where they are relevant), but as a reason for extra punishments. That’s wrong. It has a chiling effect on freedom of conscience. And that, it may be said, is the purpose of “hate crimes” laws: sometimes you can get their advocates to admit that they want to intimidate people from expressing certain views. That’s not right.

The prosecutor can look into the social and political views of the defendant all he wants.

Agreed – for the reasons, and within the limits, that I’ve given. The person’s social and political views may form part of their motive, and therefore may establish their murderous intent. Once intent is established, they should play no further role. They should not be the occasion for any ‘extra’ punishment.

Thanks, ILC. I see my comment didn’t make it, so I’ll try to repeat what I wrote yesterday.

Sorry Pat, we don’t. The difference between murder and manslaughter is the person’s degree of intent to kill… not their social or political views.

You’re right. Although it’s possible that the motivating factor of a murder could be social or political views, it doesn’t have to be. So it is different.

One of the points I was trying to make was that one of the arguments against hate crimes laws is that thoughts are being punished. My argument is that (even though the type of thoughts are different), murder is punishing thoughts, in addition to the crime of homocide.

But now we’re saying, the crime is killing, stealing or assault and… we’re going to look at the person’s political and social views, apart from their supporting role in establishing (or, as punishable in addition to) the person’s actual intent to kill, steal or assault. That can’t be good.

Okay, but as I said above, one’s political and social views can be their motivation to commit homocide or other physical crimes. For example, if a person hates gay persons so much that he wishes them dead, decides to stand outside a gay bar and waits for the next person who exits that he perceives as gay, and then kills him, this crime is murder, even though the only motive was his social views. The prosecutor would need to prove this beyond a reasonable doubt.

The prosecutor can look into the social and political views of the defendant all he wants. Just like for murder cases, he can look into the relationship between he and his victim, and speculate what how the defendant thought about the relationship, etc. But the prosecutor has the burden of proof that these thoughts were the motivation. As I mentioned in my previous post, I oppose any hate crime statute in which the burden of proof is not the same as any other crime.

Livewire, my understanding was that proving an act was a hate crime would require the same burden on the prosecution as proving any other crime. And the defendant doesn’t have to prove anything. I oppose any hate crime statute that does not have the prosecution with the burden of proof. If that is the case for hate crime statutes as it is now, I oppose them.

I suppose ILC will now complain that my having a boyfriend is “collectivism” and that my sharing anti-collectivist views with other anti-collectivists is in the same sense “collectivism”.

I think you’re confusing me with you, Iggy. Of the two of us, only you habitually make statements which are that warped and stupid.

To wit, this thread: where you have tried to argue, in essence, that Bruce’s connecting the hypocritical Gay Left and the gay-hating Islamists would somehow make Bruce a collectivist. LOL

Insanity Plea: I did it, but was unable to tell between good and evil at the time.

Murder vs. Manslaughter: It was a heat of the moment, it was an accident, I did it but didn’t mean to.

Hate crime: Not only did he do it but he did it because he is a hater.

It’s a completely different standard. In the first two, the prosecutor has to prove the mindset requires the higher penalty. In the later, the defendant has to prove a negative about himself.

Livewire, defendants lie sometimes. It’s up to the prosecutor to sort out and prove what really happened, and if applicable, the intent. I get what you’re saying about fairness here, but as I said, there are several degrees of punishment for homocide.

Then you’re requiring the jury to read my mind.

They’ve been doing it ever since murder was a crime.

Why? I mean why is ‘I want is wallet’ lower on the offence-o-meter than ‘he’s a fat whte guy, get him!’ And who determines why the perp did it? I mean if I’m killing the fat white guy, I’m going to say “I was going for his wallet’ if I know it wil get me a lighter sentence than “I was going to kill the fat white guy.”

Then you’re requiring the jury to read my mind.

Then what are you doing on this blog, Iggy? Did you notice that it’s a political blog with the identity word “GAY” in the title?

Discussing with others who share my sexual identity is quite different from supporting hate crimes legislation and issuing statements of specified outrage re. crimes against homosexuals. I suppose ILC will now complain that my having a boyfriend is “collectivism” and that my sharing anti-collectivist views with other anti-collectivists is in the same sense “collectivism”.

Will you now have the guts to argue, as logically you should, that only you know the one true conservatism; Burke and other traditional conservatives don’t?

Observe my previous statements way back in the thread:

#2 — Both statements from GOProud are consistent and run profoundly against my understanding of conservatism.

#5 — but my understanding of conservatism does not regard with any importance such politically artificial boundaries.

#15 — The only inconsistency I’m noting is between GOProud’s statements and my understanding of conservatism.

It can be seen that I have maintained that my understanding of conservatism* does not agree with the collectivism Bruce (via GOProud) is expressing. ILC’s logic (“…as you logically should…”) is bad logic, i.e. that my statements in any way imply that my definition of conservatism is the only definition, ignoring all the evidence to the contrary. This is, quite simply, argument in bad faith. To ignore the differentiation I have taken pains to repeatedly state and then make it an argument against me is deliberately counter-productive.

* For the record, I am not a conservative and this is partly why I kept repeating “my understanding of conservatism”. The term conservatism is a broad one. It’s only reasonable to approach such terms generally, acknowledging various interpretations, even if general trends can be observed such as rejecting identity politics. This I have done by any reasonable standard.

Livewire, thanks. Now that you mention it, I do recall seeing or hearing about the ad.

I guess my problem is, if I’m killed for my wallet, or I’m killed because some eco-nut decides I’m ‘white, fat, and a threat to the earth’ either way I’m dead, and he felt he had a motive for killing me. Why is ‘fat white guy’ so much worse than ‘guy with wallet’?

As a victim of the crime, it doesn’t matter. Dead is dead. But there are different degrees of the severity of crime, depending on how it happened, and what you thinking before and at the time it happened.

You reiterated my point, saving me the effort of typing it again, since Ignatius didn’t seem to understand the ‘if hate crime laws are so good, surely those groups would be supporting their use when it’s not their ox being gored’ bit the first time around.

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=57022

Also, as a footnote to the above story, not only were the firefighters awarded $34,000 in damages due to sexual harassment, but now the city of San Diego is trying to appeal the judgment:

http://www.sandiego6.com/news/local/story/City-to-Appeal-Firefighters-Awards-in-Gay-Pride/hqGM38lBXUOLMOUA2mKrRQ.cspx

In short – equal rights for me, but none for thee. Typical liberal mindset.

Regards,
Peter H.

Never mind that ILC above disagreed that that is what Bruce wrote for the purposes of disagreeing with me.

Except I didn’t. In earlier posts, I accepted your characterization – oops, I mean one of your two contradictory characterizations – of Bruce’s post:

Here is one way Iggy represented Bruce’s post:

referring to brutality against homosexuals in Islamic fundamentalist societies and the relative silence of liberal gay organizations, highlighting this silence as hypocritical

[emphasis added for the purposes of reading comprehension]

Which I was fine with. Enough for your trying to stuff words in my mouth; let’s move along:

Conservatism theoretically does not practice the identity politics of the left.

Then what are you doing on this blog, Iggy? Did you notice that it’s a political blog with the identity word “GAY” in the title?

The connection between the two is collectivism, specifically identity politics based upon sexuality. This is anti-conservative.

The way you’ve structured that, it logically follows that all collectivism is inherently anti-conservative. (You have been identifying identity politics as a mere instance of the greater and deeper offense, the latter being collectivism and the thing that would make identity politics “anti-conservative”.) Then… what do you make of the collectivism-within-limits aspects of Burke and many others in the conservative tradition? (which some admirers such as Rauch prefer to call “communitarianism”) Will you now have the guts to argue, as logically you should, that only you know the one true conservatism; Burke and other traditional conservatives don’t?

But now we’re saying, the crime is killing, stealing or assault and… we’re going to look at the person’s political and social views, apart from their supporting role in establishing (or, as punishable in addition to) the person’s actual intent to kill, steal or assault. That can’t be good.

Bruce wrote a post which cleverly connected the two: the gay persecution on the Islamists’ part and the hypocritical ignoring-of-it on the Gay Left’s part.

Never mind that ILC above disagreed that that is what Bruce wrote for the purposes of disagreeing with me. Glad he finally read it.

Let’s look instead at your characterization of Bruce and GOProud as “consistently anti-conservative” … So, there’s that as well. Even if your analysis of Bruce and GOProud were correct (which is laughably not the case), your calling them “anti-conservative” for it would still be misplaced / incorrect.

Wrong again. Conservatism theoretically does not practice the identity politics of the left. Identity politics places identity (race, sexuality, gender) over or in the center of political considerations, usually resulting in legislation crafted to appeal to or give special compensation to members of various groups. This is a form of collectivism. Conservatism theoretically rejects the notion of identity politics in favor of policies that benefit everyone regardless of such social identites.

GOProud has issued two statements which Bruce has posted here at GayPatriot. The first deals with Islamic terrorism as expressed through what he terms “gay purges” and the hypocrisy of the gay left in not expressing outrage. The second deals with hate crimes legislation, calling them “laudable”. Bruce is expressing an outrage that is based upon the sexual identity of the victims of gay purges (identity politics) and the laudable nature of hate crimes legislation (identity politics). The connection between the two is collectivism, specifically identity politics based upon sexuality. This is anti-conservative.

But we already do that for murder vs. manslaughter.

Sorry Pat, we don’t. The difference between murder and manslaughter is the person’s degree of intent to kill… not their social or political views.