Hate Crimes Laws

US Bill of Rights, First Amendment, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.”

“Call to the way of your Lord with wisdom and goodly exhortation, and have disputations with them in the best manner; surely your Lord best knows those who go astray from His path, and He knows best those who follow the right way.” Mohammed, “The Koran” “The Bee”

“Let us suppose, therefore, that the government is entirely at one with the people, and never thinks of exerting any power of coercion unless in agreement with what it conceives to be their voice. But I deny the right of the people to exercise such coercion, either by themselves or by their government. The power itself is illegitimate. The best government has no more title to it than the worst. It is as noxious, or more noxious, when exerted in accordance with public opinion, than when in opposition to it. If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind. Were an opinion a personal possession of no value except to the owner; if to be obstructed in the enjoyment of it were simply a private injury, it would make some difference whether the injury was inflicted only on a few persons or on many. But the peculiar evil of silencing the expression of an opinion is, that it is robbing the human race; posterity as well as the existing generation; those who dissent from the opinion, still more than those who hold it. If the opinion is right, they are deprived of the opportunity of exchanging error for truth: if wrong, they lose, what is almost as great a benefit, the clearer perception and livelier impression of truth, produced by its collision with error.” J.S. Mill, “On Liberty” Chapter 2.

“Racist incidents ranging from harassment and abuse to physical violence are offences under the criminal law. Inciting racial hatred is also a criminal offence. Publishing and disseminating materials such as leaflets and newspapers that are likely to incite racial hatred is also a criminal offence. If anyone has a complaint with respect to any of these criminal matters they should be reported to the police.” The UK website on Law and the Race Relations Act. http://www.cre.gov.uk/legaladv/rra.html

Section IV and V of the Public Order Act of 1986 in the UK states that a person is guilty of a crime if they “b) displays any writing, sign or other visible representation which is threatening, abusive or insulting, within the hearing or sight of a person likely to be caused harassment, alarm or distress thereby” Section IV deals with Fear or Provocation of Violence and this requires that it be done to a person likely to be frightened by it. Section V deals with Harassment, Alarm, or Distress and this allows such things to be said quietly in a building where persons who might be harassed by them would not be expected to be present, but not in any setting where such persons might be present by accident.

The number of organizations opposed in one degree or another to Hate Crimes Legislation in the US is large. It includes the ACLU which presented a recommended amendment to the Hate Crimes Prevention Act of 1999 to prevent its becoming a thought crime act. It includes the Cato Institute which produced a brief to Congress recommending that the act should not be passed at all. A number of issues are present in the question of Hate Crimes. Among these is the question, is punishing a crime more harshly because of its motivation a thought crime bill? Is it legitimate to include non-violent acts such as the distribution of leaflets and literature that might be called hate literature as hate crimes?

Hobbes attacked this kind of civil authority in Leviathan discussing the inquisition;

Hobbes would have supported the Sovereign’s right to limit speech, but Hobbes had lived through a civil war and feared civil strife more than tyranny.

This is the most powerful argument in favor of hate crimes laws. The Social Contract must defend itself against its population splitting into groups divided by a mutual hatred of one another. Catholics vs. Protestants, the rich against the poor, one race against another. The question is, will hate crime laws act as such a defense or make matters worse by aggravating the situation, magnifying every small dispute into a contentious confrontation. Hobbes set his Sovereign Authority above the law;

Hobbes fear of civil strife led him to advocate an absolute sovereign equivalent to the Emperor in the Roman Principate. He allowed the sovereign to void all law by edict as it chose. He still admitted that it would be a violation of Natural Law for said Sovereign to act in a manner which would produce its own destruction, and that acting against the general interests of the Citizens was acting to produce its own destruction. Hobbes error was not in noting that in the final analysis all government is by men, it is in failing to note that men govern on the basis of their beliefs. Their loyalty can be to the law or to a man. Government by men loyal to the idea of government by the law is as possible and practicable as government by men loyal to the absolute authority of a quasi-divine sovereign or imperator. The authority of the law is superior to the authority of a man because the law is less arbitrary and therefore inherently less abusive.

Questions of Reciprocity

All legitimate Human Rights are Reciprocal. Ernst Zundel has been arrested and prosecuted under the body of Hate Crimes laws enacted through the British Commonwealth. His website contained revisionist literature denying the existence of the Holocaust. This was the kind of speech which can be construed as harassing, alarming or distressing Jews.

Zundel does not believe in the Holocaust. He probably feels that the Holocaust literature is an attack on his race. He is personally harassed, alarmed, and distressed by what he considers this attempt to degrade and promote hatred against his people by the Jews. Zundel believes that his revisionist literature is defending his race from racially motivated hate literature which accuses his race of a crime, the Holocaust, which he believes never happened. If we apply the British Hate Crimes laws to both parties in the dispute equally, all discussion of the Holocaust becomes illegal. It is only by applying this law selectively to suppress one side of a disagreement that it can be used.

Probably a majority of whites in the US are increasingly disturbed by discussions of slavery and the civil rights struggle. They cringe inside when these issues are raised because they know that it always prefaces an attack on them for things which they had no power over, which happened before they were born. All discussion of slavery, racism, civil rights, etc. violates the body of British law on hate crimes if it were applied equally. Whenever such issues are raised by blacks it can seem to be done to promote anger and hatred between the races, and it is psychologically harassing to whites. Assume that a law was passed making the possession or distribution of ‘hate’ literature which tends to promote hatred and anger between the races a felony. Most of the literature on slavery, segregation, lynching, the civil rights movement, etc. could be classified as hate literature under such a law. Many whites would probably be secretly relieved to have a law which makes discussion of slavery and segregation illegal. Conviction of a felony in several states results in the permanent loss of the right to vote. Most of the advocates of hate crimes laws would probably support a law which denied the right to vote to people convicted of hate crimes. 90% of blacks in the US could be quietly, legally deprived of the right to vote quietly, almost overnight under such a law. The advocates of UK style hate crimes laws in the US today are intent on forging the legal chains which can be used to bind them in the future.

The Golden Rule of Democracy

Rabbi Hillel (30 BCE to 20 CE) was one of the greatest of the Tannaim, Jewish scholars and religious leaders who lived in Israel under the Roman Occupation. His summation of the Jewish Faith, is the golden rule of democracy. Do not give the state a power over others you do not want it to have over you. This is especially true if you are a minority.

It is clear that laws which suppress hate speech and indeed any speech which may be emotionally disturbing to some members of the public go to far. There is no doubt that the entirety of the United Kingdom is far down the path towards being subjected to thought police. These laws cannot represent any attempt to protect legitimate human rights because all legitimate human rights are reciprocal in nature. Laws which are designed and intended to be applied to only one side in a dispute are inherently illegitimate.

In the US a hate crime does not exist until a real physical criminal act has been committed. Thus, any act punishable as a hate crime is already punishable by existing law. Opponents of Hate Crime laws cite this as proving that Hate Crimes legislation is unnecessary.

Motive, the Law and regulating Thought

When a person shoots another person in a hunting accident and kills him, he has taken a life with a gun. When a person buys a gun with the intent of killing another person and then shoots him, he has taken a life with a gun. In both these cases the physical action is the same. The second action, premeditated murder is currently punished more harshly than the first action, accidental manslaughter. No one says that this body of laws which judges the motive of a criminal act constitute thought crimes laws. There is nothing new or radical in changing the severity of a sentence on the basis of motive.

This does not prove that punishing a crime more harshly because it is a hate crime is necessary. It simply proves that taking the motive into account when sentencing is not radical or new. Many opponents of hate crimes laws miss this point and call the idea the implementation of thought crimes laws and the creation of though crimes police.

The problem with hate crime laws is that motive is nebulous and many people who are not haters in any meaningful sense of the word may be brought up on charges of hate crimes because other people construed their actions as being hate based.

If a nerd and a black meet, the black will almost certainly think the nerd is a racist. The nerd is used to being picked on, and will therefore tend to hold back and maintain a distance. The black will attribute this to a sense of racial superiority and a dislike of black people. The nerd will probably talk about computers or other intellectually intense geek stuff. The black will consider this an attempt to put him down because whites think blacks are less intelligent than whites. The nerd is likely to see the Black as threatening and a potential bully. Both are members of discriminated against minorities subject to hate crimes. Both will see signs of hatred in the other because of their experience of discrimination, not because it really exists.

An example of this from my own experience might be worthwhile here. It was the afternoon of 9/11 the Twin Towers had been destroyed that morning. I was working security at a gate to a power plant. Naturally orders had been issued to be more careful in enforcing security requirements than normal. A black pickup with heavily tinted windows drives through the gate without slowing down. I wave at it to stop. The driver, who is completely invisible to me, just keeps on driving ignoring me completely. I called the next guard station down the road, described what had happened and asked him to tell the driver he needed to have his ID checked when he came through the gate. The driver turned out to be a black janitor who came through the gate every day. He came driving back and started shouting at me about how I knew it was him, how I was harassing him, etc. I had absolutely no idea it was him. Believe it or not 9/11 had shaken me up a bit and I didn’t realize that pickup came through the gate every day at that time. Normally I would have. The fact that it was 9/11 and the entire US was on high terror alert didn’t phase him at all. He knew I was a vicious racist harassing him because of his race.

Probably 90% of the ‘racism’ that blacks believe they encounter on a daily basis in the US is in their own eyes and not in the people they project it onto. This phenomenon of projection is well documented psychologically. Blacks will gladly admit that Whites project negative stereotypes on them and see bad things that aren’t there. They never think that this is a two way street. Any negative that blacks experience in an encounter with a non-black will very frequently be interpreted as racism regardless of what is actually going on.

There is a good chance that anytime there is a shouting match, a fight, a vehicle accident involving a white perpetrator and a black individual that the black community will interpret it as a hate crime. If a white person has a flat tire, loses control of his vehicle, and hits a black person, he may be prosecuted as a hate criminal. Such prosecution will be demanded by the black community. If he is not prosecuted in this way, blacks will see this as proof of racism in City Hall. If he is prosecuted in this way whites who know the individual and are sure that he is not a racist will feel threatened and discriminated against. Hate Crimes laws become a tool of racial hatred and a hate crime themselves. Hate Crimes laws in this scenario become a cause, not a prevention of increased anger and hatred between the races.

Once the law is enacted every altercation involving members of different races or groups will promote more race hatred and anger regardless of how it is prosecuted. If it is not prosecuted as a hate crime the black community will be enraged and possibly riot in the streets. If it is prosecuted as a hate crime a growing number of non-blacks will be prosecuted and possibly convicted of hate crimes they are not guilty of and their friends, families and associates will become increasingly angry and frustrated.

Real hate crimes are horrendous. The ones which catch the headlines and fuel the desire for hate crimes legislation are so awful that they already qualify for the worst punishments available under the law. Calling them hate crimes cannot make it possible to punish them more harshly than the law already allows. Hate crimes laws will not make it possible to punish real hate crimes more harshly than is already possible. So indeed, hate crimes legislation does not do anything at all, except create another cause for hatred between the races.

This violates Hobbes Natural Law that the Social Contract cannot act to produce its own destruction.

Hate crime laws tend to violate freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom of assembly, free practice of religion, and do not promise to do anything except increase the anger, frustration, and hatred between different groups in society. They violate the meaning of the word tolerance discussed in the section of Separation of Church and state.