Slash and homosexuality

Steve <bboy_mn@yahoo.com> bboy_mn at yahoo.com
Thu Jan 16 10:15:16 UTC 2003


--- In HPFGU-OTChatter at yahoogroups.com, "annemehr <annemehr at y...>"
<annemehr at y...> wrote:
 
> 
> Actually, I don't understand what hate-crimes laws can be expected 
> to accomplish.  My former pastor's nephew was murdered for the two 
> dollars and change he had in his pocket -- out of complete 
> *indifference* to his life.  
> 
> Is murdering out of hate really worse than murdering out of 
> indifference?  These laws make it worse to murder (or to assault,
> or terrorize) when the motive is hatred of the victim's group.  
> But motive can be very hard to prove, and to me, murder is murder.
>  Still, I'm open to explanations on this.  Or is this skating too 
> near politics for this group <refers self to PFLAG or  somewhere 
> if this turns out to be the case>?
> ...substantially edited...
> 
> Annemehr


bboy_mn: (who is aware that we are dangerously approaching OT even for
an OT forum)

Since you identified yourself as a Conservative [in the part I cut
out] rather than a Rupublican, is it safe to assume you are in Britian
or at least not in the US? Just curious.

"...murder is murder..." actually it's not. That's why I asked if you
were in the UK, because there they don't have a range of crimes for
killing people. 

Here in the US killing someone, even intentionally falls into a
spectrum of criminal offense; conspiricy, accessory, manslaughter,
third degree murder, second degree murder, first degree murder,
negligent homicide, and each of these has a range within each catagory
that make allowances for special circumstances. 

There are allowances for 'crimes of passion'; example, someone becomes
hysterically angry and kills another person under the influence of
uncontrolable emotion, assuming they don't try for temporaty insanity,
the court would make some allowance for the 'crime of passion'. 

People who use the 'gay panic' defense as an excuse for killing a gay
person would fall somewhat in that catagory. Although, no courts
really accept the 'gay panic' defense anymore. 

Related to this is 'premeditation', if you plot and plan to kill
someone, that's different than killing them in the heat of the moment.
The opposite of heat of the moment murder is cold blooded murder.
Also, the viciousness and brutality of the crime are given
consideration. Vulnerability of the victum is given consideration. 

Point? Courts have alway give consideration to 'special circumstances'
in the crime of murder (in it's various forms). The difference is that
not all judges interpret the circumstances the same way. A good
example, several decades ago a white person killing a negro in the
south would have a sympathetic judge and a light sentence, a negro
killing a white person under the identical circumstances, would have a
very UNsypathetic judge and receive a harsh sentance. 

Now change that example to gay people; one judge would say 'good
riddance', another judge would be outraged. Hate crime create a
universal legal opinion that judges can't ignore. You can't single out
groups of people then with premeditation, stalk them, and seek them
out with the intent of killing them. Those represent special
circumstances in a crime of murder. You can't kill Jew simply because
they are Jew. You can't kill gay people simply because they are gay.
Those are special circumstances crimes. Sadly, your friend's son is no
less dead, but he was chosen at random, and was chosen for no special
reason. Motivation matters in crime. Motivation affects the
viciousness of a crime and implies harsher sentences. Hate crime laws
simply assure that the special circumstances of hate motivated crimes
are recognized and dealt with uniformly and harshly by all judges. 

So do people who go out and stalk gay people with the professed intent
of killing them and motivated by a professed hate for them because
they are gay, qualify gay people for hate crimes protection? Now take
out the word 'gay' and insert 'jew', read the sentence and ask
yourself the same question. In many place, gay people aren't protected.

Conclusion, law has alway given consideration to special circumstances
in crimes. Hate crime laws assure that 'those' particular
circumstances are not ignored or overlooked by some judges.

Just a few thoughts. (and I promise the moderators not to let this
conversation go too far.)

bboy_mn










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