Slash and homosexuality

annemehr <annemehr@yahoo.com> annemehr at yahoo.com
Thu Jan 16 18:17:38 UTC 2003


--- In HPFGU-OTChatter at yahoogroups.com, "Steve <bboy_mn at y...>" 
<bboy_mn at y...> wrote:

> > ...substantially edited...

> 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.


No, I am a US citizen, (tho' I did live in Abingdon in England the 
year I was 11).  I just said "conservative" (small "c") in response to 
John's 'liberal'.

> 
> "...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. 
> 

<snip>

 
> 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.

Aha! Okay, *there's* a good reason for the hate-crimes law.

>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.

True. But, they can still be either premeditated (stalking) or 
spontaneous (running into a person of the hated group randomly 
somewhere and killing without any forethought).  With the premeditated 
 crimes, the intent may be much easier to prove.  In the case of the 
unpremeditated murder, unless you have reliable witnesses, how would 
anyone know whether the victim was killed in a hate crime or just 
because they got into some unrelated argument?  I think some care 
would have to be taken *not* to apply the hate-crime law to cases 
where the victim's status in a group *is not proven* to be a factor in 
the crime (by the "reasonable doubt" standard).

<snip>

> 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

I guess my concern was that there have come to be so many 
circumstances to consider that it can get extremely confusing for a 
jury (or judge), which may make justice that much harder to attain.  
It almost seems like a poker game with prosecutors and defenders going 
for whatever they think they can get.  But I do take your point that 
hate-crimes need to be defined in the law to prevent judges and juries 
from purposefully overlooking their seriousness.

Now I am wondering: if someone who hates a particular group of people 
commits a crime against one of them, without any advance planning, but 
simply for belonging to that group, can that ever *truly* said to be 
"unpremeditated"?  Or does their unchecked hatred serve as a form of 
premeditation in itself? <trying to make the topic a bit less 
political and a bit more philosophical...>

Annemehr
 





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