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| I wrote this for AP English?; What do y'all think? | |
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| Tweet Topic Started: Mar 17 2010, 02:20 PM (429 Views) | |
| Darkle | Mar 17 2010, 02:20 PM Post #1 |
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Keldarian Monarchy
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Jacob ------- Ms. -------- English III AP – 7 15 December 2009 Hate Crime Legislation: A Crime in Itself Discrimination, in myriad forms, has a long history in the United States. To combat what came to be known as hate crimes, the committing of an act of crime out of a motivation of bias against the intended victims (Federal Bureau of Investigation 2009), laws were formulated and passed that would place harsher punishments upon the heads of those accused, and found guilty, of hate crimes. In fact, in 1994, a law passed on the federal level required that all punishments for hate crimes be raised, to set them specifically apart from traditional crime (United States. Cong. 1994). However, these measures of increasing punishments have amounted to a massive breach of the America’s most prized civil right. Because higher levels of punishment have been established for hate crimes, as opposed to traditional crimes, and because hate crime legislation takes into consideration the individual thoughts and opinions of the accused when deciding upon possible punishments, such legislation constitutes a violation of the First Amendment right to free speech, as it effectively places people on trial for what they think and for what they say, rather than strictly for what they do. To those of you who do not agree, consider this: a man kidnaps a child, is found and brought to court. He is now on trial for kidnapping. Should he be convicted, and let’s say for the sake of this example that he is, he will face certain punishments. Now, let’s add a new dynamic to this example. Say the man is white and the child is black. A white man has now kidnapped a black child, has been found and brought to court. This man is also on trial for kidnapping, just like the first man, but wait! The prosecution claims that this kidnapping was carried out with a motivation of bias! of hate! The punishments that the man would already have been facing for the simple act of kidnapping have just increased! Continuing this example, let’s say that this was the case, and that the man did indeed kidnap this child because of a hate-driven motivation. And now I pose a question to you, readers: Is it right to give this man a harsher punishment because he acted out of hate? Many ardent supporters of hate crime legislation would contend that, yes, it is right. Their reasoning behind this claim is that hate crimes do more damage to a person and community than a traditional crime would (United States. Cong 2009). I ask, however, in what ways are hate crimes more harmful? Does it really make that much of a difference if the man kidnapped a child because of racist motivations? Or religious ones, or any other kind? I say, no! It does not! The fact that one acts with a motivation of bias would have no bearing on the physical or psychological trauma of the victim. Would you, reader, feel any better about having been kidnapped or beaten because your aggressor wasn’t acting out on some bias they held against you? Having said that, if you still would argue for the cause of laws against hate crimes, consider this question: Is it right to give this man a harsher punishment because he was thinking a certain way while he committed the crime? Because that is what hate crime legislation amounts to: the prosecution of someone for their personal beliefs and convictions, instead of, or rather as well as, for their actions. Another question: Would you want your beliefs held against you if you were ever on trial? Most Americans would vehemently oppose such a bold move against their right to free speech. However, despite all of this, many still give full support to this legislation, claiming that hate crime is on the rise and that these laws are truly necessary. But according to the FBI statistics on hate crime, comparing the years 1999 and 2004, the levels of hate crime have remained fairly stable. To be more specific, in 2004, a total of 7649 hate crimes were committed (“Hate Crimes: Facts & Figures”). In 1999, there were 7876 committed (Federal Bureau of Investigation 1999). Those two numbers are fairly close, and, in fact, based off of this comparison, the level of hate crimes has actually decreased over time! So what does that say to hate crimes being a growing problem? And in regards to the necessity of such laws, consider the real life case of the murder of James Byrd Jr. in Texas. Byrd Jr., a black man, was accosted by a trio of white males who proceeded to tie him to the back of a truck before driving down a road with Byrd still attached. The state of Texas was without a hate crime law at the time, so the three were tried on a murder charge. Two of them were sentenced to death row and the other was sentenced to life in prison (Taylor). How would a hate crime law have affected those rulings, or made them any more effective? This trial, in a former slave state no less, is ample proof that a hate crime law is not necessary to ensure that criminals are properly punished, even when the issue of bias plays a factor in the crime. Based off of this scenario and the fact that crimes do already have punishments without hate crime laws, the fact that hate crime laws are necessary hardly seems factual anymore. The purpose of hate crime laws is to prevent, or at least attempt to prevent, hate crimes. But they don’t dispel the underlying problem - just as other laws don’t dispel the underlying problems leading to traditional crimes - which is, simply, hateful and discriminatory thought. But it is hardly fair to expect a law to do such a thing, so that can hardly be held against these hate crime laws. What can be held against these laws, and held firmly, is the fact that they actually encourage discrimination. Although this specific function may truly be unintended, it is a truth. What these laws promote, in the end, is the legal and social elevation of one class of people above another. How is this true, is a question I imagine many may respond with to this. To answer, I ask you to think back to the kidnapping example I presented earlier. The white man on trial for a hate crime has been placed on a lower legal and social status than the black child, in that case. The black child is now considered more important, evidenced by the fact that the white man is facing harsher punishments simply because he was thinking badly about the black child when he kidnapped the child. The same principle applies to any other crime that finds itself becoming labeled with hate. Let’s say a homosexual person assaults a heterosexual because he doesn’t like straight people. In court, the heterosexual will be given more importance than his attacker because his attacker happened to feel hate towards straight people. Some supporters of hate crime laws state that hate crimes not only damage the victim, but also the social group the victim belongs to, so hate crime laws are necessary to protect both (Sharpe Reference 817). This only further proves my point. The hate crime laws are in place to protect the status of social groups, and they do so by debasing the people who commit bias-fueled crimes against those groups and stripping them of their importance. Such action is akin to the American apartheid of the post slavery era. Laws were put in place to degrade the black peoples of America and prevent them from affecting the status of whites. The only differences here are that the social groups are no longer separated by law, and that the issue has expanded beyond race to include sex, religion, sexual orientation, and physical and mental capability as well (Sharpe Reference 815). But laws are still in place to demean the offenders. Laws still exist to elevate social groups above one another, and those laws are the hate crime laws! The very laws that are meant to crack down on crimes of hate, which are born of divisions in the American people, only serve to further divide those people! That alone, forgetting all else that is stacked against them, is reason enough to take action against these laws. And there are two actions I can see that would remedy the problem of America’s hate crime laws. Either, as Stuart Taylor so satirically suggested in the National Journal, make them so broad that they include all of the crime that happens all the time, and therefore increase the punishments for crime across the board, or abolish them altogether. As the latter is certainly the more practical of two options, it is the option I champion as the solution for the unconstitutional, segregating, superfluous laws that are hate crime laws. These laws are becoming as an albatross about the neck of America, dragging us down into the archaic pits of social protectionism. So, in the name of free speech, and for a freer, more accepting future, tear down these laws! Works Cited Federal Bureau of Investigation. “Hate Crime - 1999.” Federal Bureau of Investigation. Federal Bureau of Investigation, 1999. Web. 19 Nov. 2009. - - -. “Hate Crime-Overview.” Federal Bureau of Investigation. Federal Bureau of Investigation, n.d. Web. 18 Nov. 2009. “Hate Crimes: Facts & Figures.” Issues: Understanding Controversy and Society. ABC-CLIO, 2009. Web. 17 Nov. 2009. Sharpe Reference. “Hate Crimes.” Social Issues in America An Encyclopedia. Ed. James Ciment. Vol. 4. Armonk: M.E. Sharpe, Inc., 2006. 815-818. Print. 7 vols. Talyor, Stuart, Jr. “Let’s Make the Federal Hate Crimes Law Broader--Much Broader.” National Journal (Sept. 2006): n. pag. Gale Group . Web. 12 Nov. 2009. United States. Cong. Senate. Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Prevention Act. Ed. Reid. 111th Cong., 1st sess. S 909. N.p.: GPO, 2009. THOMAS (The Library of Congress) . Web. 17 Nov. 2009. - - -. - - -. Senate and House. Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994. By Brooks. 103rd Cong, 2nd sess. Washington: GPO, 1994. THOMAS (The Library of Congress). Web. 19 Nov. 2009. |
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| The Isles of Orland | Apr 4 2010, 12:30 PM Post #16 |
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Super Power
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Australia - we don't really do metaphors, its a cultural thing we're more into similes... |
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| Nuuk | Apr 4 2010, 03:44 PM Post #17 |
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Every time I hear Albatross I think "Bad luck for seamen." And then that reminds me of other things. There is a reason why you don't turn over the fish you eat too. Well written essay though. |
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8:23 PM Jul 11