Hate-crime = Thought crime?

So is your problem with laws as you think they are currently applied?Or do you have ideological reasons to object to the very notion of hate laws as appied to intent? Not in any way that I have been arguing in this thread. Feel free to try and demonstrate otherwise.Is your issue with hate laws current application (as you perceive it to be)? Or on more principled grounds? If so what?

Don't bother. Recognise that I am talking about intent. The intent is the wider aim. If I beat up Catholics with the wider aim of driving them out of my local community that isn't motive that is intent. What would you call it? So what are you calling the wider aim of intimidating a sub section of the community achieved by targetting individuals? Does it matter which woerds we use as long as the concepts and principles are clear? The anti-law lobby here seem intent on ignoring the reality that such crimes occur by yabbering on about "thought crimes" when the concept of wider intent (as I am using the term) is established in all sorts of legal areas. No. But terminological issues aside let's concentrate on concepts here. You don't seem to be denying that in reality crimes are commited against individuals with the wider intent of intimidating those within the same community. You don't seem to be denying that such intent can be evidenced. Nor do you seem to be denying that such crimes can be incredibly socially damaging. You don't even really seem to be explicitly denying that we should tackle such socially damaging situations through legislation.Instead all you have done is locate some dictionary definitions and go "Look look it says 'motive' and motive is 'thought' so hate crimes are thought crimes. Look look my dictionary says so".So aside from yor dictionary definitions which part of the intent based arguments you are being presented with do you actualy disagree with? Badly applied laws will be bad laws. With regard to effective application in the US I remain rationally agnostic But I am interested to know why you think the laws are being applied badly? Most states seem to have implemented them. No? In fact numerous countries across the globe have implemented such laws. Are they all wrong? Only if you conflate evidenced intent to intimidate a community by targetting individuals and places of social gathering with personal motivation for doing so. Whatever words we use there is no excuse for conflating concepts.Evidenced intent or "targeted subjugatiion" as I have called it here.Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.

Why so hateful Leg? Is it coz I is English? I know how much you Welsh boys hate the English. I am starting to feel very intimidated by your subjugating thoughts. I can feel the vitriol emanating from my screen. Quick - Somebody call the thought police!! HeeeeeLLLLLppppp Meeeeeee. Er no. Strangely that is exactly how I feel about your position here. Which people are in fear of violence? How do you know whioch group is being intimidated unless you take the wider intent of the attacks into account?Your position here is contradictory. Well done for making the hyperbolic misrepresentation of the year. I am talking about attempting to drive people away from the local area or close down a social facility of some sort. Not exterminating people for heavens sake.I think we can all agree that a bit more than a few hate laws are required to avert genocide. Sigh. Because it doesn't take into account the reality of the situation. The more malevolent and socially destructive reality of targeted subjugation as opposed to random and isolated crimes. Nor does it deter those who are just bullies seeking to join in preying on an easy target. So then we agree that we have deterred casual participation in prejudicial attacks. We have deterred those bullies who are not bigots as such but just opportunists who would prey on the weakest elements of the community for no other reason than having an easy target. Thus restricting hate crimes to those who are truly engaged in acts of socially destructive discrimination, intimidation and subjugation. Restricting such crimes to those who if caught will be dealt with more punitively. Protecting society in the process. And your objection to this state of affairs is.........what exactly?If those who are not fuelled by hatred but who might otherwise be tempted to take part in persecuting a localised minority purely because they are an easy target are deterred by the stigma and punishment of hate laws then the laws have succeeded. Welcome to reality!! Now we just need to evidence such intent in exactly the same way that we evidence intent in any other crime where intent is a significant component.Could this be progress on your part? Then it seems that your entire objection is based solely on your perception of how the laws have been applied. But badly applied laws will be bad laws.I approached this topic by asking myself two questions. A) Is there a role for the sort of laws under consideration? B) Can such laws be implemented effectively? I have tried to approach this thread from that point of view. Meanwhile you have, until now, seemed unable to grasp this simple concept. Instead you have been so blinkered by what appears to be your Daily Mail/Fox News tinted view of the world that any consideration of hate laws that fail to comply with this paradigm of prejudice are simply rejected on idealogical grounds.But we may have had a breakthrough here..........? I believe that pretentious pompous preaching prick with a preconceived paradigm of prejudice was the argumental alliteration you are seeking to arrive at. Here is a site that will help you with those big words: http://dictionary.comEdited by Straggler, : No reason given.

Dude you can call it whatever you want. I have called what I am talking about "targeted subjugation" for clarity but none of you guys accepted that term either. If you want to play semantics rather than concepts then I would suggest it is because your "thought crimes" argument does not hold up on a conceptual basis.Whatever the case the evidenced targeting of individuals or places of social gathering so as to intimidate a wider sub-community is not the same as doing that because you believe that Puff the Magic Dragon told you personally to go out and rid your your local community of Catholics.Wider aims beyond the individual crime commited can be evidenced. Even if your exact internal thought processes that led to that aim cannot. What term do you want to use for that wider aim? If not "intent"?

Well want do you want to call the wider aim of an individual crime? If there is evidence to suggest that a crime against an individual (or place of social gathering) is intended (there is that word again) to intimidate and subjugate other memebrs of a social group to which the the targeted individual belongs what would you call that?Or are you saying this situation just does not exist and needs no means of expression?Edited by Straggler, : Spelling

If you are interested solely in the application of the law as it stands in the US today then I will drop out of this conversation. I thought we were talking about the principle of hate crimes and whether they necessarily equate to crimes of "thought". As I have described them they do not. And you seem to agree. If you will argue only in terms of dictionary definitions and your (media driven?) perception of the current application of law then my argument of principle based on timeless and universal aspects of human nature will be lost on you. But that is not my failing. It is yours. Really? Are you denying this exists? Or that it can be evidenced? Or that it needs to be tackled legally?If you are failing to recognise the reality of crimes committed with the wider intent to intimidate and subjugate then it is your paradigm of legal prejudice that is lacking. Not mine. You can yabber on about the straw man of "thought crimes" all you want. But what we are talking about here is evidenced and real. Your ideological inability to recognise this reality does not mean it does not exist or should not be tackled. Any crime where the intent as opposed to the pure physical outcome is a significant componet of the crime. Which part of that is alien to you? I will ask you again because you have not been forthcoming:What term do you want to use for that wider aim of intimidation and subjugation?If not "intent"?Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.

FinallyYou can see that your paradigm of prejudice is based on outmoded historical thinking.It is us white well meaning but misguided middle class liberals that will need hate crime protection from angry ethnic majorities.I know it. You know it. Now we just need to persuade CS, Legend and Hyro......

Apparently this thread is about locating dictionary definitions to support a preconceived ideological position. Apparently this thread is intended for those who wish to bandy around meaningless phrases such as "thought crime" as if the mere use of such phrases provides a definitive and argument clinching point. Apparently this thread is about justifying the use of these meaningless phrases through semantics and the application of the aforementioned dictionary definitions.Nave fool that I am - I thought that this thread was about crimes committed against individuals or places of social gathering with the evidenced wider aim of intimidating and restricting the freedoms of other members of the same target group as the immediate victim. I thought this was about crimes, concepts and evidence. But apparently this is not the case.Silly me.

Intent to defraud.
Lurking with intent.
Breaking and entering with intent.
Assault with intent to rape
Possession of drugs with intent to supply.
Grevious bodily harm (see GBH link below)I could go on if you want me to? Here is another link about intent and the law.

And I do so proudly. But I can feel that hate again. You should get counselling. Some big words. And some even bigger assertions. I see you followed that dictionary link I provided. Crimes committed against individuals or places of social gathering with the evidenced wider aim of intimidating and restricting the freedoms of other members of the same target group as the immediate victim. Specifically on the basis of "racial group, religion, sexual orientation, disability, ethnicity, nationality, age, gender, gender identity, or political affiliation".Why these criteria? Because there is historical evidence of extreme prejudice on the basis of these criteria to the extent that such prejudice is a recognisable social phenomenon. If people start subjugating each other on the basis of eye colour to the point that this becomes a widespread social phenomenon then we would tackle that too. But this seems unlikely. As such occular hate offences are not required. For example. Rarely I suspect to any level that requires police or legal intervention. Except in Merthyr of course. That isn't what I am arguing in favour of though is it? And, despite your repeated assertions to the contrary, I very much doubt that is how the law actually operates in Britain either.But let's assume you are right for the sake of argument. Do we change the laws? Or do we just throw them away? Which part of my argument do you actually disagree with?You don't seem to be denying that in reality crimes are committed against individuals with the wider intent of intimidating those within the same sub-community. You don't seem to be denying that such intent can be evidenced. Nor do you seem to be denying that such crimes can be incredibly socially damaging. You don't even really seem to be explicitly denying that we should tackle such socially damaging situations through legislation.Instead all you have done is locate some dictionary definitions and go "Look look it says 'motive' and motive is 'thought' so hate crimes are thought crimes. Look look my dictionary says so". It must be very comforting to be able to ignore reality by dictionary defining your way around it. So aside from yor dictionary definitions which part of the intent based arguments you are being presented with do you actually disagree with?And before you start bleating about the legal definition of intent see my post Message 211 to CS. Nope. That doesn't answer the question. How do you know who is being threatened beyond the immediate victim? Who is being "put in fear of violence" (as you put it) in the Catholic example we are discussing? How do the laws you are advocating as sufficient recognise this act of wider intimidation? I find it hard enough to feel guilty about the things I really should feel guilty about. So oppressing a few Welshmen isn't really a big worry. In fact it is kinda fun.Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.

I will grant you that the public information sites of the UK government are very misleading with regard to the actual law. It seems the people who write home office sites for the public think the public too stupid to understand "intent" or "aggravated" and so do use the word "motivated" quite persistently.But I have looked up the actual laws as Rrhain also did and it is quite clear that the word "intent" is specifically used throughout the wording of the actual laws under consideration. Here is an example: With regard to your "thought crimes" claims point 5 might be of interest. Sounds very much like the "evidenced intent" I have been talking about no?So if anything it seems that the hate laws in the UK have a PR problem rather than the "thought crime" problems that you claim.

Well it must have been somebody Welsh who wrote the Home Office public information site then. Because they seem as ignorant of the actual wording of thw law and of the difference between intent and motive as you do. You don't work for the HO at all do you.....? I very much doubt it. Firstly you are dealing with minors who are not fully legally culpable. Secondly a crime such as assault or GBH has to have been committed before any other consideration is required. And thirdly you would have to demonstrate evidenced intent of a wider intimidatory or subjugating effect on one of the predefined (based on historical evidence) social groupings made as part of the 'normal' crime. In your opinion. Primarily based on your personal conflation of intent and motive. The lawmakers of the world seem to disagree with you. And they it seems know the difference between the two terms. Is this a problem with the actual laws you want to get rid of? Or is it the bad application of the law? Should we dispense with every single law that has been implemented over zealously or stupidly by individual police officers? Would we have any laws left if we did? Let's see what you link actually says shall we? So we see that this is not the fault of the laws themselves but an idiot police officer making a "gross error of judgement". As I suspected it would be. I am sorry but this is just hyperbolic crap. I live in one of the most socially diverse parts of London. And that makes it one of the most socially diverse places in the world. It is hardly crime free either. Now according to you the entire nation of Britain is gripped with fear of even thinking. Given the social mix in Brixton if what you say is true about the application of such laws every other crime committed would be a hate crime! Yet they aren't. Why? Because you are applying a parochially minded right wing press point of view and seeking out examples where ideiots have applied the laws badly and then taken this as some sort of defining principle to support your preconceived paradigm. In short you are talking out of your ill informed arse.Should we get rid of all the laws that individual police officers have applied stupidly? Would we have any laws left if we did? That one I have been making all thread. The one you seem determined to disagree with in principle despite grudgingly agreeing with all of the steps taken to reach the conclusion. Which races or religions do you think are specifically protected by the law over any others? Or is the law specifically worded so as to be blind as to which religion or race is being targeted? Still on about "thought crimes" huh? Which part of evidenced intent are you still struggling to comprehend? Did you read the actual UK laws in question? In Message 218. And also the message about intent in the law Message 211.Given that intent is a common component of numerous laws are you suggesting that all laws where intent is a significant component are "thought crimes"? Should we get rid of all of them? Or could it be that your entire "thought crimes" argument is a massive popular misconception?I think the biggest problem with the hate crime laws in the UK is one of PR. And this isn't helped by the sort of imbecilic application you have highlighted. But that hardly justifies recinding the laws in question now does it? Should we get rid of all the laws that individual police officers have applied stupidly? Would we have any laws left if we did? just to be clear - This is not a rhetorical question.Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.

Ding ding. Well let me "answer" your question with some questions. Is "beyond reasonable doubt" a subjective judgement at all? If crimes of any sort were entirely free of subjectivity we could in principle do away with judges and juries and just run the evidence through a computer programme to determine guilt. Yes? But I cannot ever see this happening. Surely a degree of subjectivity is just a fact of human reality? Are you saying that we should do away with all crimes where intent is a significant component because determination of guilt in such cases is too reliant on subjectivity? Presumably not. So are you then applying harsher criteria to hate laws because you oppose them on other grounds? Intent in many forms can be, and frequently is, evidenced in a court of law.Secondly as I have said previously one of the things about practical bigotry is that to be effective the intent needs to be reasonably clear. Graffiti that says "Go home Pakkis" doesn't leave much room for interpretation and is fairly typical of the sort of thing under discussion. Likewise "Burn in hell fags" doesn't leave much to the imagination. Active bigots determined enough to commit the sort of crimes under discussion are very helpfully not shy about expressing their bigotry. In fact in my (albeit anecdotal) experience they tend to be rather proud of themselves. And then there is all the surrounding evidence as with any other crime with a significant intent component.But in short if the sub-section of society in question is blissfully unaware that they are being intimidated then the intimidator isn't doing a very good job. So in cases that matter I don't think the issues you raise are likley to be as much of a problem as you are assuming they will be. As I have said previously I think it is more at the local community level that hate laws are most relevant. So I would quibble what it is you mean by "the entire Islamic community". As you pointed out, at a national level a civil rights movement rather than a few laws is probably more appropriate (although some laws might indicate the start of a wider social movement). But let's assume you mean closing the local mosque down or, more realistically, stopping local Muslims using said facility freely and without fear as is their basic right. Then I guess so.The obvious thing to do is question the perpetrator. I personally suspect that (for the reasons stated above) the answers might be both forthcoming and quite revealing in many cases. I also guess that this is where motive in terms of securing a conviction (as I believe you described the role of motive earlier) and intent in terms of what the specific crime committed actually is, and thus the punishment incurred, come into play. But ultimately wider intent should be evidenced in exactly the same that intent is evidenced for any other crime.I am no lawyer. But it seems to me that now we have definitively established that the actual laws under discussion are based on evidenced intent rather than motive - That, gripes about how well (or not) such laws are being applied in practise aside, there is little to distinguish these laws from any other. In principle.If you disagree then I am not sure on what basis exactly?

Well nor is it illegal for you to intend to sleep with someone elses wife or to intend to relieve them of the cash in their bank account. Whether your intentions are illegal or not (regardless of success - e.g. intent to defraud) very much depends on how you are intending to go about achieving those aims. Doesn't this rather prove the very point you are opposing? Doesn't this demonstrate that the crimes you are opposing on the basis of them being "thought crimes" can in fact be no such thing? Because as you have pointed out it is perfectly legal to express personal prejudices and even campaign on the basis of ones prejudices as long as you are not actively engaging in criminal activities to do so. And you just happen to be repeatedly trashing Mosques. Isn't that part of the contextual evidence really rather crucial? Well nor is it illegal for you to intend to sleep with someone elses wife or to intend to relieve them of the cash in their bank account. Whether your intentions are illegal or not (regardless of success) very much depends on how you are intending to go about achieving those aims.There may in some cases be a fine line between expressing oneself and intentionally intimidating others but surely that is why we have judges, juries and an entire legal system to differentiate between such legalistic subtleties. I don't see this as a weakness of any particular set of laws. But as an inevitable fact of almost any law. It should not be illegal to want your community to be Muslim free and to express that desire. It should be illegal to seek to achieve that wider intent through individual acts of intimidation, threat or violence that have that intent as their basis. And I still fail to see why exactly you want to ignore the reality of that wider intent in the law?. If sufficiently evidenced. Why Oni? I am really struggling to understand your objection to taking wider evidenced intent into account here. Why pretend that these crimes are identical to isolated random incidents when they blatantly are not the same in terms of actual or intended effect? Is it a principled objection? A practical one? I don't understand your position here at all. You are conflating the perfectly legal intent to express your desires and act upon them within the law with the illegal intent of achieving these desires through illegal means.Seriously - Now that we have definitively established that the laws under consideration are based on intent I don't see how anyone can meaningfully argue that they are "thought crimes". Any more so than any other crime in which intent is a significant component. So surely the answer to the main question posed in the OP has to be - "NO".Or am I missing something here?Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.

Do you agree that the "thought crime" premise of the OP is false? In light of us having definitively differentiated between intent and motive? I think you are the one missing the point here.Is adultery illegal? I didn't think it was. But fooling said wife into sleeping with you because she thinks you are her husband (no - don't ask me how this works in practise either) is illegal. So intended method, not actual aim, is important here. And when I said "relieve them of the cash in their bank account" I wasn't thinking of stealing or fraud necessarily. It is possible to just persuade people in a wholly legal way to give you their money. How was it intended to relieve them of their money? That is the question. In short the difference between legality and illegaility is very much determined by how you intend to acheive your aims. No? Oh fair play. That makes you more interesting then. But I still maintain that the "thought crime" premise of the OP has been refuted. Do you agree? If not why not? Well we have covered the fact that the "how" matters above. But if that wider intent is both evidenced and more socially destructive than the same crime without the wider intent why would the law not seek to recognise and tackle the reality of that situation? If it was called vandalism with intent to intimidate/subjugate/whatever the legal phraseology here is - Would that make things clearer? Well should it be the only thing punishable regardless of wider intent? that is the question here is it not?How is vandalism (or assault) with intent to intimidate/subjugate/whatever the legal phraseology here is different conceptually to, for example, arson with the intent to defraud? Here arson is the primary crime. But intent to defraud the insurance company was the wider aim of the crime.How are they conceptually different in your view?Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.Edited by Straggler, : Spelling grammar clarity..