Crime Vs Hate Crime

A criminal offense against a person or property motivated by a prejudice of race, sexuality, ethnicity, religion, gender, gender identity, or disability is defined as a hate crime. Imagine a person being killed in spite of the dislike for the color of the victim’s skin or their ethnicity. Or think about a criminal committing arson by setting a mosque on fire for the reason that they do not agree with the religious affiliations attached to the mosque. Both are clear examples of a hate crime, and hate crimes have been committed for hundreds of years dating back to, as Tom Strissguth (2003) identifies, 1649 (p. 104). Current hate crime laws that are in place have every good intention in mind to keep victims safe, but there are arguments from scholars

One is that hate crime laws only protect minorities and certain groups. These scholars feel as though these laws grant minorities an unfair protection and the laws do not protect the superior race, the white race. The other stance is that criminals should not have a longer sentence in prison for their hate motivation, since they will already be doing time for the crime itself. These critics think every minority will claim a crime was committed because of hate and there will be no division between hate crime and the original crime committed. However, these critics focus on the specifics of the hate crime laws. Instead, the focus should be broader and redirected to the lack of education of hate crime laws. Creating more educated students on the hate crime laws, laws in general, and the ethics of life, could reduce criminal activity overall, not just hate

Sullivan explains his thoughts that if everyone is considered a minority, or feels as though they can be considered as a minority, then every crime has the possibility of being considered a hate crime. Sullivan states the hate crime laws are “simply another name for crime” (p. 26). In other words, Sullivan does not grasp the importance of hate crime laws and does not believe hate crimes are a serious issue, hence the title of his article “Hate Crimes Are Not a Serious Problem.” To eliminate the hate crime laws sends the message to criminals that it is acceptable to commit a crime based off of bias thoughts and get away with the hate motivation. I am not saying that picking a random individual to commit a crime on is a better alternative and deserves less jail time. However, people with different characteristics, traits, and various minorities are more prone to hate crimes, and all of them deserve to be protected. Victims deserve to be able to obtain justice since they cannot change who they are as a human being. Without these laws, these minorities or different individuals will want to stay in constant protected areas away from other hatred beings against them. With additional education and understanding in our younger citizens, these arguments could be put to