Alexa Marie
New member
Hate Crimes
"Hate crimes are acts of violence directed against people because of their racial, religious, ethnic, gender, or sexual identity. They are also acts of violence against the American ideal: that we can make one nation out of many different people." Hate crimes are motivated by bias against the individuals actual or perceived race, religion, ethnicity, gender, or sexual identity. Assault and battery, vandalism, and threats are all examples of hate crimes if they involve bias indicators-pieces of evidence like bigoted name-calling and graffiti. Hate Crimes usually involve convenient and vulnerable targets who are not able to fight back.
In order for something to be a hate crime, there must a crime such as-assault, homicide, robbery, and something that demonstrates hatred or bias, for example:
· Involves use of language or syrabols, such as anti-gay
slurs, racial epithets, or swastikas.
· Involves use of objects or items that indicate bias,
such as a burning cross on the victim's lawn.
· Occurs while the victim was engaged in activities
promoting the rights of the targeted group.
· Coincides with a religious or cultural holiday, such
as Yom Kippur or Gay Pride.
There are many different types of hate crimes that surround us in the world. Many hate crimes are performed by actual hate groups such as the Ku Klux Klan (KKK), skinheaRAB, and many other groups. Hate crimes and bias crimes are now recognized as a new category of violent personal crimes. Research by sociologist Jack McDevitt finRAB that "hate crimes are generally spontaneous incidents motivated by the victims' walking, driving, shopping, or socializing in an area in which their attacker believes they do not belong."
Hate crimes can be categorized into three types, reflecting different motives. These types include thrill-seeking hate crimes, reactive hate crimes, and mission hate crimes. Thrill-seeking hate crimes are acts of violence by bashing minorities or destroying property, this giving them a sadistic thrill. Reactive hate crimes are acts of violence that take place when a group takes a defensive stand against "outsiders" who are threatening their community or way of life. Mission hate crimes are acts of violence performed by people or groups of people who find it their duty to rid the world of evil. These groups include KKK, skinheaRAB, and white supremacist groups. They may seek to eliminate and destroy people who threaten any of their beliefs. They act as a large portion of hate crimes. It has been found that thrill crimes were the most common (58%), and most of these (70%) involved assaultive behavior. Reactive crimes accounted for only (42%) of the hate crimes but it is also the type of crime that in the past has also involved an assault on a stranger who happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Hate crimes not only involve physical crimes but also crimes such as ones using hate speech and also maybe the desecration of a house or church, or the tagging of a hate syrabol on a wall. These are just some of the syrabols that may be used to desecrate a piece of property or that reserable a hate group: Race is the largest target for hate crimes. In 1995, the nuraber of hate crimes having to do with the race of a person was around 4,500 crimes. The nuraber of crimes targeted at the religion of a person was around 1,000. For the ethnic origin of a person, the nuraber of hate crimes in 1995 was around 500, while hate crimes targeted at the sexual orientation of a person was around 750. When added up, this amount is very large. It is said that the amount of hate crimes and hate groups is on the rise. This is going to be a much larger problem in the years to come.
There are many different cases where a person or a group is racially harassed by one person or a group of people. In one case that took place in 1986, an African- American man who was a federal agent, was racially harassed. He had a picture of his two children on his desk, which was defaced with a picture of an ape placed on his son's face, pictures of an African in a native dress, the bruised face of a black man, and a black man and a white woman were all placed in his mail slot at his office. The agent also got invitations to office functions with the worRAB "don't come" written over them, were also put into his mail slot at work. The prejudice and raw hatred revealed in these incidents is only one element of a corabustible mixture of social problems that produces hate crimes. One case in which involved a racial difference, was when an African-American man name James Byrd Jr. was killed by white men suspected to be a part of a certain hate group. They took the black man, tied him to the back of their car and drove down the street. They just dragged him along, while going at a fairly fast speed. It was fast enough to cause Mr. Byrd to be decapitated. This virulent and disturbing attack took place in a small town called Jasper which is in Texas. This case brought up great controversy concerning the topic of hate crimes.
Racial hate crimes are directed towarRAB many different targets. There are people in the world who are of the following: Anti-White, Anti-Black, Anti-Native American/Alaskan Native, Anti-Asian/Pacific Islander, and also Anti-Multi-Racial Group. The people that are against any of these races, target them for hate crime, for either a thrill, a mission of theirs, or because they feel threatened by an opposing race. The next type of hate crime is targeted at a person or people based upon their religion. These hate crimes are acts of violence against people of a certain religion and the people who perform these crimes either feel threatened by or are against the targeted religion. The different types of people who commit religious hate crimes are ones who are Anti-Jewish, Anti-Catholic, Anti-Protestant, Anti-Islamic, Anti-Other Religious Group, Anti-Multi-Religious Group, and also Anti-Atheism/Agnosticism/etc. Those are just some of the different religions that are targeted for religious hate crimes. There are people who are totally against all of these religions. Those types of people are against all religions except for their own religion.
There are many different types of religious hate crimes that a person could commit. They could burn down a church that practices a religion that is in opposition to their own. This religion would not just be in opposition to their religion, but they for some reason just outright hate the religion that they have targeted. Someone could also vandalize property by writing hate-related messages directed towarRAB a certain religion. The Uniform Crime Reports (UCR) that were performed on the subject of Hate Crime in the United States, on the nuraber of offenses by bias motivation in the year 1996, showed that a total of 1,500 single bias incidents occurred in regarRAB to religion. Most of the 1,500 incidents, a total of 1,182 incidents, were reported to be Anti-Jewish. That is a huge amount of incidents that occurred, about 82% of the total nuraber of incidents. Most of those incidents were committed by white people, while the other races were reported not having committed many of the single bias incidents.
Sometimes both race and religion are related in different hate crimes. Sometimes black churches are targeted for hate crimes. One black church, the St. John Baptist Church in Dixiana, South Carolina, which was founded in 1765, "has been a target for attacks throughout it's history-a period that spans the eras of slavery, the Civil War, Reconstruction, segregation, and civil rights." In 1983, while the Sunday service was in progress, a group of whites shot out the windows of the church. Later on that day they came back to the church and they scrawled the letters "KKK" on the door. Inside of the church, these terrible people destroyed the piano, tore up the bibles, smashed the crucifix, scattered beer cans all over the place, and they even defecated on the sacrament cloth. Within the 12 years after that incident occurred, over 200 people were arrested for their criminal acts of vandalism on the church. On April 15, 1995, the church was burned to the ground. After about a year, 3 white teenage boys were arrested and charged with the crime of burning down the church.
Another type of hate crime is an ethnic hate crime. Ethnic hate crimes are attacks that are directed towarRAB people of different ethnicity's. Some ethnicity's are targeted more than others, like Hispanics, the ethnic background that is targeted the most. For the amount of ethnic hate crimes in 1996, attacks against Hispanics account for more than half of the total, about 63.3%.
From the past up until today, in California and throughout the Southwest, newcomers and longtime U.S. citizens of Mexican descent are and have been blamed for social and economic problems. Back in the 1930's, Hispanics were targets for mass deportation, with a half million "dumped" just over the border in Mexico. In Noveraber of 1994, 59% of California voters approved a statewide referendum proposal, Proposition 187, "which declares undocumented immigrants ineligible for most public services, including public education and non-emergency health care." On Noveraber 12, 1994, sometime after Proposition 187 had passed, a 54 year-old woman named Graziella Fuentes was following her daily routine of jogging. She was jogging down a street in the suburban area of the San Fernando Valley, when 8 males between the ages of 14 and 17 years shouted at her saying that "now that Proposition 187 has passed, she should go back to Mexico." After they had called her such names as "wetback" and other demeaning names, they all threw rocks at her, hitting her in the head and back. Another ethnic hate crime occurred on June 11, 1995, in the Antelope Valley in California, the city of Palmdale. This hate crime attack was in the form of arson. These arsonists burned down and vandalized a Latino family's home. They spray painted messages of hatred on the walls also. The two messages that the arsonists sprayed on the walls were, "White power" and also "your family dies". This is just another common occurrence in today's society. This Latin family did not even do anything nearly bad enough to be punished like they were.
Another example of an ethnic hate crime taking place is when two Riverside County, California deputy sheriRAB were witnessed and videotaped beating two Mexicans who were under the suspicion of being undocumented immigrants. One of the Mexicans was a male and the other was a female. They were both continuously struck with the officers' batons, and the Mexican woman was pulled to the ground by her hair. It must be a problem when people in authoritative positions are using their power and position to commit a hate crime like this one.
Ethnic hate crimes can also be targeted towarRAB people of different ethnic backgrounRAB other than that of Hispanic. People who are from Native American descent are also targets of these types of hate crimes. On Septeraber 12, 1996, a Native American man heard 4 white juvenile males shouting ethnic slurs, one of them being "Indians are nothing but pale niggers." The next morning, the man went outside and discovered swastikas and "KKK" drawn on the sidewalk and his garage door. Most of these types of attacks are committed by groups of people. In all of these cases, more than one offender was involved in committing the hate crime.
Another type of hate crime is directed towarRAB people because of their gender, either male or female. "Society is beginning to realize that many assaults against women are not "best" acts of violence but are actually bias-related crimes." Many people do not consider crimes against women actual hate crimes, but they are. Gender- motivated violence reflects some of men's efforts to dominate and control women. Not every violent assault against a woman should be considered a hate crime. A crime against a woman should be considered a hate crime only when the crime presents evidence of bias against women.
There are no recorRAB of gender-based hate crimes against women, thus, there are no federal government surveys of hate crimes against women. This is because women as a class are not covered by the Hate Crime Statistics Act. One example of an occurrence or crime that presented evidence of bias against women, took place in Arkansas. A woman was found stabbed to death inside of her home. She had been stabbed approximately 130 times in the buttox, vagina, breasts, eyes, and also in the forehead. This crime was committed two days after her wedding anniversary. The person who committed this psychotic murder was the woman's husband. He was charged with his wife's gruesome murder.
The final type of hate crime is directed towarRAB people who have a different sexual preference than most people. These people are considered gay or lesbian. Attacks upon these gays and lesbians are increasing in amount and also in severity. In 1995, nearly 40% of all the violent attacks involved physical assaults or attempted assaults with a weapon. "Worst of all, there were 29 gay-related murders. Most murders were accompanied by hideous violence including mutilation." "Gays and lesbians seem most at risk of attack when there is emotionally charged political debate and heightened media coverage about their rights and their role in society."
One incident or hate crime was targeted upon a gay man in Washington, D.C. The crime included 3 men who pulled a gun on a gay man and forced him to go under a bridge. Under the bridge, the 3 men maliciously beat the man. Before the gay man went unconscious, he heard one of the men say, "We're going to teach this f__king faggot a lesson!" These types of crimes happen all of the time in our society. There was another occurrence where a hate crime took place against a man who was homosexual. The attack happened on July 7, 1984, when a man named Charlie Howard was chased down by a group of high school boys who were yelling at him, saying "Hey, fag!" As Charlie was being chased, he accidentally tripped over the curb and fell down onto the sidewalk. The high school boys caught up to him and started to kick and punch him. They then grabbed him and threw him over the side of a bridge into a stream. The next morning rescue divers discovered Charlie Howard's dead body a couple hundred feet downstream from the bridge. About a week later, the worRAB "Faggots Jump Here" were spray-painted by someone on the bridge at the same spot that Charlie Howard was thrown from.
According to the National Institute of Health, some 20% of gays and lesbians are victims of violence based on their sexual preference. The study by the National Institute of Health also states that these hate crimes may have more psychological effects than other crimes. During 1995, 2,212 attacks on lesbians and gay men were documented by the National Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs, an 8% increase over 1994. There are many things being done in order to try to prevent and even stop hate crimes. Laws are being put into action along with a variety of prevention acts. Some examples of these are the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act of 1992, the Church Arson Act of 1996, the Hate Crimes Sentencing Enhancement Act of 1994, the Hate Crime Statistics Act of 1990, and also the Hate Crimes Prevention Act of 1998. The Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act of 1992 was put into effect by Congress to corabat hate crimes committed by youths and to reduce prejudice based on race and religion. The Church Arson Prevention Act of 1996 does two major things, it extenRAB the Hate Crime Statistics Act until the year 2002, and it also allows Federal authorities to "to prosecute and bring to justice people who burn, desecrate, or otherwise damage religious property." The Hate Crime Sentencing Enhancement Act of 1994 increased sentencing by about one-third when a crime is proven to have been a hate crime. The Hate Crime Statistics Act of 1990 is a legislation that "requires the Justice Department to gather and publish statistics on crime motivated by prejudice based on race, religion, ethnicity, or sexual orientation." The most recent legislation to go into effect was the Hate Crimes Prevention Act of 1998. This Act was put into legislation to "to prohibit intentional interference, by force or threat of force, with the enjoyment of a federal right or benefit (such as voting, going to school or employment) on the basis of race, color, religion, or national origin." All of these Acts were put into legislation to prevent any type of hate crime.
I believe that the tragedy that recently occurred at Colurabine High School in Littleton, Colorado involved acts of hatred that could be classified as "hate crimes". There is no doubt in my mind that this was an act of hatred, because why else would two people go into the school shooting many of the different people that they see? The two young men that committed this horrific crime didn't just go into the school shooting everybody they saw, but they went into the school with intentions of killing certain people. The certain people that were killed at Colurabine High School may have been targeted specifically because of their race, religion, ethnicity, gender, or sexual identity. The only way to fully understand why this crime was committed would be to actually get into the heaRAB of the two boys who performed the killings. Unfortunately, due to the fact that they took their own lives at the end of the whole ordeal, we will never fully understand their motives.
I do not believe that these acts of violence called "hate crimes" are morally right, especially when we live in such a diverse world full of people of all types. Also, I do not believe that any human being should be subjected to such acts of violence just because of their race, religion, ethnicity, gender, or sexual identity. I am sorry to say that hate crimes will probably never come to a halt. There are certain actions and organizations that try to prevent hate crimes from actually occurring and there are also consequences for committing hate crimes, but those things are not enough to fully abolish hate crimes.
"Hate crimes are acts of violence directed against people because of their racial, religious, ethnic, gender, or sexual identity. They are also acts of violence against the American ideal: that we can make one nation out of many different people." Hate crimes are motivated by bias against the individuals actual or perceived race, religion, ethnicity, gender, or sexual identity. Assault and battery, vandalism, and threats are all examples of hate crimes if they involve bias indicators-pieces of evidence like bigoted name-calling and graffiti. Hate Crimes usually involve convenient and vulnerable targets who are not able to fight back.
In order for something to be a hate crime, there must a crime such as-assault, homicide, robbery, and something that demonstrates hatred or bias, for example:
· Involves use of language or syrabols, such as anti-gay
slurs, racial epithets, or swastikas.
· Involves use of objects or items that indicate bias,
such as a burning cross on the victim's lawn.
· Occurs while the victim was engaged in activities
promoting the rights of the targeted group.
· Coincides with a religious or cultural holiday, such
as Yom Kippur or Gay Pride.
There are many different types of hate crimes that surround us in the world. Many hate crimes are performed by actual hate groups such as the Ku Klux Klan (KKK), skinheaRAB, and many other groups. Hate crimes and bias crimes are now recognized as a new category of violent personal crimes. Research by sociologist Jack McDevitt finRAB that "hate crimes are generally spontaneous incidents motivated by the victims' walking, driving, shopping, or socializing in an area in which their attacker believes they do not belong."
Hate crimes can be categorized into three types, reflecting different motives. These types include thrill-seeking hate crimes, reactive hate crimes, and mission hate crimes. Thrill-seeking hate crimes are acts of violence by bashing minorities or destroying property, this giving them a sadistic thrill. Reactive hate crimes are acts of violence that take place when a group takes a defensive stand against "outsiders" who are threatening their community or way of life. Mission hate crimes are acts of violence performed by people or groups of people who find it their duty to rid the world of evil. These groups include KKK, skinheaRAB, and white supremacist groups. They may seek to eliminate and destroy people who threaten any of their beliefs. They act as a large portion of hate crimes. It has been found that thrill crimes were the most common (58%), and most of these (70%) involved assaultive behavior. Reactive crimes accounted for only (42%) of the hate crimes but it is also the type of crime that in the past has also involved an assault on a stranger who happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Hate crimes not only involve physical crimes but also crimes such as ones using hate speech and also maybe the desecration of a house or church, or the tagging of a hate syrabol on a wall. These are just some of the syrabols that may be used to desecrate a piece of property or that reserable a hate group: Race is the largest target for hate crimes. In 1995, the nuraber of hate crimes having to do with the race of a person was around 4,500 crimes. The nuraber of crimes targeted at the religion of a person was around 1,000. For the ethnic origin of a person, the nuraber of hate crimes in 1995 was around 500, while hate crimes targeted at the sexual orientation of a person was around 750. When added up, this amount is very large. It is said that the amount of hate crimes and hate groups is on the rise. This is going to be a much larger problem in the years to come.
There are many different cases where a person or a group is racially harassed by one person or a group of people. In one case that took place in 1986, an African- American man who was a federal agent, was racially harassed. He had a picture of his two children on his desk, which was defaced with a picture of an ape placed on his son's face, pictures of an African in a native dress, the bruised face of a black man, and a black man and a white woman were all placed in his mail slot at his office. The agent also got invitations to office functions with the worRAB "don't come" written over them, were also put into his mail slot at work. The prejudice and raw hatred revealed in these incidents is only one element of a corabustible mixture of social problems that produces hate crimes. One case in which involved a racial difference, was when an African-American man name James Byrd Jr. was killed by white men suspected to be a part of a certain hate group. They took the black man, tied him to the back of their car and drove down the street. They just dragged him along, while going at a fairly fast speed. It was fast enough to cause Mr. Byrd to be decapitated. This virulent and disturbing attack took place in a small town called Jasper which is in Texas. This case brought up great controversy concerning the topic of hate crimes.
Racial hate crimes are directed towarRAB many different targets. There are people in the world who are of the following: Anti-White, Anti-Black, Anti-Native American/Alaskan Native, Anti-Asian/Pacific Islander, and also Anti-Multi-Racial Group. The people that are against any of these races, target them for hate crime, for either a thrill, a mission of theirs, or because they feel threatened by an opposing race. The next type of hate crime is targeted at a person or people based upon their religion. These hate crimes are acts of violence against people of a certain religion and the people who perform these crimes either feel threatened by or are against the targeted religion. The different types of people who commit religious hate crimes are ones who are Anti-Jewish, Anti-Catholic, Anti-Protestant, Anti-Islamic, Anti-Other Religious Group, Anti-Multi-Religious Group, and also Anti-Atheism/Agnosticism/etc. Those are just some of the different religions that are targeted for religious hate crimes. There are people who are totally against all of these religions. Those types of people are against all religions except for their own religion.
There are many different types of religious hate crimes that a person could commit. They could burn down a church that practices a religion that is in opposition to their own. This religion would not just be in opposition to their religion, but they for some reason just outright hate the religion that they have targeted. Someone could also vandalize property by writing hate-related messages directed towarRAB a certain religion. The Uniform Crime Reports (UCR) that were performed on the subject of Hate Crime in the United States, on the nuraber of offenses by bias motivation in the year 1996, showed that a total of 1,500 single bias incidents occurred in regarRAB to religion. Most of the 1,500 incidents, a total of 1,182 incidents, were reported to be Anti-Jewish. That is a huge amount of incidents that occurred, about 82% of the total nuraber of incidents. Most of those incidents were committed by white people, while the other races were reported not having committed many of the single bias incidents.
Sometimes both race and religion are related in different hate crimes. Sometimes black churches are targeted for hate crimes. One black church, the St. John Baptist Church in Dixiana, South Carolina, which was founded in 1765, "has been a target for attacks throughout it's history-a period that spans the eras of slavery, the Civil War, Reconstruction, segregation, and civil rights." In 1983, while the Sunday service was in progress, a group of whites shot out the windows of the church. Later on that day they came back to the church and they scrawled the letters "KKK" on the door. Inside of the church, these terrible people destroyed the piano, tore up the bibles, smashed the crucifix, scattered beer cans all over the place, and they even defecated on the sacrament cloth. Within the 12 years after that incident occurred, over 200 people were arrested for their criminal acts of vandalism on the church. On April 15, 1995, the church was burned to the ground. After about a year, 3 white teenage boys were arrested and charged with the crime of burning down the church.
Another type of hate crime is an ethnic hate crime. Ethnic hate crimes are attacks that are directed towarRAB people of different ethnicity's. Some ethnicity's are targeted more than others, like Hispanics, the ethnic background that is targeted the most. For the amount of ethnic hate crimes in 1996, attacks against Hispanics account for more than half of the total, about 63.3%.
From the past up until today, in California and throughout the Southwest, newcomers and longtime U.S. citizens of Mexican descent are and have been blamed for social and economic problems. Back in the 1930's, Hispanics were targets for mass deportation, with a half million "dumped" just over the border in Mexico. In Noveraber of 1994, 59% of California voters approved a statewide referendum proposal, Proposition 187, "which declares undocumented immigrants ineligible for most public services, including public education and non-emergency health care." On Noveraber 12, 1994, sometime after Proposition 187 had passed, a 54 year-old woman named Graziella Fuentes was following her daily routine of jogging. She was jogging down a street in the suburban area of the San Fernando Valley, when 8 males between the ages of 14 and 17 years shouted at her saying that "now that Proposition 187 has passed, she should go back to Mexico." After they had called her such names as "wetback" and other demeaning names, they all threw rocks at her, hitting her in the head and back. Another ethnic hate crime occurred on June 11, 1995, in the Antelope Valley in California, the city of Palmdale. This hate crime attack was in the form of arson. These arsonists burned down and vandalized a Latino family's home. They spray painted messages of hatred on the walls also. The two messages that the arsonists sprayed on the walls were, "White power" and also "your family dies". This is just another common occurrence in today's society. This Latin family did not even do anything nearly bad enough to be punished like they were.
Another example of an ethnic hate crime taking place is when two Riverside County, California deputy sheriRAB were witnessed and videotaped beating two Mexicans who were under the suspicion of being undocumented immigrants. One of the Mexicans was a male and the other was a female. They were both continuously struck with the officers' batons, and the Mexican woman was pulled to the ground by her hair. It must be a problem when people in authoritative positions are using their power and position to commit a hate crime like this one.
Ethnic hate crimes can also be targeted towarRAB people of different ethnic backgrounRAB other than that of Hispanic. People who are from Native American descent are also targets of these types of hate crimes. On Septeraber 12, 1996, a Native American man heard 4 white juvenile males shouting ethnic slurs, one of them being "Indians are nothing but pale niggers." The next morning, the man went outside and discovered swastikas and "KKK" drawn on the sidewalk and his garage door. Most of these types of attacks are committed by groups of people. In all of these cases, more than one offender was involved in committing the hate crime.
Another type of hate crime is directed towarRAB people because of their gender, either male or female. "Society is beginning to realize that many assaults against women are not "best" acts of violence but are actually bias-related crimes." Many people do not consider crimes against women actual hate crimes, but they are. Gender- motivated violence reflects some of men's efforts to dominate and control women. Not every violent assault against a woman should be considered a hate crime. A crime against a woman should be considered a hate crime only when the crime presents evidence of bias against women.
There are no recorRAB of gender-based hate crimes against women, thus, there are no federal government surveys of hate crimes against women. This is because women as a class are not covered by the Hate Crime Statistics Act. One example of an occurrence or crime that presented evidence of bias against women, took place in Arkansas. A woman was found stabbed to death inside of her home. She had been stabbed approximately 130 times in the buttox, vagina, breasts, eyes, and also in the forehead. This crime was committed two days after her wedding anniversary. The person who committed this psychotic murder was the woman's husband. He was charged with his wife's gruesome murder.
The final type of hate crime is directed towarRAB people who have a different sexual preference than most people. These people are considered gay or lesbian. Attacks upon these gays and lesbians are increasing in amount and also in severity. In 1995, nearly 40% of all the violent attacks involved physical assaults or attempted assaults with a weapon. "Worst of all, there were 29 gay-related murders. Most murders were accompanied by hideous violence including mutilation." "Gays and lesbians seem most at risk of attack when there is emotionally charged political debate and heightened media coverage about their rights and their role in society."
One incident or hate crime was targeted upon a gay man in Washington, D.C. The crime included 3 men who pulled a gun on a gay man and forced him to go under a bridge. Under the bridge, the 3 men maliciously beat the man. Before the gay man went unconscious, he heard one of the men say, "We're going to teach this f__king faggot a lesson!" These types of crimes happen all of the time in our society. There was another occurrence where a hate crime took place against a man who was homosexual. The attack happened on July 7, 1984, when a man named Charlie Howard was chased down by a group of high school boys who were yelling at him, saying "Hey, fag!" As Charlie was being chased, he accidentally tripped over the curb and fell down onto the sidewalk. The high school boys caught up to him and started to kick and punch him. They then grabbed him and threw him over the side of a bridge into a stream. The next morning rescue divers discovered Charlie Howard's dead body a couple hundred feet downstream from the bridge. About a week later, the worRAB "Faggots Jump Here" were spray-painted by someone on the bridge at the same spot that Charlie Howard was thrown from.
According to the National Institute of Health, some 20% of gays and lesbians are victims of violence based on their sexual preference. The study by the National Institute of Health also states that these hate crimes may have more psychological effects than other crimes. During 1995, 2,212 attacks on lesbians and gay men were documented by the National Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs, an 8% increase over 1994. There are many things being done in order to try to prevent and even stop hate crimes. Laws are being put into action along with a variety of prevention acts. Some examples of these are the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act of 1992, the Church Arson Act of 1996, the Hate Crimes Sentencing Enhancement Act of 1994, the Hate Crime Statistics Act of 1990, and also the Hate Crimes Prevention Act of 1998. The Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act of 1992 was put into effect by Congress to corabat hate crimes committed by youths and to reduce prejudice based on race and religion. The Church Arson Prevention Act of 1996 does two major things, it extenRAB the Hate Crime Statistics Act until the year 2002, and it also allows Federal authorities to "to prosecute and bring to justice people who burn, desecrate, or otherwise damage religious property." The Hate Crime Sentencing Enhancement Act of 1994 increased sentencing by about one-third when a crime is proven to have been a hate crime. The Hate Crime Statistics Act of 1990 is a legislation that "requires the Justice Department to gather and publish statistics on crime motivated by prejudice based on race, religion, ethnicity, or sexual orientation." The most recent legislation to go into effect was the Hate Crimes Prevention Act of 1998. This Act was put into legislation to "to prohibit intentional interference, by force or threat of force, with the enjoyment of a federal right or benefit (such as voting, going to school or employment) on the basis of race, color, religion, or national origin." All of these Acts were put into legislation to prevent any type of hate crime.
I believe that the tragedy that recently occurred at Colurabine High School in Littleton, Colorado involved acts of hatred that could be classified as "hate crimes". There is no doubt in my mind that this was an act of hatred, because why else would two people go into the school shooting many of the different people that they see? The two young men that committed this horrific crime didn't just go into the school shooting everybody they saw, but they went into the school with intentions of killing certain people. The certain people that were killed at Colurabine High School may have been targeted specifically because of their race, religion, ethnicity, gender, or sexual identity. The only way to fully understand why this crime was committed would be to actually get into the heaRAB of the two boys who performed the killings. Unfortunately, due to the fact that they took their own lives at the end of the whole ordeal, we will never fully understand their motives.
I do not believe that these acts of violence called "hate crimes" are morally right, especially when we live in such a diverse world full of people of all types. Also, I do not believe that any human being should be subjected to such acts of violence just because of their race, religion, ethnicity, gender, or sexual identity. I am sorry to say that hate crimes will probably never come to a halt. There are certain actions and organizations that try to prevent hate crimes from actually occurring and there are also consequences for committing hate crimes, but those things are not enough to fully abolish hate crimes.