Determining Hate Crimes Essay, Research Paper
Exposition: Determining Hate Crimes?
Hate based on race, religion and sexual
orientation exist within any cultural rich societies. When this type of
hate fuels a person into taking violent actions upon those they hate, it
is called a hate crime; a topic which the American public is seriously
concerned about. It has been a widely discussed subject on the media, and
often debates of whether or not a crime should be attributed with hate
are the center for discussion.
Does hate crime imply on any case when
a person is convicted for inflicting damage on someone “different”? It
is often difficult to set a benchmark for measuring sufficiency of hate
as a cause to label it in front of crime. The term can be conveniently
stretched and squeezed by people with different ideas and biases. The four
white policemen who brutally beat Rodney King Jr., a black man, half to
death for merely speeding is determined by the court¡¦s judgment,
as officers performing their duty. Hate, to those particular jurors and
judge, was not a valid concern. To them, the beating was not due to the
officers¡¦ resentment for a black man, but because they were
simply disciplining an offender of the law. To the minority groups, the
court¡¦s ruling was outrageous. From their point of view,
the savage beating was unnecessary and hate was obviously the factor which
induce the four cops to perform such a nasty feat. Because people have
varying views and opinions, application of the term “hate crime” is not
always relevant. Can we assume the murder of Nicole Simpson by OJ Simpson
a hate crime since it involves a black man killing a white woman or are
there more in depth twist to the case? People who are willing to do a little
thinking, do not just look at the difference of the victim and the convicted
and draw conclusions of whether or not the crime is hate related, they
examine all the other psychological elements also. The most common way
of judgment is to ponder: if the victim was of a different race, religion,
or sexual orientation, would the same injurious action still have taken
place? In order to picture the virtual scenario, we would need to think
critically and be able to delineate out hate, and to do that, we need to
understand why people hate.
No one is born to be prejudice. It is the
society people grow up in that teaches them to be that way. Even while
watching a seemingly harmless cartoon, we are taught unconsciously to despise
those who are different. The good guys are always a group of the same kind,
physically appealing and very American while the bad guys are always bizarre
and resemble people from a distant culture we don¡¦t recognize.
From very young, we develop stereotypes; a direct effect from the workings
of society. Popular generalizations such as Black people eating up social
security money and Asians trying to buy America are passed around. Yet,
in reality, statistics show that much more Whites are on social security
than are blacks and only the Japanese Corporations are doing the purchasing,
not Asians, particularly Asian Americans who have nothing to do with them
besides being Asian. Ironically, society tries to undo our prejudice through
education when we enter school. But the prejudice is brought back to us
when we meet students who are prejudice, whether we become their friends
or their victims of discrimination. Being prejudice upon teaches a person
to be prejudice.
How a person views something related to
racism and hatred, directly reflects on how society has raised them. The
American people do not see the bombing of Iraq and Yugoslavia as a hate
crime, because we are told what we want to believe, that we are good and
they are evil, and there would be no wrong in flexing our superior muscle.
But to the Iraqis and Yugoslavians, who lost thousands of lives, the United
States is but a racist nation who kills “non-American” people like killing
ants. For if the Iraqis and Yugoslavians were Americans, preferably white,
would the U.S value their lives differently? It is ultimately in a person¡¦s
perception, which concludes what is and what is not a hate crime.