Comments on: Conservatives, Meet Google

By: boldandbald

boldandbald — Wed, 06 May 2009 20:58:07 +0000

Jenn, thank you for posting this. I saw the American Thinker commentary and was rather upset about this. It is nice to get the facts.

You touch on something here that always bothers me. So often we see people on both sides of the political aisle attempt to rile up their base with false accusations. It seems so ridiculous to me, since there is generally so much legitimate stuff to discuss and debate that bringing this sort of thing into it only hurts the argument. The Republicans don’t need this type of false propaganda and scare tactic to use against the Democrats since the Democrats already support so many things that are truly damaging to this country without making stuff up.

Thanks again.

By: Eclectic Radical

Eclectic Radical — Tue, 05 May 2009 18:24:08 +0000

The original Supreme Court ruling on hate crimes was based on the laudably intended but precedentally dangerous idea that local or state jurisdictions might be reluctant to prosecute specific hate crimes because of shared prejudice. This was the original reason civil rights groups wanted a federal ban on lynching, because local and state jurisdictions declined to prosecute murder, rape, and mayhem against blacks in many parts of the country… and not just the south or rural west either. I could accept that argument to some extent if the current Hate Crimes legislation was based on prosecuting criminals whose jurisdiction had improperly declined to prosecute.

The problems are that, first, the laws aren’t written that way. They prosecute the motive rather than the crime, when they should make provisions for federal prosecution under hostile circumstances if that is really the argument.

And, of course, the 1870 Force Act already covers these issues. One could argue that the Force Act might need to be updated or clarified to make certain it meets necessary modern definitions, but thought-restricting legislation is not necessary.

By: Rob Taylor

Rob Taylor — Tue, 05 May 2009 02:45:54 +0000

Goo-Gull? What is this Goo-gull you speak of?

But aren’t “pedophiles” covered by Hate Crime laws because if we accept a medicalized definition of their criminality they are technically disabled?

By: Jenn Q. Public

Jenn Q. Public — Mon, 04 May 2009 19:47:25 +0000

I struggled a bit with whether this was a case of pure intellectual dishonesty among politicians or a nasty rumor running amok. I assign most of the intellectual dishonesty, in the strictest sense, to the “values” organizations and believe most of the politicos are scaremongering with what they believe are facts. But who knows?

Either way, I have no patience for the dissemination of false information. It doesn’t help the cause of shooting down hate crime legislation, and it most certainly doesn’t help the image of the Republican Party. (I’m not given to gratuitous cursing, but I had a tough time keeping my cool while writing this because this kind of nonsense is so easily avoided.)

I actually agree that the hate crimes law attempts to police thought and inadvertently left that argument out of my post. Thanks for reminding me – I will update later. Unfortunately, the Supreme Court disagrees with both of us on that issue.

By: Eclectic Radical

Eclectic Radical — Mon, 04 May 2009 15:43:05 +0000

With the exception of the specific constitutional issue cited, I actually agree with you down the line on this one… though I’d say it’s a very difficult call to determine how many conservatives in the House, the print and tv media, and the blogosphere really believe the list of fetishes and disorders presented are somehow covered by the bill and how many of them are deliberately misrepresenting the bill. I have a hard time these days telling who really is ‘that stupid’ and who really thinks we’re all ‘that stupid’, especially on the religious far end of the right. Except for Michelle Bachmann, I don’t think she could possibly be pretending. ;)

I’m against the idea of ‘hate crimes’ because I’m opposed to the notion of thought crimes. Whether we like it or not, hate /speech/ is protected under the first amendment and being a believer in the spirit of the constitution as well as the literal text I believe if it’s not legitimate to prosecute people for their /speech/ it’s even further beyond the pale to do it for their /thoughts./ I’m all in fair of aggravated charges for truly sadistic crimes, and civil rights charges when the local or state authorities fail to prosecute as they should, but the theory behind hate crimes legislation is pernicious.