[LAC-Tech]

Hello, you seem reasonable so I'd like to take the risky step of engaging with you 4 levels deep in an HN politics thread.

So, let's keep the scope of this to disabled people. Let's also both assume we're decent, non-evil people who are steadfastly against the assault of innocent disabled people on the street.

Why is it worse to attack a disabled person because you hate disabled people, than any other reason? I'm assuming you think it's worse to attack a disabled person from a place of anti-disabled hatred, than it would be attack a disabled person for a host of other reasons (ie, they were viewed them as an easier target, or they just happened to be closest to someone having a violent outburst).

I take the view that assaulting innocent people in general is unacceptable, and don't attach a large amount of weight to the motivation. On what basis does hatred of the disabled deserve special consideration, in your view?

[michaelbrave]

It shows motive and potential for more victims in future, while as if for example that particular disable person say picked their pocket and they overreacted in a violent way or for other reasons you listed would show a different motive entirely.

This also dips into premeditated, especially if there is a pattern of that attitude and motive.

[cryptonector]

So, the problem with committing a crime animated by hatred of a group rather than just the victim is that you might justify committing crimes against more victims. That is a bad thing. The issue here is not with aggravating circumstances -- the issue is with non-aggravating private speech.

[LAC-Tech]

Then surely the distinction there is a crime of passion vs a non crime of passion.

In which case, any non-personal motivation for the attack would be treated with equal severity.

[JamisonM]

I think that the motivation is of interest because we take motivation as a moral element of any crime - the killing of another person is judged more harshly when it is pre-meditated, less if just intentional, less still if accidental but reasonably foreseeable.

I think that in particular there is merit to the idea that someone that commits a crime motivated by an ideology is more dangerous, they are motivated by a belief about the world that is more durable than other circumstances in which a crime might be committed. Such a person needs to spend more time either away from society or restricted in ways that keeps society safer from them for longer.

Also we want to live in a society where visible minorities of any sort do not feel a particular fear of being targeted. Laws that make it clear that targeting is a particular moral failing send the message that society stands with those people, and that is a good thing. Doing more to protect vulnerable people in the first place is the ideal option, but increasing the punishment on the backend is at least something.

In the specific scenario you mentioned I would hope that someone attacking a disabled person because they were viewed as an easier target would also be grounds for a worse punishment. Violence motivated in such a way should be rightly viewed as far more dangerous and unacceptable than violence that is a product of a violent outburst - and I believe the law mostly works that way.

On the broader point I will say that I would love to live in the perfect world where every crime was some platonic ideal of an infraction that could be judged in some kind of void but the justice system as a whole does also need to operate in a manner consistent with the public's idea of what justice should roughly resemble. It is certainly the case that you can make the argument that hate crimes as a category are more "public relations" than real criminal law. I don't think any jurisdiction has, in the real practical application of the law, met the threshold to be considered cynical public relations. Democracies largely have human judges that do their best to be reasonable, "thoughtcrime" and modifiers to sentences for "thoughtcrime" haven't really been a thing. And once you are at the point where the judges themselves are really off the rails it won't much matter if you are quibbling about the sort of details that alarmists are getting worked up about here. I am aware of the concerns, I even share them, but the laws in question would need to be a lot more explicit to be of real concern.

[oceanghost]

I agree with you, and I think the inverse of your argument might be this--

that treating racially motivated crimes differently than just crimes... draws a line between groups of people that is unnecessary and differentiates people in exactly the way we don't want to.