NecroMadness.
Posted on April 17, 2008 in the Activism, News, Rants category
The common response most people received over the last couple of days who signed the online Downing Street petition to widen the definition of Hate Crime to accommodate crimes against a person based on their appearance or subcultural interests was……….
You have signed an e-petition suggesting that the definition of ‘hate crime’ be widened to include crimes committed on the basis of a person’s appearance or interests.
The Government’s current definition of ‘hate crime’ is as follows:
* A ‘hate incident’ is any incident which is perceived by the victim or any other person as being motivated by hate or prejudice.
* A ‘hate crime’ is any incident which contributes to a criminal offence, perceived by the victim or any other person as being motivated by prejudice or hate.
Within this broad definition, legislation focuses on hate crimes on the basis of race, faith, sexual orientation, disability and gender identity - and it is these categories which are currently monitored. We do not plan to extend this to include hatred against people on the basis of their appearance or sub-cultural interests. These are not intrinsic characteristics of a person and could be potentially be very wide ranging, including for example allegiance to football teams - which makes this a very difficult category to legislate for. However, it is important to remember that this is within a legal framework that assumes that all violence is a very serious matter; and in addition, judges have discretion to look at a wide range of mitigating and aggravating factors when they are sentencing - and are likely to view attacks motivated by hatred of this kind as very serious indeed.
Basically, a big fat NO.
Does anybody else see a problem with this?
Over 7,000 people signed that petition, more would had the mainstream media picked up a bit more on this case.
Disgraceful. Why do we elect these people?
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to be fair, there is a point in that the legislation is open to abuse. what would be better is if the government had actually taken it seriously. The fact that people are being preyed upon for their tastes, appearance and social predispositions is a sign that society, at least within our country is becoming increasingly more closed minded and the only people with the room to breathe are the bigots and the violent.