Hate-Crime Amendment Moves to N.J. Senate, Assembly

[DSM4Life]

Legislation to toughen New Jersey's hate-crime and bullying laws advanced in the state assembly on Thursday, the Southern Voice reports.

The legislation -- which would mandate two hours of anti-bias training for police -- would add gender identity and national origin to the list of classes already protected against bias-based crimes. Currently, the state's hate-crime law provides protection based on race, color, religion, gender, handicap, ethnicity, and sexual orientation, according to the article.

After the full senate approved the bill, the assembly judiciary committee advanced the bill to the full assembly for consideration on Monday, the last day of the session. Approval in the committee was followed by 45 minutes of debate prompted by conservatives who oppose the legislation, according to the Voice.

The legislation also proposed requiring school districts to amend their bullying policies and to make that information available to parents on request. The state would also establish a commission to evaluate the effectiveness of anti-bullying programs in schools and train administrators on those issues. (The Advocate)

[thegodfather]

Oh god....lets all get together afterwards around a campfire and sing Kumby ****ing Yah... Give me a break with all this liberal bleeding heart PC bullshit. If someone commits a crime against someone else, their own personal feelings about that person based on any criteria is completely irrelevant. People have the right to feel and believe things that they want, when we start punishing a person who assaults another person because they are black, harsher than we punish a person who assaults a person because they shorted them $5 bucks, I see that as a serious problem. It's a very unfair policy, and to be honest its yet another example of special interest groups shoving their ****ing ideology down the majoritys throats.

[Pooks]

Too many laws, whose gonna remember all this shit!

[Renesis]

Oh god....lets all get together afterwards around a campfire and sing Kumby ****ing Yah... Give me a break with all this liberal bleeding heart PC bullshit. If someone commits a crime against someone else, their own personal feelings about that person based on any criteria is completely irrelevant. People have the right to feel and believe things that they want, when we start punishing a person who assaults another person because they are black, harsher than we punish a person who assaults a person because they shorted them $5 bucks, I see that as a serious problem. It's a very unfair policy, and to be honest its yet another example of special interest groups shoving their ****ing ideology down the majoritys throats.

Aww I like jokingly yelling hate crime at my friends. What will I do now? Yeah I agree. I don't see how it makes any sense. I agree. If I get into a fight with someone and I lose... well then I got my ass whooped w/e. But if the person who whooped my ass calls me a spic now they are in big trouble? I don't get it -.- That person should just be punished for whooping my ass not for name calling.

[Logan13]

Oh god....lets all get together afterwards around a campfire and sing Kumby ****ing Yah... Give me a break with all this liberal bleeding heart PC bullshit. If someone commits a crime against someone else, their own personal feelings about that person based on any criteria is completely irrelevant. People have the right to feel and believe things that they want, when we start punishing a person who assaults another person because they are black, harsher than we punish a person who assaults a person because they shorted them $5 bucks, I see that as a serious problem. It's a very unfair policy, and to be honest its yet another example of special interest groups shoving their ****ing ideology down the majoritys throats.

Exactly!

[Tock]

I'm inclined to agree . . .

Why should a total stranger who robs me, get a lighter sentence than an idiot who robs me because I'm gay?

---------------

I'll admit that I haven't given a lot of thought to the notion of "hate crimes," because the concept hasn't really impressed me much. Seems to me that

equal opportunity
and
equal justice

are two sides of the same coin.

Of course, it's difficult to keep this idealism after your best friend was beat up and robbed for being gay. Or kicked unconscious by Dallas cops just for the heck of it (of course, a TV film crew caught it, much to their surprise).

IMHO, justice is equal, and equality is just. What's good for the goose is good for the gander, but five will get ya ten that most juries won't give 5 heterosexuals the same prison sentence for killing gays, that they'll give 5 gays for killing one heterosexual.
You could make the same observation for black vs. white / white vs. black crime, or lots of other things.

While equality is just and justice is equal, juries and judges and legislators and jails are human, and not infrequently screw things up. Here in Dallas, a bunch (around 20) of black guys were wrongly convicted of crimes. All of 'em were black. None of 'em were white.

So . . . y'all can debate the theory of equal justice in your comfortable suburban homes, while lots of minorities are convicted for nothing more than not being born white.

There's probably a third approach to the problem, but danged if I know what it is. Until a better solution comes along, maybe heaping extra punishment to deter abuse on populations who suffer disproportionate injustice, is what we'll have to do.
Until, of course, until a better solution comes along.

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From what I understand, there's more violent black-on-black crime than anything else. And there's more white-collar crime and pollution and fraud caused by non-blacks. There's no good reason why the black guy who robbed a bank of $5,000 at gunpoint should spend 50 years in jail, when the corporate executives of Enron, responsible for bankrupting the nation's seventh-largest company, wiping out thousands of jobs, more than $60 billion in market value and more than $2 billion in pension plans only got 18 months.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16797216


Yep, things need to be fixed, allright. But on both sides, mes freres. Both sides.