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British Hate Crimes Response: It Should Not be a Criminal Offence to be a Bore or a Creep

Telegraph editorial slams proposed law imposing 7 years prison for “homophobic speech”

By Hilary White
 
LONDON, November 13, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) – An editorial in today’s Daily Telegraph says that anti-“hate” laws end up being “anti-justice” laws. Telegraph columnist Jenny McCartney wrote today about the Labour government’s plans to enact legislation that would make “homophobic speech” a hate crime punishable with seven years in prison.
 
McCartney said while “those who like to sneer at gay people,” may be “bores and creeps” the government is going too far to make it crime to be a bore or a creep.
 
“If an individual's animus against gay people goes further, and he or she should begin a campaign of incitement to violence, harassment or physical attacks, I would urge that the offender be prosecuted according to the full force of the existing law.”
 
But a “gay hatred” law will create “not an atmosphere of enhanced tolerance, but one of confusion,” she said.
 
Many critics of hate crimes legislation point out that they violate a basic principle of law based as they are on the perceptions of those who make the complaint.

The UK’s Home Office website defines a “hate crime” as “any incident, which constitutes a criminal offence, which is perceived by the victim or any other person as being motivated by prejudice or hate”. To qualify for this definition, it must be shown that the alleged criminal must have been inspired by the victim’s “race, colour, ethnic origin, nationality or national origins, religion, gender or gender identity, sexual orientation or disability.” The law would allow an alleged victim to define the process based only on what is “perceived”.
 
McCartney wrote, “To create politically-approved hierarchies of culpability on such matters is to make a kind of nonsense of the law.”
 
Following the “hate crimes” logic, McCartney points out, results in the disintegration of the concept.
 
“Already there are hints that disabled and elderly people will soon be included under the ‘tougher sentencing for hate crimes’ guidelines. Perhaps after that there will be a move to include ginger-haired folk, overweight people and small-boned white men with glasses.”
 
“And perhaps, one day far in the future, we will beckon in so many plainly worthy sub-categories that we will arrive at the only position that makes any sense: that we are all equally valuable citizens under the law, deserving of the full protection of the police and justice system. That was, I think, the principle we started out with.”
 
Read related LifeSiteNews.com coverage:

Democrats Refuse Religious Freedom Amendment to Hate Crimes Bill
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2007/apr/07042601.html
 
Homophobic Thought Crimes now High Priority for UK Judiciary
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2002/nov/02112901.html

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