[Nuclear1]

Alright, am I missing something?  Is motivation to commit a crime and your intent behind committing a crime somehow magically different?

And did Scotty completely ignore my post about witnesses and police?

[Scotty]

Motivation and intent are actually different.  Motivation describes WHY someone is trying to do something, intent is what they are trying to accomplish.

Also, murdering a police officer or witness is also considered obstruction of justice, and that is where the extra sentencing comes from (and capital punishment can happen for regular murder too).

[General Battuta]

If you do not believe that the intent of a hate crime is to send a message, I really want to yell at you...in a coherent, rational, bilateral way.

Motivation and intent are actually different.  Motivation describes WHY someone is trying to do something, intent is what they are trying to accomplish.

This distinction seems arbitrary.

Hate crimes are terrorism. They are one and the same. Don't let the terrorists win.

[Scotty]

I'm not arguing AT ALL against the classification of hate crimes.  For hate crimes, the motivation is wanting to put the "uppity minorities" in their place, the intent is to hurt said member of said group.  The difference between intent and motivation is best demonstrated with a murder scenario.  If the perpetrator is going to murder someone, the motivation is some incident that happened between the two, or fighting over a relationship or something like that.  The intent is to do bodily harm.

(I am NOT trying to argue against the bill in the OP, nor am I trying willfully misunderstand the intent of hate crimes.)

[General Battuta]

For hate crimes, the motivation is wanting to hurt some minority or group (to teach a lesson or some bullcrap reason like that), the intent is to hurt said member of said group.

Do you mean to put a 'not' with one or the other?

Because, if you're going to put a 'not' in that first clause, I want to point you at a little phenomenon called the Uppity Negro, and a little solution called lynching.

It really is the group being targeted. Do you think the 9/11 hijackers gave a crap about Mary J. TwinTowers?

(The arguable difference between terrorism and 'hate crimes' is that terrorism is generally perpetrated by the minority against the majority, and the hate crime vice versa, but fundamentally they operate to send the same message: you are not safe. Nothing can protect you. We will kill you if you do not do what we want.)

[Scotty]

Hmmm, you are right, I did word that strangely.  I'll go edit it.

for the terrorism part, I KNOW it's the group being targeted.  During 9/11, the terrorist's motivation was trying to hurt the United States.  They intended to do that by crashing planes into the World Trade Center.  That was their intent.

The post is changed to (hopefully) be more clear.

We seem to be talking past each other.  I am not trying to refute/argue anything.

[Blue Lion]

That would be why I said I was confused. You even quoted it.

What? I quoted you saying that I think gender/race based crimes should be punished more harshly with a question mark at the end. I apologize, but it looked more like a strawman than an honest question.

So a guy who shoots someone accidentally and a guy who shoots someone for, I dunno, looking at him funny, get the same time? Same severity of crime. Fatal gunshot wound.

A guy drives over someone on the road because he was on his cell phone, another guy runs over a guy because he was sleeping with his girl. Same crime right? Running a guy over. The guy who meant to do it didn't do it any worse?

Of course these people would get wildly different charges in court. Just because the acts themselves are the same doesn't mean they are the same case.

A guy who punches a guy in the face cause he kicked his kid is probably going to get a different sentence than a guy who punches a guy in the face for wearing a pink shirt.

From what I can tell, the only example you gave me where the crimes are actually the same is the last one. And in that last one, they should get the same sentence unless the first guy realized that he was a douche for kicking the kid and decides not to press charges.

And about intent, there's no blanket "ignore intent" tenant in our law system. Killing can be and accident and that's manslaughter. You didn't intend to kill him. But then there's things like "I intended to only hurt him a little," and those things are ignored. Then there are the things GB was talking about which is true.

Wait actually, that's not treated as an intent, that's what he did. People don't explicitly beat people up, but people in effect threaten to beat people up, which is a crime. It also happens to be what he's intending to do, but whatever. Murders also intend to commit murder, but you charge them for committing murder, not intending to commit murder. And so I'm guessing that with motivation and intent, a lot of the crimes that are commit by those things are implicit crimes, with intent completely aside. Also, it's very difficult to discuss this while writing two essays for a debate class.

Yea the crimes are different because of the motivation and intent behind them. The acts themselves are identical.

Someone took a gun, pulled the trigger and shot someone. What they intended gets them convicted, why they pulled the trigger is what gets them 20 years instead of 10.

Two people can intend to commit the same crime, they can commit the same crime, but if they did it for different reasons they're going to get different prison time. That is why different prison sentences exist.

If you commit a crime for a reason people can at least understand, if not sympathize with, you're going to get less time than a person who commits a crime for a reason they don't understand or can't sympathize with.

Congress (and many other people) can't sympathize with people who commit a crime based on someone's age, gender, race etc etc etc, so they want to give them more time. This bill enables them to give them more time.

[Nuclear1]

Scotty, it boils down to mens rea, the person's state of mind at the time of the crime.  That's all the difference between reckless endangerment, manslaughter, and murder.

Reckless endangerment is driving with your cell phone on and running over a guy you didn't see because you weren't paying attention.  You're still culpable because you shouldve been paying attention, but you had no intention to harm the man.

Manslaughter, in one form, is walking in on your wife in bed with another guy, grabbing a knife on the drawer, and stabbing the man or your wife to death.  It gets knocked down to manslaughter because of a heat of the moment defense--your state of mind was clouded by your extreme emotional disturbance.

Murder is killing someone with premeditated intent.  You knew a guy who was gay, and because you didn't like him, or for whatever reason, you plotted for however long to kill him.  It's worse because you had time to think, so you shouldve changed your mind and let him go.

[General Battuta]

Hmmm, you are right, I did word that strangely.  I'll go edit it.

for the terrorism part, I KNOW it's the group being targeted.  During 9/11, the terrorist's motivation was trying to hurt the United States.  They intended to do that by crashing planes into the World Trade Center.  That was their intent.

The post is changed to (hopefully) be more clear.

We seem to be talking past each other.  I am not trying to refute/argue anything.

Okay, I agree, a misunderstanding. Sorry for jumping at shadows.

There is the very real (but not necessarily substantial) criticism that defining hate crimes may exacerbate intergroup conflict or fear. I haven't quite figured out my angle on that yet.

[karajorma]

People seem to be coming up with a suitable example here. So let me give one of my own.

1) Gang member has a beef with another gang. Buys a gun, walks over to someone from the other gang and shoots them dead.

2) Guy has an argument with his boss. Buys a gun, goes to his bosses house and shoots him dead.

3) Terrorist has a beef with America. Buys a gun, goes to a random house and shoots someone dead.


Who should get the longest sentence? The argument I'm seeing is that they were all premeditated murders and therefore should all get the same sentence.

[headdie]

People seem to be coming up with a suitable example here. So let me give one of my own.

1) Gang member has a beef with another gang. Buys a gun, walks over to someone from the other gang and shoots them dead.

2) Guy has an argument with his boss. Buys a gun, goes to his bosses house and shoots him dead.

3) Terrorist has a beef with America. Buys a gun, goes to a random house and shoots someone dead.


Who should get the longest sentence? The argument I'm seeing is that they were all premeditated murders and therefore should all get the same sentence.

ban the private ownership of guns and gun crime drops dramatically (from UK so i have simplistic views on the subject.  Private gun ownership = bad)

[karajorma]

That's another topic entirely. I could have just as easily said knife as gun and the question would still be the same.

Let's not derail this topic with another one.

[Commander Zane]

People seem to be coming up with a suitable example here. So let me give one of my own.

1) Gang member has a beef with another gang. Buys a gun, walks over to someone from the other gang and shoots them dead.

2) Guy has an argument with his boss. Buys a gun, goes to his bosses house and shoots him dead.

3) Terrorist has a beef with America. Buys a gun, goes to a random house and shoots someone dead.


Who should get the longest sentence? The argument I'm seeing is that they were all premeditated murders and therefore should all get the same sentence.

ban the private ownership of guns and gun crime drops dramatically (from UK so i have simplistic views on the subject.  Private gun ownership = bad)

Not to put the topic further off track, but ban anything, people still find a way to exploit said ban.

[TrashMan]

People seem to be coming up with a suitable example here. So let me give one of my own.

1) Gang member has a beef with another gang. Buys a gun, walks over to someone from the other gang and shoots them dead.

2) Guy has an argument with his boss. Buys a gun, goes to his bosses house and shoots him dead.

3) Terrorist has a beef with America. Buys a gun, goes to a random house and shoots someone dead.


Who should get the longest sentence? The argument I'm seeing is that they were all premeditated murders and therefore should all get the same sentence.

The terrorist. He goes to a random house is indicative enough. If he has a beef with a nation or an idea or religion - something for to big and non-uniform - killing a random person won't change anything. Even worse, that random person has nothing to do with it.

At least the other two had a beef with the undividual they killed.

[The E]

Yeah, no. All three crimes are technically the same. All three of them are comitted in the heat of passion, without much in the way of premeditation (Premeditation, in criminal proceedings, being the specific planning of a specific crime for a long time). The only thing that is different is the connection between victim and criminal. As a result, all three crimes should be punished in the exact same way.

[TrashMan]

I'm saying that the connection is the difference. Not a big one, but the terrorist didn't have any actual reason to kill a random guy. He didn't even know him.

That's why it's even less possible to sympathize with him.

[The E]

Whether or not you can sympathize with the killer should really be beside the point.
I submit to you that the reasons for the crime should be completely irrelevant when it comes to punishment. And yes, I do include other excuses, like Drug abuse or whatever in there. "Don't do the crime if you can't do the time" should be true no matter what.

[General Battuta]

I agree with TrashMan. When the crime is meant as a symbolic attack on a group, it is more severe because it harms more people than the victim.

[Blue Lion]

Whether or not you can sympathize with the killer should really be beside the point.
I submit to you that the reasons for the crime should be completely irrelevant when it comes to punishment. And yes, I do include other excuses, like Drug abuse or whatever in there. "Don't do the crime if you can't do the time" should be true no matter what.

To use the old tired phrase "stealing to feed your hungry children"

There are sometimes that someone commits a crime that I can't really get all that mad at them for it.

To me, the sentencing phase should be where you either sympathize (or not) with the convicted. There is a long range of time a person can serve, and that time should be set based on what we think about the crime itself.

[Flipside]

I'm sort of on the wall about this, since, for example, I'm of the opinion that anyone who gets behind the wheel of a car drunk and kills someone has commited Murder, because they were perfectly aware of the risks of Drink-Driving, there might not have been intent to kill, but there was certainly awareness that their actions could directly lead to someone dying, and a choice to ignore that awareness.