To commit a hate crime in the United States, the perpetrator must cause bodily injury because of race, color, religion, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, or disability. Please look at the picture. The people in the picture are the same "race" as the perpetrator. See the red flags? Although some of the marchers were carrying pro-abortion and black lives matter signs, this is an organized demonstration of the IWW. If you click the link and go to their website, you will see that the IWW wants to "build militant unionism" [my emphasis]. Their goal is for one worldwide, united union to develop communism (or anarchy according to around the world.
The sole police officer that had been stationed at this corner, asked to leave before the incident because she felt she was in danger from this crowd of "peaceful" protesters. She was given permission to do so. Also, the barricade that had blocked this street off to traffic had been removed by an unknown person-allowing the three cars through.
Enter the perpetrator. Now, he has been painted as a white supremacist who was out looking to run people over. He is also a mentally ill individual with a history of violent attacks on his mother. I am not arguing whether or not he was a white supremacist, but since he had violently attacked his own mother in the past and since the crowd is not the usual racial mix that white supremacist attack on the basis of race, I am saying that his crime should not be classified as a hate crime. Given his mental illness, I highly doubt he premeditated it. I assume being trapped in a crowd of people made him feel threatened. His mental illness heightened this.
However, the IWW was actually looking for a way to combine their cause with the "Black Lives Matter" plight (p 8). They have had floundering participation since the 1930s. Painting this attack as a hate crime, being in Charlottesville at the same time a rally by several neo-Nazis was taking place, this was the ideal opportunity to show themselves as being the same as other movements.
Since "Black Lives Matter" was there, if this were a racially motivated, premeditated attack by a white supremacist, it seems he would have targeted the "Black Lives Matter" demonstration. He didn't. He didn't even attack any of the religious denominations that were protesting the rally. Instead, he attacked a militant communist group. Political groups are not protected under the hate crime umbrella. Perhaps because members of Congress have been known to attack each other on the floor, and few of them wanted to impose additional penalties on their colleagues.
Why should we be concerned? If anyone can be tried for a hate crime simply because they are affiliated with a white supremacist group, that means the definition of hate crime has become too broad. Here is a scenario as to where this could lead: two white men, one a radical communist and one a white supremacist, get into an argument in a bar. The radical communist starts to beat up the white supremacist. The white supremacist retaliates. The white supremacist ends up with a broken arm and gets fined $10,000 and imprisoned four years for aggravated assault (because the lawyers state it was premeditated based on the person's social media posts) with an additional ten years in prison because of his beliefs and because he had visited websites and posted things stating he felt radical communists should all be taken out back and beaten with a chair. The radical communist ends up with a broken nose a $1,000 fine and 90 days in jail.
No comments:
Post a Comment