ASK MOST people what they think of hate crimes, and they will say that such acts are obviously bad. Thus it's not too surprising that when a referendum appeared on the ballot this past spring proposing the creation by the University Judiciary Committee of "specific and severe punishment guidelines for judiciary offenses motivated by hatred based on race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, religion and disability," it passed with 70 percent of the vote.
That's not to say that no one had any serious objections to the motion. In addition to a modest chunk of students worried about imposing rules on the Committee, there were those who opposed the measure because they believed that it was simply misguided. They argue that to treat a crime more harshly simply because it was motivated by race, gender, etc. as opposed to some other rationale is an overly moralistic and futile attempt to make us all tolerant of one another. They contend that the current standards of conduct provide ample guidelines for punishing those who break them. Why, they ask, must we increase the penalty for such acts when they do not differ significantly from similar crimes whose victims were not selected on the basis of prejudice?
The answer to such a contention is that hate crimes are unique in that they impact two sets of victims. Beyond the victim of the act and affected friends and family, everyone who shares the characteristic for which the victim was targeted is made by association an equally probable victim. The more blatantly obvious the targeting of the act, the more acutely the members of the afflicted subgroup feel their vulnerability to such hate and violence. The spreading of fear and intimidation through a specific population has always been the primary objective of hate crimes, and this goal places them in the same category as terrorist crimes. Terrorism is very easy to spot when Jihadists perform it against major bastions of western culture such as New York or London. However, when it is practiced by other members of our vaunted community of trust against our friends and neighbors due to similarly sinister motivations we somehow recognize it as something less menacing: a mere hate crime. But there is little to separate the two, except perhaps scale. Both suicide bombers who blow up whole crowds of Iraqi civilians and vandals who deface the property of some student from a minority group because he or she is from that group have the same goal: to spread fear through a group of people and suppress them. Punishing criminals who intend to do harm to such a large portion of the population, whether they use bombs or spray paint, requires consequences greater than those appropriate for crimes against individuals.
While hate crimes have their own intimidating effects on the target population, the way that the larger community responds to such acts by and large determines their true effectiveness. Hate crimes are most effective when the community responds not with solidarity and healing to the affected group, but with indifference. The appearance of such apathy serves only to reinforce and embolden the perpetrators and leave the victims isolated from the rest of the community. This is why the referendum mandating stronger penalties for hate crimes was so vital to the University community. For several deans and student leaders to speak about how awful hate crimes are and how the rest of the student body stands with the afflicted subgroup sends a nice message. However, giving the entire student body a chance to actively condemn hatred and simultaneously discourage future violations magnifies that message of solidarity with the victims and contempt for the perpetrators.
It is understandable that some members of Student Council opposed putting this measure to a vote so as not to appear to be infringing on the turf of the University Judiciary Committee. But such quibbles are immediately demoted in terms of importance when quick action is required by the student body and its leaders in order to send a firm and direct message to those who promote hate. Turf battles can often cause long delays in making the community's point. Even if there is consensus on the issue, the longer it takes to definitively show that sentiment greatly lessens the effectiveness of the community's message.
The student body was fortunate to be able to still vote on the referendum in a timely manner, but its will has yet to be fulfilled. The Committee should respond swiftly and decisively by making the punishment for terror as great as the punishment for what many would consider far lesser crimes: lying, cheating and stealing. Our student leaders must not delay in responding to hate crimes with the same urgency and vigor that we reserve for other forms of terrorism.
A.J. Kornblith is a Cavalier Daily columnist. He can be reached at akornblith@cavalierdaily.com.
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