I was thinking about hate crime law, mostly because someone else was talking about them and got me thinking. Hate crime, as far as I understand it, is a crime that is motivated by hatred, prejudice, and bigotry. Although I do wish those sort of feelings did not exist, I fail to see why beating a guy because he's black is worse than beating a guy because you want to take his wallet. In a way it's like the law is saying, "It's ok to commit a crime if you have a good reason, like theft, but not if you do it jsut because you don't like the victim." In addition we're now making judgements based not on actions or events, but on the judge's view of what the person was thinking at the time. How does the judge really know? I could get the crap beaten out of me on the way home from work, and the guy who does it could either say he's an anti-semite, or that he just felt like kickng the crap out of someone when I happened by. Either way I've in some serious pain, but if he can convince the judge that he really likes Jewish people, he'll spend less time in jail than if he really hates Jews. That makes no sense, the guy ought to be punished the same no matter what. A murder is a murder is a murder, no matter the motivation.