The Symbolic Interactionalism Theory Of Hate Crime

The American Heritage Dictionary defines hate as intense dislike or animosity. However, defining hate as the basis for a crime is not as easy without possibly jeopardizing constitutional rights in the process. Hate crime laws generally add enhanced punishments to existing statues. A hate crime law seeks to treat a crime, if it can be demonstrated that the offense was a hate crime differently from the way it would be treated under ordinary criminal law. Since the 1980s, the problem of hate crimes has attracted increasing research attention, especially from criminologists and law enforcement personnel who have focused primarily on documenting the prevalence of the problem and

Hate crimes may be caused by the social structures as social pressures to commit the crime. As Chakraborti N (2010) suggests that people usually will suffer strain because of difficulties and a lack of consensus serves to stir debate among practitioners. People

Prejudice can lead to many things. Hate crimes are something every individual has to be concerned with. Targets are not always based on race, but based on social class. Hate crimes are not always an uncontrollable or random act.

Though as a form of discriminatory behavior, hate crimes often have an attitudinal dimension, the relationship between prejudice and criminal behavior tends to be complex. There is reason to believe that certain hate offenses result from some personal bias or hatred. In the extreme case, a hatemonger may join an organized group in order to devote his life to destroying a group of people he considers "inferior." At times, certain prejudices become narrowly targeted. Because behavioral scientists have

There has always been presence of hate crimes amongst all people: particularly directed against minority groups. Before being accepted by society, minority groups have had to endure some kind of hostility against them. Enduring this hostility while advocating for their rights earned them acceptance into society. In my reading of Chapter 7, I came across the Race-Conflict Theory about hate crimes and my mind immediately made a connection to a recent murder that is believed to have been a hate crime. I choose this particular article because it terrifies me that anti-Muslim hate crimes are on the rise. I have always heard of people who complained about hate crimes that they experienced or about being mistreated because they are from a particular ethnic

First, from the victim's point of view, the purpose of hate/bias crimes adds the extra dimensions of fear and devaluation to the victimization. Someone has been targeted due to a core characteristic of his or her identity that cannot be changed. If membership in a target group is readily visible, the victim may feel particularly vulnerable to a repeat attack that can result in a feeling of hopelessness. The fears are also exacerbated because society has been slower to respond to hate/bias crimes than to random "stranger" crimes. The victim may then become afraid to associate with other members of the group who have been targeted or may resist seeking needed services, believing that these actions will increase his or her

There are many different hate crimes in America. Hate crimes are considered as criminal offenses and depending on which state this criminal offense has been committed, they have their own laws to rule over it. According to Jack Leven and Jack McDevitt, in their article Hate Crimes, they explained, “..the vast majority of hate crime laws do not criminalize any new behavior; instead, they increase the penalty for behaviors that are already against the law” (Leven & McDevitt, 2011). This is something that has been reviewed and updated over the years. As many new behaviors to hate crime activity surface, those crimes will eventually fall under some old laws but the penalty of it will eventually increase. This hate crime activity includes any acts that involve with any negative attitudes or prejudice toward anyone because of their race, religion, ethnicity, or gender. It often leads to people being bias and showing a tremendous amount of hatred

This study investigated data regarding criminal offenses categorized as hate crimes that “are motivated, in whole or in part, by the offender 's bias against a race, religion, sexual orientation, ethnicity/national origin, or disability and are committed against persons, property, or society”, (Hall 2013) with a speculative focus upon the psychological typology of the offender. Findings yield five major categories of the offender: “thrill-seeking, reactive/defensive, retaliatory, mission, and bias peripheral/mixed” (Freilich 2013). The study yielded that individuals who commit hate crimes are not diagnostically mentally ill, but they do share characteristics of high levels of aggression and antisocial behavior, with childhood histories of parental or caretaker abuse, and use of violence to solve family problems. Findings are considered in terms of clinical intervention and risk assessment practices with hate crime offenders using a chi-squared test for nominal (categorical) data to determine whether an association between two categorical variables in a sample is likely to reflect a real association between these two variables in a population.

Hate crimes have a devastating effect, beyond the harm inflicted on any, one victim ().  They resound through families, communities, and the entire nation, as others fear that they too could be threatened, attacked, or forced from their homes, because of what they look like, who they are, where they worship, whom they love, or whether they have a disability (). Hate crime is defined as an offense in which the victim is targeted because of the actual or perceived race, color, religion, disability, sexual orientation, or national origin of that victim (Sullaway, 2004). On the basis of the legal definition, most researchers of hate crime tend to conceptualize hate crime as a manifestation of intergroup conflict or violence (e.g., Levin & McDevitt, 2002; Levin & Rabrenovic, 2001). They are motivated by the distinctiveness of the victim(s)because the offender only targets victims with different groups (Sun, K, 2006) and they tend to justify themselves with numerous excuses, however, researchers have now been questioning the offender's mentality. With this sort of conceptualization of a hate crime and the reasoning behind them, it has then since begun to change clinical interventions with the victims of a hate crime and the research done is now focusing on the objective of the offender of a hate crime and distinctive factors or with lead to the offender's mentality.

Christopher Mathias on the HuffPost said, “A prominent American Muslim civil liberties group says it recorded a nearly 600 percent rise in hate crimes targeting Muslims over the past three years an increase the organization attributes to a presidential election cycle rife with anti-Muslim animus. In a report released Tuesday called “The Empowerment of Hate,” the Council on American-Islamic Relations says it recorded over 2,200

Hate crimes are very common in today’s society, they can range from various ethnicities and orientations as well as the severity of the crime committed. A hate crime is defined as “the violence of intolerance and bigotry, intended to hurt and intimidate someone because of their race, ethnicity, national origin, religious, sexual orientation, or disability. The purveyors of hate use explosives, arson, weapons, vandalism, physical violence, and verbal threats of violence to instill fear in their victims, leaving them vulnerable to more attack and feeling alienated, helpless, suspicious and fearful”. These attacks are fueled by a hatred for the victim’s personal lifestyle. As mentioned above, hate crimes are not specific to one group of people, the crimes can be found in every aspect of society, some are just more obvious than others. In a 2014 study it was found that 51 percent of hate crimes were motivated by the victims ethnicity. Race was the second highest rate of motivation. According to this study, it has been determined that majority of hate crimes can be classified as “simple assaults”. In relation to these statistics it is estimated that only 4% of the assaults resulted in an arrest. It is also believed that more than 60% of hate crimes are not reported. These are not reported because the victims think that nothing will come out of reporting their attacks. Also, the actual victims reported only 22% of hate crimes, while someone else reported 12%. These types crimes

Hate crimes has become an increasing problem here in the united states ranging from racial hatred to gender discrimination but what are hate crimes? According to Dr. Jack McDevitt, a criminologist at Northeastern University in Boston Hate crimes are message crimes, Hate crimes are defined as crimes that are violent act against people, property, or organizations because of the group to which they belong or identify with. The coined term “hate crimes” was first used No matter how many different definitions there are for hate crimes but we all can agree that hate crimes are wrong and immoral. But within hate crimes they are many different types of hate crimes. One of the main reasons that people commit hate crimes would

Hate Crimes: crimes motivated by a victim’s actual or perceived gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability or religion(Federal officials, 2011). Hate crimes have been around for centuries. A hate crime is considered any malicious crime that is derived from hatred towards a certain group of people. African Americans are still victim to hate crimes, even after the Civil Rights movement. James Byrd Jr. suffered a prime example of a gruesome hate crime in 1998, because of his African American descent. Three white men, allegedly, chained Byrd to the back of a pickup truck and dragged him down a gravel road, leaving his body parts severed and bloody (Marty,1998). Recently, a new group of people has been targeted by the hateful view

Hate crimes are extremely relevant in the world that we live in, and it is important that everyone is aware of them and the laws regarding them. A hate crime is a criminal offense against someone because of their race, religion, ethnicity, gender, or other characteristics. It can also be referred to as bias crime because these crimes are often motivated by personal hatred (“Hate Crimes”). There have been many laws directed against hate crimes, but in 2009, the Hate Crimes Prevention Act was put in place (“Hate Crimes”). When a person commits a hate crime now, they are subjected to more critical punishments (King). Hate crimes are a major issue because they happen to completely innocent people and they need to be addressed.

Hate crimes are crimes committed by a person with a bias or negative viewpoint of a specific group of people. Hate or bias-related crimes are thought to occur for four reasons: thrill seeking, feeling threatened,