Memorial

[dwenius]

Mathew Shepard was killed 7 years ago today.

His murderers both copped pleas, and are serving consecutive life sentences in an undisclosed prison.

Later that year, the Wyoming legislature refused to enact a hate-crimes bill that was introduced in response to the killing. Federal efforts for a similar bill also failed within the year, thanks in no small part to the intervention of Trent Lott, who was all for a hate crimes bill when it was only protecting women and jews and even blacks, but throw in the queers and you get nowhere.

As a final, minor, ignorable-except-for-its-crass-fuck-knobbery point, Fred Phelps, Supreme Wingnut and Founder of the Westboro Baptist church, led a contingent of protesters to wave signs and shout slogans at Matthew's funeral.

Comments

Re: The second part of this response contains a common rhetorical fallacy, but I don't care.

[palecur.livejournal.com]

"The primary benefit of hate crimes legislation is to allow questions of race, gender, and sexual orientation to influence these designations directly, and impact sentencing in a corresponding fashion."

I can't tell the difference between the above and "Killing a black/queer/woman is worse than killing a straight white dude." I disagree with the second, therefore I must disagree with the first.

[ronebofh.livejournal.com]

The difference is easy: a non-white killing a white because he's white.

[palecur.livejournal.com]

Blerg. I am foolish today, and must ask you to explain in a bit more detail, because I'm not getting it. Perhaps when I return for lunch it will all make sense.

Re: The second part of this response contains a common rhetorical fallacy, but I don't care.

[wisn.livejournal.com]

No.

Killing a person who is /N/ is not a hate crime. Killing a person because he or she is /N/ is a hate crime.

Re: The second part of this response contains a common rhetorical fallacy, but I don't care.

[palecur.livejournal.com]

The difficulty of proving motivation entirely aside, penalizing someone for thoughts in their head is, well, antithetical to my sense of justice. Kicking Lance Fabulous in the head for the $20 in his wallet is bad; I don't see why doing it because he's gay is worse.