He did deserve some sort of punishment. HOWEVER, I do hate when people use Orwellian thought police language like "hate crime".
Jealousy is also an emotion but we don't have "jealousy crime" laws. Is someone less dead if their spouse murders them out of "hate"?
His crime was invasion of privacy. I do warn minorities OF ALL LABELS that language in law can backfire long term for ALL of society when it attempts to set up taboos.
When you make attempts via government to censor speech, that is a short term band aid. Long term EVERYONE in the majority and minority should remember that power shifts over time and the people who are the judges and juries and lawyers and law makers may not always agree with what you want to say. The worst any person can do if they want to maintain their ability to bitch, is to hand a loaded gun via law to a government that can use it to silence them.
Now, regarding this guy. Again, his crime was not having the emotional reaction to something he didn't like, his crime was the actions he took.
While his homophobia motivated him, merely being a ignorant bigot cannot be a crime. Otherwise it would be very easy for that slur to be aimed at atheists and this website through "hate crime" utopia idealism could give license to lawmakers to shut down this site.
ACTIONS and violence and calls to violence can be the only factors. No one however on any side or sect or political party should ever have the power to create a situation where they can use government force to be free from merely being offended.
If I arrested everyone who equated atheists to Hitler or threatened me with hell, there would be tons of people in prison. Instead of insisting they don't offend me, I tell them that the "offense" is not the fact that you said it, the offense is that you have no evidence to justify your stupidity.
Jealousy is also an emotion but we don't have "jealousy crime" laws. Is someone less dead if their spouse murders them out of "hate"?
His crime was invasion of privacy. I do warn minorities OF ALL LABELS that language in law can backfire long term for ALL of society when it attempts to set up taboos.
When you make attempts via government to censor speech, that is a short term band aid. Long term EVERYONE in the majority and minority should remember that power shifts over time and the people who are the judges and juries and lawyers and law makers may not always agree with what you want to say. The worst any person can do if they want to maintain their ability to bitch, is to hand a loaded gun via law to a government that can use it to silence them.
Now, regarding this guy. Again, his crime was not having the emotional reaction to something he didn't like, his crime was the actions he took.
While his homophobia motivated him, merely being a ignorant bigot cannot be a crime. Otherwise it would be very easy for that slur to be aimed at atheists and this website through "hate crime" utopia idealism could give license to lawmakers to shut down this site.
ACTIONS and violence and calls to violence can be the only factors. No one however on any side or sect or political party should ever have the power to create a situation where they can use government force to be free from merely being offended.
If I arrested everyone who equated atheists to Hitler or threatened me with hell, there would be tons of people in prison. Instead of insisting they don't offend me, I tell them that the "offense" is not the fact that you said it, the offense is that you have no evidence to justify your stupidity.
