Customer Reviews

Punishing Hate: Bias Crimes under American Law

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I found Lawrence's book, Punishing Hate, to be an enlightening, closely-reasoned guide to understanding hate crimes and how to combat them. Lawrence's writing is both scholarly and accessible, and his ideas are both wise and practical: for example, Lawrence's insight that after a hate crime, fellow members of the targeted group (e.g. blacks, women, Jews, gay people, et al.) feel not only sympathy for the victim, not only empathy for the victim, but the sense that they themselves have been attacked. I could go into more details here, but you're better off simply picking up the book.

It is a shame that the reviewer below, "Dissident Aggressor," has chosen to rant at length, to recite untrue things (e.g. the book *does* define who should be considered a hate crime victim -- see the book's section on "social fissure lines" in Chapter 1), and to make ad hominem references to Lawrence's background. Oh, well, it *is* the internet; you never know what you'll find. One more reason to turn to this book. Few topics provoke as much confusion, vitriol and nonsense on the internet as hate crimes. Amid this cacophony, Lawrence's book is a clarion call of reason, and a call to action.

Senator Kennedy's praise for this book was spot-on: Punishing Hate by Professor Frederick M. Lawrence presents a clear, cogent case for why and how to end impunity for hate crimes, and in doing so, to eradicate them from our societies.


Lawrence has the right blend of academic subtlety and common touch, of assiduousness and compassion. He was among the first coiners of the terms "bias crime," which is more specific than "hate crime" in describing the motivation that lies behind such crimes of bigotry. In this book, Lawrence also coins the term "parallel crime," which has now entered the discourse (see: [...]) to refer to the crime that is similar in mechanics to, but vastly different in intent from, the bias crime in question.


For example: Regarding breaking a synagogue's windows with bigoted intent, ordinary vandalism would be the "parallel crime." One can think of similar examples regarding bias crimes against people of any background, religion, color or creed: African-Americans, women, gay people, and ultimately -- this is Lawrence's universal definition of who should be considered a victim of a hate crime; he discusses the question in great detail -- people of any group where a country's "social fissure lines" lie, as Lawrence aptly phrases it.


Lawrence shows how the parallelism in act between the bias crime and the "parallel crime" reveals the vast difference in the intent behind the act. This difference reveals why bias crimes inflict so much more pain on the individual -- and on the targeted community -- than the parallel crime. The deeper damage of a bias crime, in turn, reveals how bias crimes undermine society in a graver way, and why they must be seen differently, treated differently and punished more heavily than the parallel crime: because only in this way can we as a society deter people from committing bias crimes in the first place.


Lawrence's contributions to scholarship -- and his numerous appearances giving testimony before Congress -- paid off in 2009 when President Obama signed the Hate Crimes Prevention Act of 2009 into law. I'd pick this book up if I were you. No book is perfect, but Punishing Hate is as close as it gets to indispensable.

Understanding hate crimes is the first step toward stopping them. This book is compelling, provocative and well written. The author takes the reader on the journey of his research and expertise in a way that is both easy to understand and difficult to forget.
Annette Annechild

I was opposed to hate crime legislation before I read this book. However, I thought that maybe the wisdom of Frederick M. Lawrence (B.A. Williams, J.D. Yale) would cause me to re-think my position. After reading Lawrence's tract, the fervor of my opposition to hate crime legislation has only increased.

I agree with Lawrence that members of certain groups are wrongly attacked solely because of their status. Further, I agree with Lawrence that such attacks are despicable and cause a special type of harm in that they attack something which goes to the core of a victim's being. Finally, I agree with Lawrence that as a policy matter it would be worthwhile to stop such attacks so that members of minority groups would not need to fear senseless acts of aggression and intimidation simply because of their status.

That is where I stop agreeing with Lawrence. I think he gets everything else wrong and fails to consider simple counter-arguments to the positions he outlines. For one, he does not set out a universal definition of who should be considered a hate crime victim. Who should receive this status? Might there be problems with not fixing a clear definition? Absent a clear definition, could a hate crime law then be invoked at a prosecutor's whim against any criminal defendant? Might that be a dangerous tool to give prosecutors?

Lawrence, who is Jewish, states that Jews are frequently targets of hate crimes. He also mentions African-Americans and homosexuals. This is all true. But there are lots of other minority groups that can be added to this list. Right now in America it appears that Muslims and homeless individuals are two of the most frequent targets of senseless violence (several homeless individuals were beaten to death in Florida, because of their status, just weeks before this writing). Lawrence fails to mention either group as deserving of hate crime protection. I would argue that both groups deserve protection at least as much as do the groups Lawrence names. Readers of this review probably also can think of several other groups that should qualify for hate crime victim status. Indians, Asians, the Polish, the Guyanese, prostitutes--people from these backgrounds all could qualify for hate crime victim protection. One would hope that Lawrence would concede that members of his ethnic background are no more deserving of protection that are members of these other groups. If that is the case, then hate crime legislation should protect members of ANY group that is targeted because of a particular status since members of all groups should be equally entitled to protection.

Lawrence would probably agree that many different minority groups can be subject to hate crime attacks. If he is an intellectually consistent person, he also should agree that a decent hate crime statue would protect all these different minority groups--not just the ones he happens to mention. Here is the problem. Hate crime legislation tends not to protect the people who need it most. This is because the groups who are in the most dire need of hate crime protection in any given city/town/state are generally the groups with the least political power. By this, I mean that the groups most in need of protection are generally: (1) the least likely to be able to successfully lobby for legislation which would get their group protected by hate crime legislation; and (2) the least likely to appear sympathetic in the eyes of prosecutors, judges and members of the jury in any given city/town/state.

I'll illustrate these prior two points using an example borrowed from Lawrence. Imagine a "union town" where nearly everyone is vehemently pro-union. Lawrence writes that in such a town "union membership, or the absence thereof" should be an appropriate characteristic for hate crime legislation. This may be true. But a few questions for Lawrence. First, how are the non-union workers in the town ever going to get the legislature to pass a hate crime bill granting them protection? If the town is pro-union, wouldn't you expect members of the legislature to oppose the bill for fear of being voted out of office? Second, even if the bill somehow got passed in the pro-union town, how likely is it that a prosecutor would ever successfully invoke the hate crime law where a union worker attacked a non-union counterpart? Good luck getting the prosecutor to charge the union worker with a hate crime! He might lose his job! Likewise, the judge and jury are unlikely to favor convicting the union worker of a second crime (the hate crime on top of the initial charge) in a pro-union town.

The example is simple and specific. But it is applicable in other cases as well. Previously I mentioned that homeless persons and Muslims are in need of hate crime legislation because they are often targeted because of their status. But how many Muslims or homeless persons are on the bench? How much political power do Muslims and homeless persons have in cities, towns and states? The answer of course is that there are very few Muslim judges in the United States and probably no homeless judges. Neither group has much political power in the United States or much influence. One would think that groups such as theirs are particularly in need of hate crime protection, but, unfortunately, due to their lack of influence these groups are among the least likely to get protection.

So it is with hate crime legislation. Hate crime legislation tends to favor those groups who possess political power, money and influence. But, paradoxically, hate crime laws generally fail to protect those who need it most--those devoid of political power, money and influence.

Lawrence's book deserves one star because it fails to consider such basic points. It does not acknowledge how politicized hate crime legislation inevitably becomes, and it does not acknowledge how hate crime laws are typically BIASED in favor of members of ethnic groups who possess money and power.