Hate Crime
A Community Issue
By David Schneider
Hate crime is an issue that has not received much publicity, but which should be of importance to all members of the community. Violence is not something which should be tolerated in our society, and hence any form of institutionalised violence against any one section of the community should be of grave concern to society as a whole.
Hate Crime is defined in The Police and You report as follows:
"Hate Crime refers to crime, most commonly violence, motivated by prejudice, bias or hatred towards a particular group of which the victim is perceived to be a member. As such, hate crime is generally directed towards a class of people; the individual victim is rarely significant to the offender and is most commonly a stranger to him or her."
Hate crime is particularly prevalent against non-hetero members of the community and this article will focus upon instances of hate crime against members of the Gay, Lesbian and Bisexual community.
Upon doing some research into this subject, I was rather startled to find that there are no facts or figures concerning hate crime available from government sources, the only reports available are a handful of reports prepared by various non-hetero rights groups scattered about the country. The findings of these reports are alarming to say the least. Over 60% of hate crime attacks against females, and over 90% of attacks against males, occurred in public places. This is a very disturbing set of facts, we all like to think that we are relatively safe in public places, and that if something was to happen to us someone would come to our aid. Sadly this does not seem to be the case, at least in the instance of hate crimes. The Streetwise report from New South Wales records that only in just over 40% of attacks did witnesses attempt to assist the survivor. According to the Off Our Backs report, also from New South Wales, only 18% of witnesses offered assistance.
This sort of thing is very unsettling to say the least, it shows an ingrained prejudice in general society against persons of a non-heterosexual identity. Because the overwhelming majority of hate crime attacks occurred in a public place, it gives the impression that most of these crimes were crimes of opportunity. A closer look at the figures rapidly disproves this however. All reports on the topic show that most hate crime attacks occur at or near locations frequented by non-hetero persons. This suggests that most hate crime attacks are not crimes of the moment, but rather are premeditated attacks against members of the Gay, Lesbian and Bisexual community.
This begs the question, "why?" The obvious response is because of homophobia. Homophobia is defined in The Police and You as:
"Commonly understood as the hatred and/or fear of homosexuality, and of gay and lesbian people."
Why are people homophobic? Again, there are no firm facts or statistics, here we can only make assumptions reflecting the actions and statements of homophobic persons. Homophobia is justified by many persons upon religious grounds, such persons frequently quote portions of the Bible or other religious texts, citing them as showing that homosexual practices are an abomination in the eyes of the Supreme Being(s). Some claim to be deeply uncomfortable with non-heterosexual persons because they are afraid of attempts to initiate sexual relations with them. Still others suggest that non-hetero persons should be repressed because they are (allegedly) really paedophiles, wishing to interfere with children.
In actual fact the main objection to persons of a non-heterosexual orientation appears to be little more than a fear of something unknown or not understandable to the homophobic person. It has also been suggested in some quarters that many vocal homophobic persons may be people who are attempting to repress homosexual feelings within themselves that they do not understand.
There is also the socialisation factor to be taken into account. Our society has traditionally been very intolerant to persons who were seen to be different from the norm. This has resulted in the majority of our population being exposed to homophobic attitudes at a very young age, and of these attitudes being portrayed as normal and natural. This opens the possibility that much homophobic behaviour is the result of socialisation and that a homophobic person has actually given the actual issues very little thought, if any.
This argument may be given some support when some of the reports are examined. The Police and You report shows 100% of hate crimes are perpetrated by males, and the Off our backs report showed that 98% of hate crime attacks were perpetrated by males. This is consistent with the higher level of perceived homophobia amongst males in the general community.
Violence is a community issue. It is important for people to be aware of violent activities that occur against any one section of the community. The article has been intended to raise awareness of the violence being visited upon one such section. It should be borne in mind that there can be no real neutrality or non-involvement in such cases of violence. To remain silent merely encourages the offender into more severe acts, and helps to perpetrate the violence.