How is the community harmed specifically any differently than when a child is raped and murdered or anyone for that matter.
If you have to ask such a question, I highly doubt you'd understand the answers I've already given.
The additional harm from hate crimes is that failure to respond effectively to them sends the message that the law doesn't apply equally to everyone...that it's either OK -- or less bad -- to victimize some groups of people rather than others.
I'll give it another try, but I must remind you that *whether or not you understand my explanation, it is still the case that HCE's are based upon recognition of additional harm, not upon punishing thought.*
The additional harm in question, if and when a government is perceived to be too lenient upon criminals who have committed crimes specifically motivated by animus against a protected class, is that both the targeted group -- and the general population -- will come away with the impression that the protections of the law don't REALLY apply to everyone, or at the very least don't apply equally to them. Once you grasp the fact that allegiance to a government and its laws is NOT a given (people have to be trained into accepting laws), the significance of this should be obvious.
There is absolutely no reason at all to make one motive for murder any worse than another.
For the upteenth time; the basis of HCE's is not privileging one motive over another...it is recognizing the additional harm of some motives over others. This principle, by the way, is quite common. As some other posters have pointed out, the penalties for ACTUALLY killing someone are heavier than for ATTEMPTING to kill them, in part because obviously the harm is greater when you ACTUALLY kill someone.
There are killers who rape and kill only children. According to your logic, children should be a protected class too.
Actually, I WOULD support including AGE as a protected class. There are three heavy practical challenges to making that an effective policy change.
First, it would be extremely difficult to marshal the kind of evidence one would need to demonstrate age-based animus.
Second, as I already described with regards to attaching a gender-based HCE to a rape conviction, it would be similarly difficult to demonstrate that a rape was motivated by specific animus towards women (as contrasted against simply imposing sexual violence upon someone, and only being attracted to women).
Third, children have no consistent and reliable political voice. They are treated -- legally and politically -- as though they are nothing but extensions of their parents or guardians. The political organization and weight of "parents' rights" advocacy groups continues to easily outmatch the advocacy groups which organize on behalf of children.
A killer of children is terrorizing children, and they are no less important than any minority.
HCE's are not based upon whether or not the offense in question MAY terrorize someone (or many someone's). HCE's are based upon demonstrating SPECIFIC, TARGETED harm which has historically already been shown to have a chilling effect on specific communities.
They're are plenty of rapists and women-killers who have admitted to hating women. Women are also a minority class. According to your logic, we should be protected too. Are WE any less important than other minority? When there is a rapist or a woman-killer loose in the community, women feel terrorized, frightened and victimized.
EXACTLY. And YES, I would support HCE's in such cases. The challenge, once again is not in gaining MY support for such an HCE, but rather the legal challenge of demonstrating through a heavy evidentiary burden that the rapist or attacker not only bore such a specific animus, but that this animus was the basis of their criminal act (and NOT just the desire to impose sexual violence upon someone who happened to match their favored profile of victim).
No. I think hate crime legislation makes no sense in the big picture, and I think it is punishing for the motive, not the result of the crime committed.
OK, I get that you think that...AND YOU ARE INCORRECT. FACTUALLY WRONG.
Not liking HCE's is one thing. Rationalizing your dislike of HCE's
on the basis of reinforcing patent falsehoods about HCE's is quite another.