Hate Crimes Enhancements in the United States are unjustified.

"If this truly is the land of the free, should we not be free to express our own opinions?" this stands to be the final statement of my opponent in his opening arguments. in this statement and throughout much of his case my opponent advocates the freedom and liberty of the american people. and while i agree that the freedom of speech should be preserved, my opponent seems to be under the fallacious impression that the 1st amendment endorses hate crime. if my opponent can show me in what clause of the 1st amendment of the constitution of the united states that entitles us to the freedom of acting upon our hate, then i will gladly concede this debate right now. however, since there is no clause establishing anything relatively close to that, i will continue with defining a few terms and contending his points in a more in-depth manner. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- HATE CRIME-a crime, usually violent, motivated by prejudice or intolerance toward a member of a gender, racial, religious, or social group. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- my opponent's first point follows as: Point 1. Constitutional Right. It is clearly written in the first amendment that you have the right to free speech and such. In this amendment, it is understood that you have the right to hate someone, and there is nothing unjust about hate. If someone were to commit a crime simply because of the victim's racial background or something else deserving being tagged as a hate crime, they should not be punished more, simply because they do not like that person. My opponent may say that you ARE in fact, allowed to hate people, but you may not act upon this hatred. However, what would make this hatred any different from the hatred of someone who commits a crime for a reason not considered a hate crime? The plain fact is, crime is crime, and hate is hate. You cannot punish someone for what they themselves think. Punish them for the crime? Sure. But not because they hate. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- My rebuttal: The one thing my opponent is correct on here is that in the 1st amendment of the constitution, our freedom of speech is protected given the exception of slander and libel. In other words, as long as it is true, you can write or speak whatever you would like against an individual as long as it is true. however, we are discussing HATE CRIMES not HATE SPEECH, and in no where under the constitution are HATE CRIMES protected, so in all actuality this point is irrelevant to the debate. So as my opponent states that you may act opine your hate because it is protected by the constitution, he is clearly under a fallacious impression, drop this point. my opponent goes on to make a final statement in this debate proclaiming that "The plain fact is, crime is crime, and hate is hate. You cannot punish someone for what they themselves think. Punish them for the crime? Sure. But not because they hate." this is contradictory to my opponents case for the fact that while he speaks of preserving the freedoms and liberties of the american people, freedom and hatred (more specifically hate crimes) simply cannot live under the same roof. the plain fact of it all is that when you commit a hate crime (a crime, usually violent, motivated by prejudice or intolerance toward a member of a gender, racial, religious, or social group.) you infringe upon the freedoms and liberties that that person or group is entitled because of their status as an american citizen. to perhaps make my argument more conceivable, lets take a trip back into the days of jim Crow laws. Jim Crow laws were forged purely through the hatred of a race, and an intolerance oppressing african americans for years. it is for this fact that Hate Crime enhancements are just, for they preserve the freedoms and liberties that we are entitles by being an american. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- to his second arg: Point 2. Unjust Punishment. To be punished for murder, is understandable. To be punished for your hatred, is not. [as i previously explained]. Unfortunately, there have been cases in which two separate people committed the EXACT SAME crime, however, for different reasons. In court, these people were charged differently, although the same crime was committed. One of the accused was given 3 more years in jail than the other. The reason for this? Because he had committed the crime in hatred towards a specific race. Now...if justice is truly meant to punish people for their misdeeds, why were these two exact same crimes dealt with differently? The harsh reality is that just because one of these men thought differently than the other, he was charge more severely. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- my rebuttal again i have to reiterate the fact that hate crime enhancements preserve the liberties of our american citizens, people participating in hate crimes are those who strive to take away what it means to be an american. they not only make a strike against our system of law, but against the morals and ethics that make this country so great. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- when it comes down to it, my opponent advocates that we all be free and have the liberties that we deserve because were american. and while i agree that we should have those liberties, i do not agree with the notion that we should step back in time where african americans were getting lynched for looking at people wrong. freedom and hatred are two values that can never coincide with one another. which is why hate crime enhancements are just, and it is your obligation to negate this topic.