The Hate Crimes Agenda: An Attack on Faith
By Robert H. Knight
July/August 2001 Family Voice

• When Rev. Kristopher Okwedy of Staten Island, New York, purchased space on two billboards to post a Biblical verse about homosexuality, he thought he was conveying the Word of God. But public officials forced the billboard company to remove the verses. Reason: They conveyed “an atmosphere of intolerance.”

• In Saskatchewan, Canada, a newspaper owner was hauled before the province’s Human Rights Commission for running an ad that contained Bible verses dealing with homosexuality. Two mayors in Ontario have faced personal fines for failing to declare “gay pride” events in their cities. Their refusal to celebrate homosexuality showed “bigotry” toward homosexuals, the human rights commissions concluded.

• Canadian authorities have warned Dr. James Dobson’s Focus on the Family, Dr. Jerry Falwell’s Old Time Gospel Hour, and The Dr. Laura (Schlessinger) Show that they cannot broadcast unless they cut any portions dealing with homosexuality. The Canadian broadcasting board cites Canada’s “hate crime” law, in which it is illegal to speak of any group derogatorily. This also means that pastors cannot read Bible verses on air regarding homosexuality, or they endanger the licenses of stations that carry them.

• In San Francisco, city supervisors passed a resolution denouncing a Truth in Love ad campaign by Concerned Women for America and other pro-family groups. It also urged local media not to run the ads. The message—that Jesus can save homosexuals and help them leave homosexuality—was said to be “full of lies” and causing “a marked increase in anti-gay violence.” One supervisor even wrote a letter directly blaming pro-family groups for the beating death of Wyoming college student Matthew Shepard.

Homosexual activists note that the Nazis degraded Jews as a precursor to the Holocaust. They say nonacceptance of homosexuality leads directly to hate crimes. This comparison’s flaw is that the vast majority of Americans who oppose homosexuality are not Nazis and do not hate homosexuals. Most Americans want all crime victims treated equally, including homosexuals. But homosexual activists call mere disagreement “hate speech,” and recast support for traditional marriage as a form of bigotry.

In America, every state except Wyoming has some kind of hate-crime, or “bias-motivated,” law. Forty-four states have penalty-enhancement laws, which add jail time for a crime motivated by “hate” or “bias” against members of a group. Five more states have laws that call only for reporting such offenses. But homosexual activists in them are working to add the penalty-enhancement, which is the real “teeth” in hate crime laws.

While the intention seems noble, the results can be dangerous. Hate crime laws:

• Violate the Constitution’s 14th Amendment guarantee of equal protection under the law. By providing more penalties for some perpetrators, hate crime laws afford some victims less protection. Yvette Schneider, a former lesbian activist and now a Christian who ministers to people struggling with homosexuality, notes with some irony, “Now that I’m no longer a lesbian, if I’m mugged today, does that mean the mugger gets off easier?” Yes, it does.

• Penalize thoughts in addition to actions. The law is properly concerned only with human action, not motivation. No one knows for sure what is in somebody’s heart. And punishing some perpetrators because of their views or ideas violates freedom of speech. The motive is irrelevant. A crime is a crime no matter what the criminal thinks of the victim.

• Shift law enforcement resources away from other cases. Media coverage ensures that ordinary crime victims will get less attention than the “hate” case. When two robbers killed Matthew Shepard in 1998, homosexual activists and their media allies created a national sensation. By contrast, the media virtually ignored the rape and murder of Wyoming resident 8-year-old Kristin Lamb. This little girl was not a victim of a hate crime.

• Divide Americans into groups, each seeking special protection. When the government appears to take crimes more seriously for some groups, it perverts the concept of equal justice. In Cincinnati, several days of race riots ensued in April after police shot an unarmed black man. White motorists were dragged from cars and beaten.

  The U.S. Justice Department announced a hate crime charge against a white man for assaulting a black man. This fueled resentment among whites, while blacks saw it as a token gesture. The government later announced a series of hate crime prosecutions of some rioters. By turning the criminal law into a racial spoils system, hate crime laws undermine impartial law enforcement.

• May silence pastors and others who speak about the immorality and dangers of the homosexual lifestyle. As Erik Stanley and Mathew Staver of Liberty Counsel put it, “Preaching or teaching against homosexual conduct could be prosecuted as conspiracy to commit a hate crime. For instance, a minister could preach a sermon that urges those listening to ‘actively oppose the promotion or acceptance of the homosexual lifestyle in their community.’”

  Then, if someone in the community commits an offense, a prosecutor could persuade a jury that the sermon motivated the perpetrator, even if the pastor’s words were taken out of context. The pastor could then be charged with conspiracy to commit a hate crime. A Pennsylvania pastor who was carrying placards outside a “gay” bar was charged with a hate crime. In Wisconsin, a former homosexual who merely argued with a homosexual activist was charged with a hate crime. Many commentators are warning that hate crime laws will eventually throttle freedom of speech.

Apart from the possible abuses, hate crime laws are not even necessary. During a 1998 Senate hearing on this topic, Deputy Attorney General Eric Holder could produce no evidence that hate crimes were not being prosecuted.

Far from soaring, the number of hate crimes offenses involving “sexual orientation” totaled about 1,400, a slight decline from 1997.

To put all this in perspective, of nearly 17,000 murders committed in 1998, only 13 were designated as hate crimes, of which four involved sexual orientation.

While every murder is tragic, and each case deserves prosecution, homosexuals are not being singled out for violence. There is far more violence between homosexuals than against them. The National Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs reports that “gay-on-gay” violence cases are 14 times greater than violent hate crimes against homosexuals.

So far, the 2001 Senate version has 50 cosponsors; the House version (H.R. 1343), sponsored by Rep. John Conyers (D-Michigan), has 194. If passed, the bill would mark the first time that federal law elevated “sexual orientation” to specially protected status. This would open the door for further demands, including special protections in the workplace and same-sex “marriage.”

The Vermont Supreme Court cited the state’s use of “sexual orientation” in the state hate crimes law to determine that homosexuality was no longer disfavored in the law. It then concluded that this should apply to family law as well.

In 1998, Bill Clinton proposed an initiative by the U.S. Departments of Education and Justice to develop “safe schools” curricula called “Healing the Hate.” The programs amount to a re-education process for Christian children who believe homosexuality is wrong. The Senate draft of the national education bill contained a similar proposal. It amounted to a license to stigmatize Christian children.

California is implementing an even more extreme version. A state panel has recommended inserting prohomosexual messages into literature, social studies, health and even math word problems, beginning in kindergarten. The idea is to stop “hate conflicts.”

In Washington state, lawmakers put forward a “bullying” prevention bill.

“We are extremely concerned about this bill because we believe the anti-bullying measure is the first step toward what we are seeing happen in California,” said Anne Ball, State Director for CWA of Washington. She says that such bills “invite subjective judgments on free speech rights—of particular concern to the ‘politically incorrect’ Christian perspective on homosexuality.”

Laws are not enacted in a vacuum. Hate crime laws are part of a larger agenda.

Citing New York City’s hate crimes code, city attorney Dana Biberman described Rev. Kristopher Okwedy’s billboards as expressing “open hostility and intolerance of homosexuality. ... Whether these were quotes from the Bible or not, they were nonetheless ... unnecessarily confrontational and offensive, [and] didn’t belong in Staten Island.”

Anyone who believes in freedom of speech, religion and association should oppose hate crime laws.

Robert H. Knight is the Director of the Culture and Family Institute (CFI), an affiliate of Concerned Women for America. Read CFI’s report “The Bush Administration’s Republican Homosexual Agenda: The First 100 Days.”

More from July/August 2001 Family Voice