Another post-election hate crime wave?

The news reports that we are in the grips of a hate crime wave not seen since the civil rights era.

There indeed has been a spike in the number of reports of such incidents, say representatives for two organizations that track such occurrences. A representative for one group, in fact, said the rise appears to be even worse that what was took place immediately after the terror attacks in 2001.
"Since the election, we've seen a big uptick in incidents of vandalism, threats, intimidation spurred by the rhetoric surrounding Mr. Trump's election," Richard Cohen, president of the Southern Poverty Law Center in Montgomery, Ala., told USA TODAY. "The white supremacists out there are celebrating his victory and many are feeling their oats," Cohen said.

That sounds scary and disturbing...and familiar.

Hate crime surged in England, Wales and Northern Ireland in the second half of July – nearly a month after the EU referendum vote – and still remains at significantly higher levels than a year ago.
The latest set of figures quietly released by the National Police Chiefs’ Council on Wednesday show a 49% rise in incidents to 1,863 in the last week in July when compared with the previous year. The week after saw a record 58% increase in recorded incidents to 1,787.

Well, that proves it. Those are hard numbers from unbiased sources, that just happen to fit into the meme that Brexit voters and Trump voters are all just a bunch of racists. Amirite?

Or is there another explanation?

On the surface, Britain would seem to be in the throes of an alarming wave of hate crimes.
In 2015, Britain recorded eight times as many hate crimes as the United States, which has five times as many people; that was 31 times the hate crimes reported in France and 88 times the total in Italy...
All in all, it is a numerical portrait of a society in the grip of hatred and bigotry. Except the statistics are misleading, said Mark Hamilton, the assistant chief constable of the Northern Ireland police, who leads Britain’s hate crime policy for the National Police Chiefs’ Council.
“In most cases, it’s not a rise in hate crimes. It’s a rise in reporting,” he said in an interview in his Belfast office. Since hate crimes are generally underrecorded, he said, “our national strategy is to increase the level of hate crime reporting.”
The number of reported hate crimes in Britain has risen for two reasons: increased public awareness and changes in the law so that almost anything can be recorded as a hate crime so long as the victim experiences a verbal or physical assault as such.
Many crimes counted in the statistics are registered through True Vision, a government-funded website that allows anyone to anonymously report what they have experienced or witnessed as a hate crime.
Rather than a hotbed of racial hatred, then, Britain is more a country that takes hate crime seriously and encourages citizens to report such acts when they occur.

How can this be? I've seen dozens of these stories about a hate crime wave.
Surely the news media wasn't committing journalistic malpractice again?

Although the so-called Brexit vote “created a license” for some to lash out, Mr. Hamilton said, “if we look at what we’re reporting, we’re not reporting massive numbers of serious crime.”
Data from the Home Office published last month showed that more than half of all hate crimes were categorized as threatening but nonviolent behavior.

Oh yeah. Facts.
But I've read that hate crime has been on the rise in Britain for years.

When Tony Blair first introduced hate laws, in 1998, they applied only to incidents of racial intolerance. However in 2003, the net was widened to include religious discrimination. Over subsequent years, first homophobic and then ‘transphobic’ abuse was added to the list, along with disability hate crime and, more recently ‘crimes against older people’.
Last week, a new category of potential victim emerged: it was reported that several police forces may soon treat ‘misogyny’ as a hate crime, following the alleged success of a pilot scheme in Nottingham where it was decided that wolf-whistling could in certain circumstances constitute ‘threatening behaviour’.
Women may not be the only new demographic singled out for protection, either. Consider, if you will, the annual report of Stop Hate UK, an influential charity which gets around £240,000 a year from grants, largely from the public sector.
It suggests that ‘goths’ or people who choose to wear black clothes, are potential hate crime victims. To this end, it contains a ‘case study’ of abuse supposedly suffered by a ‘goth woman [who] has five facial piercings’.

Oh right. When you keep broadening the definition of 'hate crime' more 'hate crimes' will be reported.
That's a lot easier to believe than a country suddenly becoming a bunch of racists.

Something tells me the post-Trump election hate crime wave will vanish as well.

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SnappleBC's picture

(not something I regularly find the need to do LOL) until I got down to this bit...

Well, that proves it. Those are hard numbers from unbiased sources, that just happen to fit into the meme that Brexit voters and Trump voters are all just a bunch of racists. Amirite?

Like you I am more than a bit skeptical at the Democratic hysteria (including MSM) that's being pounded out 24/7 nowadays.

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A lot of wanderers in the U.S. political desert recognize that all the duopoly has to offer is a choice of mirages. Come, let us trudge towards empty expanse of sand #1, littered with the bleached bones of Deaniacs and Hope and Changers.
-- lotlizard

detroitmechworks's picture

Which is that the perception of many folks is that the hate crimes are up.

As usual, the media doesn't care about what's actually happening, as long as they can fit a narrative that allows them to knock off for cocktails at 3 on Friday.

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I do not pretend I know what I do not know.

Police can't find any report of incidents they supposedly responded to. People retract their statements. Or "clarify" their Facebook posts.

These people are first-rate assholes who make it harder for real victims to be believed. Fuck them.

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detroitmechworks's picture

And the facts will soon fit it.

And if they don't we'll make SURE they do. Trust us, we're from the Media and we're here to inform you.

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I do not pretend I know what I do not know.

Are you all skeptics that there has been at least a surge in reports if not also the possibility of a surge in real incidents and perhaps also increased intensity of these incidents of racism?

I have first hand knowledge of what happened at UPenn where all of the AA freshman students were put into a chat room that talked about lynching them? https://twitter.com/i/moments/797192211607629825

This is totally out of the norm. I don't think I need a statistical analysis to know that. And there have been a lot of things going on around here. When the accounts are coming first and second hand, the stories are in the neighborhood newspapers, I think it's happening. This is not just inflammatory gifs from Occupy Democrats. I'd hate to be complacent and be wrong about it.

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Love ya, mean it

If people hadn't been spending the last two years crying wolf over faked on-campus racial incidents and claiming that the names of dorms and libraries made them feel unsafe, these claims would have more credibility.

Any video online? The only video I've seen shows a Trump supporter getting beat up.

Not saying it's impossible. But there is a lot of SJW bull crap out there.

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featheredsprite's picture

They created Trump. What did they expect? Did they think they could build him up and then make him look like a fool? They thought they could sit in their expensive chairs and out-fight a street fighter who just happens to also own expensive chairs.

Dummies.

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Life is strong. I'm weak, but Life is strong.

Not Henry Kissinger's picture

Better if a guy named Sayeed Farouk was reporting that a guy named Christopher Hayes was the shooter.

Dems sure do love them some hate crimes.

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The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?

detroitmechworks's picture

for terrorism.

Of course, I fully expect to be on whatever List they come up with, but being mistrusted equally by both political parties is surprisingly liberating.

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I do not pretend I know what I do not know.

Without looking it up, but didn't we see the same with burning of black churches? That in fact churches were burning at the same rates as other buildings and churches. One of the problems was that any fire incident was assumed to be and reported as racial arson.

Local headlines today: "Schools reporting rise in racial attacks after Donald Trump election". Oh no. I read the article and there were no attacks if you define "attack" as meaning physical assault. There was only one incident reported in the article, and it was some really stupid shit said by a few students to a black student. Other than one incident there was no reference to any school actually reporting attacks. It was more about what some student groups were doing about the Trump victory. Total irresponsible headline. Looks to me like the adults are the ones doing the agitation and stirring up animus where none existed.

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something ugly in the air. I received an email from kids' high school yesterday.

Since the election last Tuesday, we have seen an increase in number of culturally insensitive, derogatory and discriminatory type comments targeted toward some of our students of color, those who are English learners, Muslim, and/or identify as LGBTQ. Additionally, some students who support President-elect Trump have reported similar comments and behaviors targeted toward them. Students and staff indicate that some of what they are experiencing / witnessing constitutes bullying, harassment, and / or hate speech.

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The earth is a multibillion-year-old sphere.
The Nazis killed millions of Jews.
On 9/11/01 a Boeing 757 (AA77) flew into the Pentagon.
AGCC is happening.
If you cannot accept these facts, I cannot fake an interest in any of your opinions.

And we are going to be just like the Democrats sticking their heads in the sand about how bad Hillary is if we pretend like it is not happening. This thread is dangerous in it's denial. I'm disappointed.

Someone on my gay football league was attacked last week, had a bottle thrown at him and was chased by a pack of drunk Trump supporters. A couple guys at the local "gay" gym in the gayborhood have been harrassed and assaulted by a loud obnoxious Trump supporter who was later banned from the facility. Most of these include references directly to the Trump win. There is no doubt these issues are connected.

Is this a hyper-sensitive response? Mmm, I don't think UPenn students and the entire community marching together about what happened at Penn last week being overly sensitive at all when all the AA freshmen were put in a group called "nigger lynching".

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Love ya, mean it

detroitmechworks's picture

Seeing as how all the hate crimes conveniently cite Trump when doing their nasty business?

You'd think that a pattern would be easy to show hard evidence of.

It always seems to be a friend of a friend who knows a guy who wrote a blog post about another blog post about a twitter story that somebody said happened.

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I do not pretend I know what I do not know.

an event from Halloween weekend, involving a couple of spectators at the football game dressed as Trump and Obama -- with Trump leading Obama around on a "leash" in the form of a noose.

no i wasn't there, but several tens of thousands of people were, so i'm willing to accept that it really happened.

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The earth is a multibillion-year-old sphere.
The Nazis killed millions of Jews.
On 9/11/01 a Boeing 757 (AA77) flew into the Pentagon.
AGCC is happening.
If you cannot accept these facts, I cannot fake an interest in any of your opinions.

detroitmechworks's picture

http://www.sbnation.com/college-football/2016/10/29/13468492/wisconsin-n...

Campus claims 1st Amendment protection for the protestors who apparently held a sign which stated "What difference at this point does it make?"

Very interesting statement for people supporting the lynching of Obama to make. Almost as if it was an attempt to say what is GOING to happen after a Trump victory.

In other words, sounds like a couple guys saying TRUMP IS A RACIST.

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I do not pretend I know what I do not know.

I was told by a Trump supporter that they wished I would die this week. Not related to any of my "identities" and about as effectual as a three year old throwing a tantrum, but certainly unkind and the first time someone has said to my face that they wanted me dead since I was a lgbt activist in college.

There certainly feels like a rise in discourtesy, if not hate speech. How much that translates into hate crimes, I am still unsure.

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