Kristine Carlos on question 1 --
I would assume there is something a little more painful about being the victim of a hate crime. To me a hate crime is directed towards who I am, aspects of myself that I was born into or not in control of (such as my ethnicity or gender). If I was the victim of a crime, of course it would suck that I was a victim of a crime to begin with, but to put myself in the shoes of people who were victims of hate crimes, it hurts even more to find out that I was targeted for being something that they don’t approve of or agree with, much more something that I have no control of and cannot change. The intolerance of who I am hurts more than just being targeted, say, because I held a different opinion with them (an opinion I developed throughout my life based on my experiences) or was fighting over some material possession or something. It feels a little more… discriminative, I guess, to choose to do me wrong only because they hate some inherent quality about me rather than to do me wrong based on aspects of myself that I earned, gained, claimed, or developed throughout the course of my life.
I think there is something different about crime targeted towards aspects of my identity that I have no control over versus opinions, values, or other parts of myself that I cultivated through my own experiences in life. It hits harder to be a victim of hate crime because anyone can be murdered or raped or robbed. But a hate crime, I think there’s a different reason behind it. It’s not just some random murder, rape, or robbery. The reason of the crime committed is because of some inherent quality the unfortunate person has that everyone else may not have.
For example, let’s say someone has 100 bucks in their wallet.. And it just so happens that that person gets robbed in an alley or something. Although it sucks regardless to get robbed in an alley because you have 100 bucks in your wallet, I feel as though it’s so much more impersonal to be robbed because you had 100 bucks in your wallet, because anyone has the potential to earn 100 bucks. However, being robbed because that person was gay or straight, white or black, that’s a lot more personal because they are inherent qualities--qualities you cannot earn or develop throughout your lifetime. You are just born with those qualities. I think there has to be some basic level of tolerance and understanding because people really cannot help some aspects of their identities.
