Hate Crimes

Hate Crimes

1. DEFINITION

   • when individuals become victims of crime on the basis of their race, ethnicity, religion, political convictions, gender, or sexual orientation
   • from verbal abuse to murder
   • threats, harassment, or physical harm and is motivated by prejudice against someone's race, colour, religion, national origin, ethnicity, sexual orientation or physical or mental disability

2. RACE - XENOPHOBIA

   • Xenophobia is an unreasonable fear, distrust, or hatred of strangers, foreigners, or anything perceived as foreign or different.
   • The single biggest mitigator of negative stereotyping is personal familiarity
   • victimization by police, brutal assaults, murders, ethnic cleansing in an area, mass expulsion from the country

3. SEXUAL

   • Prejudice and discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation
   • Apartheid - homosexuality was outlawed
   • corrective rape
     • men rape lesbian women, purportedly as a means of “curing” the woman of her sexual orientation

4. IMPACT

   • Societal
     • targeted group
       • isolated
       • vulnerable
       • unprotected
       • intimidated
     • broader community
       • fear
       • distrust
       • renewed conflicts (polarisation / destabilisation
   • Individual
     • injury to dignity
     • known symptoms of trauma (depression, anger, sleep disturbance, feeling unsafe, etc)
     • trauma takes 5 years to heal