The shooting that took place earlier tonight in Charleston, South Carolina might have been racially motivated. That’s the position that Charleston’s Chief of Police is taking, stating on live TV “I do believe it was a hate crime.” Support for that claim comes from the fact that parishioners of this specific church are predominantly black, while the suspected assailant is a white male in his early 20’s. Nine people have been confirmed dead in the wake of the incident, including the pastor of the church. Churches are gun free zones in South Carolina, where even concealed carry is forbidden without specific permission from the presiding clergy.
That’s the police chief, not the mayor.
Charleston South Carolina looks like a wonderful city to visit.
I hope they catch the bastard who caused this senseless act. I hope to god they do. I’ll already see to many people on news sites blaming lack of gun laws and this and that for this tragedy.
I hope to god they people of this incident find the peace and strength.
As opposed to all those other murders, which are crimes compassion, or maybe crimes of indifference. A ‘hate crime.’ Puh-lease.
Thank you, “Hate crime” is a weasel word!
Murder is Murder!
“Hate Legislation” is BS!
It’s a control issue
Exactly this. All murders are hate crimes. All malum in se crimes are, by definition, hate crimes.
From a political 2A perspective, this is a smart move. It takes the spotlight off the tool (the gun) and puts it on the perpetrator.
With a crime of passion or convenience or individual hatred, it’s easy to suggest that the gun made the decision to kill easier, bringing focus on the gun and raising alarm regarding weapons amongst the general population.
With a hate crime, you can focus on the person. No guns? He would have found some other destructive means to bring about death. The person was specifically looking to harm his targets and restricting access would have done nothing to stop it.
The way I understand the popular usage of the term “hate crime” is a crime that has been committed due to the fact that the victim(s) is a member of a group such as race, religion, gender and so on. The victim or victims and a “non-hate crime” would be someone that is being robbed or victimized in a random fashion, someone the Perp has a beef with in the past and so on. So, in my mind this looks like it may have been a “hate crime” but it seems too early to say for sure at this point.
Invoking “hate crime” terminology really only means “some victims are more equal than others.”
Crime is crime. Harm is harm. Tort is tort. And dead is dead.
Motive is irrelevant.
First, it is sad such a tragedy happens. Even more so in a congregation.
I do not live in Charleston, but murder is murder. Hate has nothing to do with it. To get a conviction in court, motive is not an element of the crime. Don’t care why someone murders you; dead is dead, always has been. And I don’t support any notion of “correction” of such behavior; just end that person’s ability to behave in such a manner. Doesn’t matter if the shooter was any color; shot is shot. The whole idea of punishing thoughts is about as scary as it gets. There is no limit on the number of thought crimes possible.
People are fooling themselves if they think racism always stems from hate. I can make a choice of who I like/don’t like without hating anyone. Because I believe most of humanity is inferior to me on a number of planes does not mean I am hateful to anyone or anything. Actually, it would require emotion to hate, and I have none towards people I do not know, or people I choose not to associate with. Maybe I even think certain people should be eliminated because of what they individually have done, but I wouldn’t waste an emotion on them. Nor is there any reason for emotion in acknowledging that survivors of this shooting will need assistance coming to terms (if they ever do) with this violation of decency and basic humanity. Logic leads to the conclusion these folks will not be the same after tonight. Next steps are to get family together and to recognize the blessing that the survivors are still here. Steps after that are to let logic and reason guide the track-down and application of justice on/to the shooter. No hate, no emotion, just relentless pursuit of the outcome.
Notwithstanding any of the above, there are families grieving who only this morning were making plans for a pleasant evening, and a good new morning tomorrow. There will be time for balancing the scales shortly, but now we can only stand quietly by and wonder at the society which generates people with no concept of morality or respect for life. People who justify the carrying of sidearms for self-protection.
Wow, you started off rather insightful and logical then outed yourself as a full blown retarded monkey in the final couple sentences. A shame you’re not intelligent enough to grasp what an oblivious idiot you are.
This sort of response is why I continue to enjoy hanging out with the mental giants here. Apparently reading through an entire missive and recognizing the even the worst reasoning for having contempt for people does not constitute “hate”.
Sorry, got interrupted by a slide jam with one of my students.
Meant to finish the last sentence on the note that a complex and subtle declaration is sometimes too much for folks here. But I really do value learning about people who wander around with death in their pockets.
The even the worst reasoning……WTF…… are you angry for being shot in the head?
Thank you for the edit. Should have read “that even….”
Always delights me when the intolerant can find minutia to stumble over. Like the lefties, ignores the subject matter entirely.
Mr. Sucks, he wasn’t carrying for self protection
Agree, but not sure the reason for having the pistol are relevant. He had a gun, he used it illegally, the motive for having the gun did not add to or take away from the enormous crime.
Idiot. If some of the congregation had been able to carry a sidearm, the shooter may have been stopped. How, exactly, does making the law-abiding defenseless make them safer from people who wish to do them harm? If someone is intent on committing murder, do you seriously think they’ll stop because they might violate some anti-carry law? Is logic really that alien to your thought process?
Guys don’t feed the troll.
All he wrote was a lot of mumbo jumbo with absolutely no meaning. He said he has contempt for his fellow man, but doesn’t hate. Then he calls gun owners hateful.
Also his name is 2asux.
Gibbs Rule 70: If you have to explain yourself, get a better audience.
Ok, let’s start at the beginning:
– 2A sucks for the gun grabbers and anti-gun idiots
– Emotion interferes with my trigger discipline
– It is not necessary to have any motivation at all for committing a crime (mass murder in this case)
– It is not good or bad that one group or another is a target of a crime; a crime is a crime
– Even the most obtuse, crappy, unreasonable, silly or indefensible logic for a crime is irrelevant
– People love to live emotion-filled lives, it makes them feel good about their wretched selves
– Popularly, “hate crime” lets the mush-heads express their outrage because they believe the word “hate” will result in a greater penalty than just a “regular” crime
– And yes, I can dislike, ignore, discount and avoid anyone I don’t like…for no reason at all
We’ve talked a lot on this site about the importance of branding and marketing to appeal to low information and emotional voters. I’ve been using the term “massacre magnets” to describe GFZs, specifically linking the two phrases to get my point across. I’ve found it to be pretty effective. Any thoughts?
Funny how they can put the “hate” part out so early in the investigation, but other tid bits will just have to wait. Let’s stir the pot some more and get everyone pissed off, maybe look for a drug store to burn down.
It’s simple. White guy kills blacks = hate crime. Black guy kills whites = not hate crime.
Non Muslim shoots up Mosque = hate crime. Muslim shoots up Church = not hate crime.
Obviously, the chief has some backpedaling to do if the culprit turns out to be Muslim.
From the sound of things, I suspect the shooter is a hard-left militant atheist. Watch the story get dropped like a hot potato once that’s discovered…
All of this “hate crime” business is stupid anyway. Murder is murder. The criminal’s motivations are irrelevant to anything except being a tool to track him down by.
If this atrocity had happened in a synagogue, anti-Semitic, a mosque, anti-Muslim, but a Christian church? Racism.
Did the chief state that it was a probable hate crime because of race? As written, the post only speculates why the term was tossed out. The chief may have been alluding to it being anti-Christian.
Stop using modifiers in front of the word crime. Was it illegal? yes. That makes it simply: a CRIME.
It what was done was legal but mean-spirited, it’s still not a crime. Hate doesn’t make something criminal, the fact that it’s illegal is what makes it a crime. Murder with any device is still murder, so let’s go ahead and curtail the phrase “gun crime” as well. Something is either a crime, or it’s not.
This black church choose to disarm itself. There was a time in this country when every church attendee was armed. A church shooting was stopped in Colorado by an armed guard. In California a shooter went past two Synagogues with armed guards posted at the front door. He shot up the liberal reform Synagogue instead with no armed guards.
Evil is real. Everyone must be prepared to fight it both spiritually and physically.
When black people stopped accepting the white liberal thinking process which is also evil then life will improve for them.
Pretty sure carrying in a church is illegal in South Carolina. Doesn’t mean this church would’ve embraced concealed carry, but barring it may not have been up to them to decide.
From what I understand, if the pastor had given his blessing on carrying in the church, it would have been legal… but apparently that point is moot anyway as allegedly this pastor/politician was also pro gun control. We can infer from that that there was no chance on this earth that he was going to allow legal gun carry in his church.
Pray for the families for Evil harbors no prejudice in its victims. The St. James Massacre in Capetown South, Africa killed 11 and wounded 58 at a Sunday evening church youth service. Charl Van Wyk, a Christian Missionary and legal concealed carry permittee, interrupted the 4 attackers with a 5 shot .38 Special. Although Van Wyk thought he missed, he wounded one BODY ARMOR wearing attacker, upset their plan and the attackers with FULLY automatic AK47’s broke off the attack saving many more lives.
South Africa regulates and licenses ALL firearms. A permit is required for every firearm.
Be prepared! Train. Carry everywhere all the time. Defend the innocent!
It’s illegal to take away other people’s protected rights, and antis hate the Second Amendment and we who support it. Therefore, every anti is also guilty of hate crimes.
Strange how when a white guy kills blacks its a hate crime but when 6 black guys kill a white guy yelling ‘Kill whitey! Kill that cracker’ not a word is said.
The same goes when a white officer kills a black man riots abound but when a black cop kills an innocent white guy you hear crickets chirping.
Go figure.
Of course, it don’t fit the agenda and never will.
I thought it was workplace violence.
Obviously. I just hope bg doesn’t have a permit. They control crime where I live by not issuing permits and no oc. Works wonderfully well. 🙂
What do you need a firearm for? Just wear a tshirt with “No Shooting Zone” on it.
Wouldn’t we need to state “Gun Free Zone” so the nannies,gun-grabbers and criminals will know how sensitive and caring we are? Know that our caring and sensitivity means we should be exempt from unpleasantness?
just heard on foxnews…the reason for designating this a “hate crime” is twofold:
– feds have no murder statute, so to get them involved, something federal needs to be involved (civil rights, etc). “hate crime” allows doj to nose into a city/state matter
– under “hate crime”, feds can apply the death penalty
very scary and dangerous
It’s BOHICA time!
Bend
Over
Here
It
Comes
Again
Barry has already made his “Gun Violence” speech.
look at Chicago, blacks killing blacks on the daily isn’t that a hate crime?