Re: I know beating the shit out of someone is illegal, what about slurring them?
 

The only way speech can be a crime is if the speech is designed to incite unlawful action like a riot or some other kind of violence.

So, yes, if you tried to stir up a bunch of people to commit violence against a certain class of people, it could be a crime, and it could be a hate crime depending on the law of the state and the character of the class towards which the incitement was directed.

However, if you just stand up and say "I bleeping hate those bleeping [insert unfairly targeted minority of your choice here]; they suck because x, y, and z," it's not a crime. Unless you go far enough so that your speech could be construed as incitement to act.

It's a difficult standard to meet. If there's the least bit of theoretical spin on it such that the speech can be construed as suggesting persecution in the abstract (Example: "One might say that the best thing for this country would be for [unfairly targeted minority] to get their asses kicked up, down, and sideways"), it's protected by the First Amendment (in the US, of course).

So basically, it can't be a Hate Crime unless it's a Crime, Statikk...

Danny is right about most of that shit....what you have to understand is that racial classification IS racist...and what we have to understand is that "hate crimes" can never be truly identified when dealing with multiple ethnicities in a certain area. You can't always tell what the motives of a persons violent sctions are. I mean, all violent acts are part of an act of hatred...why should you classify them specifically to hatred against races...