News :: GLBT
Report shows gay hate crimes as common as other typesby Kilian MelloyThursday Jun 14, 2007 A new report on bias crimes indicates that hate crimes directed at GLBT people are as prevalent as hate crimes directed against other minorities.
The report, released to by the Williams Institute at the UCLA School of Law, is titled "Comparison of Hate Crime Rates Across Protected and Unprotected Groups." On average, the report shows, 13 out of 100,000 GLBT individuals report being the victim of a bias-motivated crime. For African Americans, the rate is eight out of 100,000; for Muslim Americans, 12 out of 100,000; and for Jewish Americans, 15 out of 100,000.
"Often people try to pass off [the absence of federal hate crimes laws pertinent to the GLBT community]] as... not as big a problem as race-based hate crimes," Rebecca Stotzer, a research fellow at the Williams Institute, said in a story posted today on theadvocate.com.
Continued Stotzer, "But when you actually look at the rates and you think of it as a risk per person, you can see that the numbers are actually much more even between groups that are protected versus those that are not."
The report draws on a study done in 2004 by William Rubenstein, the faculty chairman of the Williams Institute, but incorporates new information. The new edition of the report was sparked by the current consideration by Congress of re-introduced federal hate crimes legislation titled The Matthew Shepard Act.
"This report’s findings provide a new perspective that should inform policy makers who are deciding whether to include hate crimes based on sexual orientation and gender identity in federal hate-crime laws," said Williams Institute research director M.V. Lee Badgett.
"The numbers show that hate crimes remain a serious problem for the gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender communities," added Badgett.
If passed, the Matthew Shepard Act would provide federal hate-crimes protections to the GLBT community. The House of Representatives has already passed an identical bill.
Under current law, only crimes committed on the basis of race, color, religion, and national origin are covered by bias crime provisions. Crimes committed on the basis of actual or perceived sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, and disability are not covered under current federal legislation.
Kilian Melloy reviews media, conducts interviews, and writes commentary for EDGEBoston, where he also serves as Assistant Arts Editor.
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