What purpose is served by declaring an obvious falsehood? That is Faux News tactics
But it's not an "obvious falsehood." Creative lawyers and judges find ways to twist and expand laws every day and, sometimes, the results aren't good for society as a whole. You're assuming that won't happen here because you are emotionally invested in the law.
In fact, given how your own country has used laws against "
hate speech" to try and censor journalists, I could probably make an argument that you're the one being disingenuous. However, I prefer to give you the benefit of the doubt and refrain from accusing you of the bad faith you attribute to me.
along with the physical attack comes the psychological aspect of it all. No one should have to feel that they should be subjected to such a targeted attack. If the guy beats my mom over a traffic incident, the reasons are outside herself. She's going to be traumatized, sure...but she won't feel the internal void that a rape victim or a victim of a racial/sexual bashing will. The damage is over and above the physicality of it all.
That's merely an assumption on your part. Crime victims also report a feeling of mental violation regardless of whether the crime is a "hate crime." There's often a feeling of "what did I do to deserve this?"
Case in point: in traffic court I've seen people who were hit by drunk drivers who are emotionally distraught over what happened. Obviously the drunk driver didn't target them because of their race/gender/sexual preferance. He just got wasted and plowed into them. But the sense of loss and violation in the victim is still great.
