Hate Crimes against Latinos

Hate crimes against Latinos

The number of hate crime reports on Hispanics has an upward trend due to the correlating anti-immigrant rhetoric that motivates bias based on ethnicity and national origin in America. A significant percent of victims of hate crimes are targeted because of the offender’s racial biases that relate to sexual orientation, religion, ethnicity, gender identity, and disability. According to law enforcement records, the rate of hate crimes against Latino Americans are more prevalent today (A Wave of Hate in America, 2008). Hate crimes violate human rights internationally.

There are various incidents where the Latino people get beat up, raped, vandalized, or killed based on a trait that they cannot control. Hate crimes are attacks on people or a group of individuals. It is a crime that victims are the targets of defendants intentionally based on the victim’s race, nationality, ethnicity, sexual orientation, race, or gender. Latino Americans make up the diverse demography and therefore deserve the protection of their heritage and sharing of the same privileges as other Americans.

Thesis

Hate crime against Latinos propagates criminal acts that stem from prejudice based on race, ethnicity, religion, and socio-cultural systems. The victim’s responses are similar to the implications stemming from violence against other types of personal violence such as sexual assault, murder, and intimidation.

Background

Since the mid-1960s, the society has experienced an increase in the development of problems associated with Latino victims of hate crime. This form of the offense has existed from the past where governments and individuals would participate in such incidences proudly. In the 18th century, people of a different indigenous group would be lynched, tortured, whipped, and killed alongside their sympathizers. There was no police authority or government intervention on such incidences. The Republican legislation to criminalize the undocumented has sparked a rage towards illegal immigration and influenced the rising cases of hate crimes against Latinos from the public and extremist organizations.

The Republican politicians exploited the wedge issue of immigration and promoted vigilantes against the Latino community members. Most crimes reported to the Federal Bureau of Investigations are race related. American white supremacists, anti-immigrant extremists, and African Americans commit most anti-Latino crimes. Hate crimes are bias-motivated and often violent. The hate crime between African Americans and Hispanic Americans is fuelled by their competition of blue-collar jobs and lack of sufficient education of members.

Reasons for committing hate crimes against Latinos

Hispanophobia is the aversion, fear, hatred, distrust, and discrimination of people who are of the Latino origin, culture and speak the Spanish language. Politicians play a role in fuelling the phenomenon using illegal immigration and the eradication of the bilingual education ideologies. Most white supremacists see Latinos as the obstacle to their ambitions. They fear the moral influences and moral struggles that exist within the grand coalition of two cultures. American Hispanophobia flourishes from the immigration of people that identify as Hispanic from nearby countries. Most Americans assume that the Latinos originate from the bordering Mexico and therefore whenever an illegal immigrant is caught by the law enforcement authority, they a face deportation to Mexico.

White supremacist groups that claim to be legitimate advocate groups such as the Numbers USA, the Center for Immigration Studies and then Federation for American Immigration Reforms oppose the immigration reforms that favor Latinos. Through massive resources and political funding, they invoke racist stereotypes. These forms dehumanize the Latino people and promote the bigotry of hate groups. Most offenders are ignorant about the origins of the Latino people and are terrified of accepting the difference in the society. They aim to keep America a fair society that does not integrate and adopt adversity.

According to psychology, people that commit hate crimes have low self-esteem and therefore compensate the lack of self-worth by instilling fear in others. Latinos in America get jobs and strive to improve their life in a new country. Most free American use them as a way to improve their self-worth by intimidating their self-worth despite their achievements. The other reason is that most of these criminals have experience of brutality from the Latino community and therefore perform acts of hate crimes as vengeance. Anti-Mexican feelings attack other Latino American populations.

In America, terrorist attacks trigger white extremist citizens to target people from other races including Latinos. Most Americans feel strong negative emotions whenever there is a terrorist attack and therefore blame immigration laws that allow people from other countries such as Latinos to attack them on their land. They, therefore, insult them or beat them up to scare them away to go back to Mexico despite the lack of knowledge of their citizenry.

Anti-Hispanic hate crimes exist as a bias towards people of the Latino tribal, social, cultural, and national affiliation. More people that promote intolerance base their ignorant information on rumors and hearsay; therefore, they influence other people to commit hate crimes against Latinos. The racist skinhead philosophy encourages the white supremacist literature that forces hate crimes. Most cases include naïve teenagers who do not fully understand the history of immigration and how the dimensions of cultural diversity work.

Anti-Hispanic groups view the immigration reforms as a threatening move to the American societal structure. They see the Latinos as lazy and that they associate with drugs and gang violence from Mexico and spread it to their youth in America. This reputation sparks feelings of disgust and mistrust and therefore affects most intentional hate crime incidences. Most offenders shout hateful slurs whenever they beat up or murder a victim and warn them off to tell their fellow community members to leave the host country.

Variations of hate crimes against Latinos

In July 2008, Luis Ramirez experienced brutal beatings by four teenagers as they shouted that they wanted the Mexican population to get out of Shenandoah, Pennsylvania (Lopez, 2012). The 25-year-old man was a Latino, and the incident happened after the passage of the Illegal Immigrant Relief Act that suspended business licenses and permits of all property owners that rented their premises to ‘illegal aliens and hired ‘unlawful workers’ (Lopez, 2012). The victim had a white wife but was an illegal immigrant. The offenders were teenagers who later faced trials and persecution based on their hate crime.

The anti-immigration messages on mainstream media create the invasion perception by the public about the Hispanic Community. The media celebrities sometimes show the Latinos as spreaders of criminal activities and diseases that demonize and infiltrate the American community. Forms of harassment direct to explore the intensity of the discriminatory nature of the society against people of a different cultural affiliation.

Neo-Nazis, American nationalists, white supremacists, and native groups harass, intimidate, and beat up people of the Latino origin. They organize for hate violence activities and conduct raids on individuals that belong to the Latino descent. The members derive pride for their rate of activity in the group. They attack individuals, community property and post hateful messages in the form of literature. During the execution of their expeditions, they use ethnic slurs such as ‘spick’, ‘wetback’, ‘beaner’, ‘dirty Mexican’, ‘Cucaracha’ and Bandito to insult their victims. They perceive the Latino community as ridden with disease and criminality. Due to their ignorance and spite for the immigration laws, they see every Latino as an illegal immigrant that wants to contaminate their fair society.

Extremists use the internet and advanced technologies to promote bigoted ideologies. They recruit people to promote their hate crime messages about the vilification of the Hispanic community. Social networking sites have a large number of potential audiences that include impressionable youths. The teenage population contributes to the most significant majority of the population. Most offenders are usually young and vulnerable to influence to commit crimes that create a rebelling nature that is praised by the sponsoring organization.

Hate crimes exist in the form of intimidation, simple assault, and aggravated assault. In a court of law, a white American, who performs acts of rape on a female Latino gets charged for both race and gender prejudice. The hate crime can ranges from prejudice due to sexual orientation, stalking, and disability based on the circumstantial evidence. Latino Americans experience hate crimes through hate speech by offenders who threaten violence against written or spoken words that target this particular group of persons or an individual who is Latino by descent. 

Verbal and nonverbal communication targets the Latino community in a negative manner can exist as a hate crime if it shows the intention of the threat as unequivocal and immediate. The crime is severe if the aggressor is in a position to carry out the threat. Suspicious neighbors usually report to the federal authority on any Latino family that moves in their area, to ensure investigation on the legality of member’s residency status.

Graffiti that is offensive to the Latino community is an offense. Artists targeting the people of Latino decency usually use hate group symbols and epithets that offend the people or Latino based institutions as a specific target. Hate crimes exist in the society as prejudices against the Latino social group. The offense creates suspicions among people that live in a cosmopolitan society. Most victims report property damage due to the discrimination and get infuriated whenever they find their houses either spray-painted or stained. 

Effects of hate crimes against Latino Americans in the society 

Ethno violence sparks large-scale urban and suburban structural disturbances. Latinos that face intimidation or are physically injured because of their ethnicity and race undergo various forms emotional distress. Most people react either emotionally or physically based on the severity. They endure feelings of betrayal, in-depth personal hurt, vulnerability, anger, weakness, sadness, and fear for their community’s safety. They also experience changes in daily life activities where they avoid people of a different ethnic background to avoid criminal forms of confrontation.

Hate crime activities cause psychological distress, depression, and post-traumatic stress disorders. The internal disorders may transform into the propagation of hate crimes against other people as a form of vengeance. The victims suffer repercussions for their identity and undergo affective disturbances reinforced by the degree of violence during the reinforcement of hate crimes (A Wave of Hate in America, 2008). 

A majority of victims does not suffer physical injuries because of hate crimes, but they sustain minor injuries on the person and property damage. They try to avoid future victimization by moving away from the neighborhood, purchasing a gun as security measures, or installing home security systems. The victims reduce social participation with people of a different ethnic identity and increase safety precautions for their families and community. They avoid confrontation by minimizing contact with people from the victim’s decency. The social avoidance is a behavioral coping mechanism. In most cases, the method results to retaliation in future incidences.

Hate crimes isolate individuals and communities, hinder economic empowerment because a Latino graduate may feel victimized as a minority group, and therefore stall to pursue career goals in institutions that have a victimization reputation (Melendez, 2005). The illegal immigrant perceptions make most employees discriminate when hiring to reduce the level of criminality in their premises. They have the misconception that federal agencies may turn a spotlight towards them once they discover there is a Latino worker in their organization.

Latino victims that have knowledge on the policies safeguarding individuals from the vice contact human rights agencies, the police and support organizations. The community system is a reliable network that provides a platform for people who develop psychological implications, and therefore, they share their experiences and contribute suggestions in case of future attacks.

Hate crimes are a terrorist stunt because they cause uncertainty and terror among members of the Latino group. When one member experienced hate crime, the other members feel vulnerable to go through the same torture due to high probable chances. They therefore either arm themselves to retaliate or report the matter to the concerned authorities. The Latino multicultural societies experience factionalism and divisions based on the degree of violence towards the members.

Interventions to combat hate crimes

Social services apply short or long-term intervention techniques depending on the extent in adversity of the hate crime reports. In 1948, world leaders signed the Universal Declaration of Human Rights that declares hate crimes as violations of human rights and therefore interventions to punish offenders exist in state and federal laws. In 1965, one-hundred and seventy-five nations established powerful principles in the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination that discourage citizens of signatory countries to combat national origin discrimination and racial biases (Catalano, 2013). 

Today some ongoing programs motivate the aim of the fight against hate crimes against Latino. The programs include the Radicalized Gang Violence Prevention Initiative and the Network against Hate Crime. The most trained law enforcement agencies that prevent hate crime is the Los Angeles County (Catalano, 2013). The Los Angeles County Commission has compiled, produced reports, and analyzed incidences of hate crime submitted by educational institutions, community members, and police agencies since the 1980s. The Commission is responsible for dissemination of the long-standing reports throughout the nation.

The United States judicial system opened cases from the past when hate crime laws were weak, and the police authority had no jurisdiction on incidence with minority groups. Highly traumatized individuals usually undergo intensive psychotherapy and frequent social work visits to provide stable environments for the victim (Melendez, 2005). Meditative dialogues across racial, religious, cultural, and ethnic boundaries reduce the prevalence of prejudices related to hate crimes. Long-term interventions include cultural acceptances, informational awareness, and inter-ethnic education about a social group such as the Latino community. 

Civil rights organizations adopt and promote mechanisms that create bilateral relationships between the offenders and the victims. The organizations improve the law enforcement reforms that respond to reports and incidents that show prejudice. The state builds the capacity of Latino community members so that they can voice out concerns on the vice and find complimentary and supportive systems that implicate on government efforts.

Leaders from media, business, and religion, labor, and education departments have the role to advocate for the shaping of attitudes in the opposition of immigration laws that favor the Latino community. In all organizations, immigration reforms shape the fairness and working environments for the Hispanic workers.

The policy-makers design complementary strict laws that enforce vigorous education and training on ways to reduce prejudice in the society (Melendez, 2005). Coordination and institutionalization of initiatives and programs that promote violence prevention reduce the rate of hate crimes. On the internet, the government disseminates information regarding hate violence prevention resources and programs. The reviews and monitoring procedures ensure that these databases have anti-bias training innovations and promote the modern practices.

Challenges in combating hate crimes against Latino Americans

Estimating the current prevalence of hate crimes is difficult. Most offenders use derogatory words that do not appear to be harmful. There is the protection of all forms of language by the free speech and free thought clause the United States of America Constitution and in the Human Rights Code ("Redirecting...” n.d). In such a case, the victim usually feels intimidated, but they cannot seek and acquire the justice they deserve. Critiques of the hate crime laws highlight the conflicting ideologies between the law enforcement strategy and the fundamental rights of people. They make claims on certain aspects of the society such as immigration, the illegality of residence and freedom to utter offensive words.

The laws also persecute groups against the Latino group, therefore, creating divisions and racial lines between neighborhoods. The collective persecution propagates more hate crimes because the group, from which an offender originates from, feel persecuted as a whole (Morin, 2009). The term hate crime is misleading because most people do not commit these criminal acts based on their feelings of hate but mostly prejudice and bias.

Latinos rarely report hate crimes because they have a negative perception to the law enforcement agencies, which do not give hate crimes a priority in the justice system. They fear that the social context by which the incidence occur may cause retaliations by the perpetrators. Linguistic and cultural barriers discourage compelling narration of the offense, and the enforcement agencies dismiss the reports casually. The victims usually lack sufficient knowledge of the justice system based on their personal ignorance and therefore ignore the vice. 

Government agencies have a negative perception based on experience with Latino youths or gangs, and therefore, the innocent victims fear predictive insensitive treatment through the search for justice. There are low numbers of formal hate crime reports and policies, therefore; the aggressor walks scot-free based on the gap that is institutionalized by inadequacy. The offenders usually continue in their escapade routines until they get caught or murdered by the victims.

The investigation process that proves the bias is characteristically long and cumbersome and therefore most officers and lawyers are reluctant to take on such cases unless they have significant motivating factors. Most Latinos’ immigration status conflicts with the legality of their residency, and therefore they fail to file reports with law enforcement agencies because they fear deportation consequences.

In states that do not have hate crime statutes, the local prosecutors cannot pursue hate crime convictions based on the lack of laws in the judicial structure. Such laws cripple federal authorities and try to infiltrate the system to find justice for the victims.

Most hate crimes today exists in soft forms such as intimidation, insults, and offensive graffiti on property and public amenities. Most physical assaults face treatment as simple criminal activities, and it is hard to persecute group violence in institutions as hate crimes towards Latinos. Individuals should be tried based on their personal basis against another person rather than as a group against another group because it creates more ethnic divisions between the Latinos and other races. The effects of hate crimes against Latinos destroy families, people, and towns based on their severity (Morin, 2009).

The government needs to fund anti-bias educations and all initiatives that aim to reduce hate crime prevalence. Agency coordination promotes the success of such objectives because they increase community participation. 

References 

A Wave of Hate in America December 15, 2008; 199(20):4. Available from: Academic Search Complete, Ipswich, MA . Accessed May 12, 2016.

Catalano, T. (2013). Anti-Immigrant Ideology in U.S. Crime Reports: Effects on the Education of Latino Children. Journal Of Latinos And Education , 12 (4), 254-270. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/15348431.2013.785408

López, M. P. (2012). An essay examining the murder of Luis Ramírez and the emergence of hate crimes against Latino immigrants in the United States. Arizona State Law Journal , 44(1), 155-173.

Melendez, M. (2005). We took the streets: Fighting for Latino rights with the Young Lords. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press .

Morín, J. L. (2009). Latino/a rights and justice in the United States: Perspectives and approaches. Durham, NC: Carolina Academic Press .

Redirecting... . Heinonline.org . Retrieved 12 May 2016, from http://heinonline.org/HOL/Page?handle=hein.journals/chiclat17&div=6&g_sent=1&collection=journals