Very Sad. My heart goes out to the totally innocent victim. Wonder if any of those guys are overcompensating if you know what I mean.

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Yes. I think these guys are ABSOLUTELY closet cases. Anytime someone is overly emotional over the way SOMEONE ELSE chooses to live their life, the person is either jealous or trying to convince themselves and others that they are not gay. It happens all the time. Closet gay politicians have been the biggest opponents of equal rights for gay people. Closet gay preachers (Eddie Long, Ted Haggard, etc.) have organized marches to fight gay marriage. The list goes on. I see girly gay guys all the time. Who gives a shit? If it makes you happy to put on tight-ass pants, wear makeup, hair weave, etc., then knock yourself out.

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Surveillance video:

http://www.wsbtv.com/videos/news/store-sur…

I wonder if the bus driver called the police or alerted anyone.

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WSB video is interesting because it shows a little more. Looks like it was over when the kid stumbled into the guy in the orange shirt who then helped him walk away while the trash went the other way.

I suspect nobody called anyone because it was over before anyone could have been called.

What's up with that guy grabbing a tire from across the street and throwing it.

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What's truly disgusting is that the law here can do NOTHING to protect gays. A bias crime?? It's pure hate. Plain and simple. Thank god the Feds are getting involved, or these idiots could have walked away with a slap on the wrist. I can only hope that one day, the laws in georgia and in the rest of the country will change, to truly have everyone treated as equals. Perhaps this tragic event of ignorance and hatred will finally make politicians change their mind about "bias" crimes towards gays in our good ole state.

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As much as I want to see theses guys pay...big time...and as much as I want to see them locked up...and yes, as much as I want to see them beat down, I don't believe hate crime laws should exist. Hate crime laws are thought crimes, pure and simple. Assault bumped up to aggravated assault, aggravated assault bumped up to attempted murder, there are ways to adjust the charges to the seriousness of the crime and the motives of the predator. Hate crimes create protected classes and inequalities before the law. Hate crimes criminalize a state of mind, something that is too amorphous to have a basis in law. Perhaps premeditation as a factor can be extended beyond murder charges to address crimes such as this. Something other than thought crime should be used.

If a state of mind in itself is a crime, how long before we start getting locked up for what we believe or what we say, despite no move against the rights of others? Don't scoff. people are in prison in a lot of places merely for having unpopular beliefs.

I know I'm lonely here, but I'm right.

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"Yes. I think these guys are ABSOLUTELY closet cases. Anytime someone is overly emotional over the way SOMEONE ELSE chooses to live their life, the person is either jealous or trying to convince themselves and others that they are not gay."

they could just be bullies

"Hate crime laws are thought crimes, pure and simple."

no, they are crimes motivated primarily by thought. dragging someone behind your truck because of their skin tone is not a thought crime.

"Assault bumped up to aggravated assault, aggravated assault bumped up to attempted murder, there are ways to adjust the charges to the seriousness of the crime and the motives of the predator."

there are ways to bump them down, too. hate crime laws address crimes which affect large groups of people beyond the victim and victim's kin.

"Hate crimes create protected classes and inequalities before the law."

no, hate crimes attempt to address inequal treatment of protected classes and subjugate classes which already exist in society

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Vinc…

vincent chin was beaten to death because of his presumed nationality. he never did anything wrong to his murderers - he was beaten to death simply because he was asian. his murder then had an impact on every asian and asian-american in detroit, because none of them knew if they were going to be beaten to death next. a judge gave them a slap on the wrist, three years probation and no jail time for a manslaughter charge

this sent a clear message to detroit's asian population - you're second class citizens. watch your back

"Hate crimes criminalize a state of mind, something that is too amorphous to have a basis in law."

so temporary insanity is also invalid?

hate crimes do not criminalize whatever biases you personally hold. hate crimes are, by definition, when you commit crimes acting on those biases

don't worry, dave. the NWO isn't going to kick down your door just because you hate muslims. unless you've been killing them or spray painting swastikas on mosques or something

"I know I'm lonely here, but I'm right."

you misspelled 'loony'

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@ Oy - I see where you're coming from, but Polster beat me to a response. I'm definitely against having the govt control how or what I think about whatever, but the minute I take any kind of negative mindset out on someone else, then it does become a hate crime. I'd say these guys should have been just charged with aggravated assault or something similar to that attack in legal jargin, but it became a hate crime the minute they started calling him a faggot; right then and there the motives of these thugs became clear: we hate gays. That's when mental thought left the realm of imagination and became reality.

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oydave: Westboro Baptist Church. the 'god hates fags' picketers who protests as often as possible? they're not getting arrested, are they?

how do you feel about legislation which prevents them from protesting at funerals? is that the unjust persecution of a 'thought crime' as well?

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This shit happens all the time on the south side. Funny that people only get riled up when they say the word "faggot". If he was just "black" no one would care.

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"If he was just "black" no one would care."

Perhaps it wouldn't be as big a news item. Though if it was a group of White guys jumping a black guy and it was filmed people would also be all over it.

Sort of dovetails into the hate crime issue. There is an additional emotional or self respect issue that transcends the individuals when a group of people beat up someone for being a different race or having a different sexual preference. Heck even at the level of the victim it adds similar additional burdens.

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@ InAtl - well said and totally agree.

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As far as I know, no one here is getting arrested for what they think...yet. Hate crimes are a step in that direction...and they only flow one direction. Watch a DA's ears blow steam when a hate crime charge is suggested against black assailants of a white person. Hate crimes can lead to unequal treatment under the law. Dragging a guy behind a truck is not a thought crime, it is a crime, pure and simple, and the racial identity of the guys on either end if the chain shouldn't matter. If the assault was premeditated and happened because of racial animus, take that into account with charge and the sentencing but don't codify mental states into the law. Make it a degree of the charge, as in first degree murder.

It's that pesky Constitution that Ruth Buzzi Ginsberg thinks should not be a model. That's the only thing restraining the PC police and it's just a matter of time until it's bonds are broken and prevailing social attitudes will have the force of law. That's where the hate crime road leads.

As for Westboro Baptist, unless they are breaking another law, they shouldn't be arrested, as repulsive as they are. I do love the tactics of the bikers who show up before they do and block 'em out.

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"As far as I know, no one here is getting arrested for what they think...yet. Hate crimes are a step in that direction...and they only flow one direction. Watch a DA's ears blow steam when a hate crime charge is suggested against black assailants of a white person."

when you say 'whites' do you mean 'white heterosexual protestant males' because plenty of LGBT and religious hate crimes are committed against white people (against jews, against muslims etc.)

although i think this is just another example of you crying "where is the evidence" without looking for the evidence first. in 2009, the FBI recorded 652 hate crimes based solely on anti-white racial bias

http://www2.fbi.gov/ucr/hc2009/incidents.h…

"If the assault was premeditated and happened because of racial animus, take that into account with charge and the sentencing but don't codify mental states into the law. Make it a degree of the charge, as in first degree murder."

so you're freaking out about hate crimes as orwellian thought policing but you're actually ok with hate crime legislation? because you did just say that it's acceptable to take anti-whatever bias into account as a charge, which as it turns out is the very definition of a hate crime

it's really hard to understand the way you think, dave

"It's that pesky Constitution that Ruth Buzzi Ginsberg thinks should not be a model. That's the only thing restraining the PC police and it's just a matter of time until it's bonds are broken and prevailing social attitudes will have the force of law. That's where the hate crime road leads."

ah, so you really are just terrified of goofy hypotheticals that have no basis in reality.

it's kind of telling that one of your big fears is that your prejudicial biases might someday become criminalized

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"Of course hating "white heterosexual protestant males" would not be criminalized at all."

if they ever stop dominating american social discourse, then it's possible at least

kind of hard to 'hate crime' a group which only ever feels socially threatened by internal paranoia

until then the white heterosexual protestant males are safe, unlike white jews or white homosexuals or white heterosexual women

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@ Oy - I'm sorry man, but I've gotta wholeheartedly disagree with some of your opinion on two points.

First off, the act was premeditated. Camera phone was out. The guy was behind the victim to cheap shot him and then the buddies pounced. That shows a planned strategy, although a cowardly one.

Then one of them yelling faggot over and over again shows that the mental hateful thought that those people were thinking became reality. The motive of the attack was clear. The boy was beaten for no other reason than that he was gay.

But I do agree with you about Westboro. They are a hateful bunch that should be shot on sight; but we all have the right to say whatever we want as long as we're not causing physical harm or panic, etc... Yet, what local cities are doing to distant that disgusting family from protesting at funerals by placing them at a good distance away from the mourners is also a great way to show that, just because we have the right to say hateful things, doesn't mean it has to be tolerated. And that was one helluva a run-on sentence.

Free speech is a slippery slope, but taking hate from a mental state and applying it to a violent and real setting should be punished.

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Isn't referring to the act as a "beatdown" a bit flippant? Wouldn't something along the lines of "assault" or even "beating" have conveyed the seriousness and severity of the matter, rather than making it sound like the title of a shitty humor column? Was that decision to borrow a word from the urban dictionary made by a journalist or an aspiring UFC commentator? Do editors really edit anymore?

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