I Think I Hate That

"Mr. Marks, by mandate of the District of Columbia Precrime Division, I'm placing you under arrest for the future murder of Sarah Marks and Donald Dubin that was to take place today, April 22 at 0800 hours and four minutes."
From the movie Minority Report.

That movie was about a government that used psychics to find out who was thinking of committing a crime so that they could be arrested before the crime. That was science fiction, I hope.

I have always been of the opinion that what goes on inside a persons head, their way of thinking, and what they are thinking of, is the most private of realms. The first amendment guarantees freedom of speech. I think there should also be a guarantee of free thought. In fact I think freedom of thought should be even more sacred than freedom of speech, religion, or the right to walk around with a gun.

That's why I don't support hate crime laws. Basically hate crime laws tack on extra punishment if you happen to hate somebody who is black, gay, Catholic, etc., and beat them up or kill them. What's the difference if you assault somebody because you hate the fact that they are gay, or you do it because you are drunk and hate the fact that they looked at you wrong? You still hate them. No, I think hate crime laws open up a can of worms, where the government gets to determine what you were thinking of when you committed a crime, and punishes you extra hard if what you were thinking wasn't correct. A murder is a murder, an assault is an assault, they both hurt the recipient of that crime no matter the reason, and the punishment should be appropriate. It's a slippery slope when the government starts passing laws about how people are thinking, and I would rather they didn't go there.