The Text and Context of Malediction: A Study of Antisemitic and Heterosexist Hate Violence.

Abstract

Research into the contours of hate crime has gone through several ebbs and flows over the last twenty years. At times, acts of horrific brutality have brought the issue of hate violence into the public imagination; sometimes leading to legislative changes, education programs and the funding of community organisations to manage the harms caused by this unique form of violence. The Stephen Lawrence murder in the UK in April 1993, and the Matthew Shepherd murder in the USA in October 1998 both led to major policing and legislative changes, including the introduction of penalty-enhancement measures, which were thought to more adequately ameliorate the additional harms generated from targeted violence, and to create the conditions for good citizenship in diverse societies. However, this legislative and policing transformation of hate crime regulation is not universal, even in Western democratic states. The Australian Federal government has not responded in comparable ways; preferring instead to abrogate much of its responsibilities under the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination and International Convention on Civil and Political Rights to state governments¿particularly, in relation to gay men and lesbians¿ social citizenship rights. In relation to hate violence, contemporary Australian research has begun to address the inconsistent application of law, public policy and policing practice. However, the issue of `hate speech¿ has remained largely uninterrogated. Equally, research has tended to focus on the unique characteristics of specific forms of hate violence, rather than assess the conditions of exclusion shared by disparate groups. This book remedies both of these deficiencies by providing a critical analysis of the role of hate speech in hate violence, and offering a comparative investigation of antisemitic and heterosexist violence.