The basic form of my question is: Should hate crime laws apply only to crimes committed against minorities?
At first, the answer seems quite obviously to be no. However, there are advantages to making hate crime laws specific. Two of these are, first, that having special laws in place which protect only them might help reassure members of targeted minorities, and second, that making hate crime laws exclusive also sends a message to a country's population that the protected minorities are officially recognised and supported by the government. Making hate crime laws general accomplishes neither of these objectives.
However, I still think that the good of generalised laws outweighs the bad. General laws will protect people in the event of a minority becoming the majority too quickly for legal systems to recognise the change; they will protect everyone, thus not causing unfair discrimination against the majority, and they will also help curb resentment by members of the majority. Laws protecting only homosexuals, for instance, are likely to make already prejudiced non-homosexuals angry, and may somewhat bother even people (of all sexualities) who are not biased. General laws would still protect minorities more than majorities, simply because hate crimes are typically directed against members of minority groups, but they would not discriminate against anyone simply because they were part of the majority.
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