Submitted by Curious, Oct 11, 2007 22:59

I do not in any way support or accept the hateful ideologies that the symbols being discussed represent. As I read this article however, a couple of questions did come to mind, namely what constitutes a hate crime and should freedom of expression be repressed due to the conceptual nature of the symbols displayed? A swastika drawn on a bathroom stall door is vandalism, yet I doubt the nature of many other messages displayed on walls in male lavatories across the country convey strictly wholesome messages toward females. What about the disgusting filth that objectify and sexually degrade women, are those vandalistic messages also hate crimes? What if a swastika was drawn on a textbook, or on a sidewalk with chalk, would/should those instances garner the same attention as this incident? Should individuals that entertain such hatefilled ideologies (that are indicative of violence, but are not necessarliy violent crimes in and of themselves) be punished more severely than others who commit the same type of crimes but without the ideological backdrop? The noose which was hung on the professor's door was a violent crime, as the victim was most likely specifically targeted, and the motive, presumably, was to frighten or intimidate her. Though a swastika drawn on a bathroom wall can be intrepreted in a variety of ways: a passive display of someone's beliefs, an attempt to intimidate males of certain ethnicities, the thoughtless musings of a rather narrow-minded youth, the actions of someone trying to provoke and aggitate, etc... Should we as a free society be completely intolerant of this symbol and what it represents, as is still the case in present day Germany? If so, how do we delineate limitations of freedom of speech?

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