Editorial from The Guide	Editorials Archive

Matthew Shepard's murder, we are told by many gay spokespeople, underscores the need for hate crime laws to deter and condemn violence motivated by bigotry. And Aaron McKinney's trial for that murder illustrates that victims of violence-- not prosecutors-- now call the shots in criminal proceedings. By judging crimes differently based on the political status of the victim, both hate crime laws and so-called victims' rights provisions do pernicious damage to the gay movement's legitimate goal: equality under the law. Misled into pursuing an agenda of victimhood, many of our organizations have traded demands for liberation with a plea for protection. But a political strategy wherein "victims' rights" trample equal protection are foolishly short-sighted and inherently unjust.

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Hate crime laws are abhorrent to those who value fairness and equality because they "protect" some more than others. Beating or killing a member of a group popular enough to garner special hate crimes status is judged as more serious than doing the same violence to someone without an effective political lobby. The law can properly concern itself with questions about intent: was the violence done accidentally, or with the goal of lasting harm or death? But when it asserts that motivations other than self-defense can be ranked based on who was attacked-- some punished more than others-- equal protection for all is nullified. Had Shepard been killed for being one of our nation's homeless drifters (a group though beset by violence, never likely to be specially protected), justice would demand the same concern for his murder as had he been a member of a protected class. Everyone, not just those on a list endorsed by politicians, merits the same legal protection.

Similarly, the victims' rights movement has perverted the role of prosecutors. Instead of seeking indictments and convictions on behalf of "the people," prosecutors are urged to cater to the vengeful animus of alleged victims and their lobbyists. When prosecutors become clients of victims instead of advocates for equal protection, the goal of criminal proceedings shifts from justice to revenge. Thus, we witnessed the spectacle of gay groups cheerleading at a trial whose sole purpose was to kill the accused: McKinney was willing to plead to a life sentence-- the trial was a response to the political pressure for blood. After it became clear that the jury was not going to kill McKinney, Shepard's father relented: "I am going to grant you life," he said in a statement to the court, a frightening confirmation that he, not the state, was deciding the accused's fate. But there are compelling reasons not to have angry, emotionally distraught victims direct legal proceedings: equitable due process must replace vigilantism in a society committed to ordered liberty.

And we may never know McKinney's side of the story. Under threat of death, he and his attorneys agreed to a court-imposed gag order forbidding comment to the press about court proceedings, Matthew Shepard, or what happened that tragic night. Constitutional guarantees of an open and fair trial and freedom of speech were swept aside in deference to "victims' rights."

It is perhaps understandable that some gay groups are seduced into portraying us all as victims in need of protection, for the prevailing political climate rewards victimhood. But as people who were uniformly seen as victimizers (of youth, decency, and the American way) just a few years ago, gay people must be ever-mindful that a state expanding its power to "protect" victims will both erode civil liberties and manufacture monsters. Instead of myopically trying to join the "protected elite" by trumpeting our victim status, we must have the vision and courage to demand liberty and justice for all. **