People for the American Way‘s Right Wing Watch points out that Focus on the Family holds at least two conflicting positions regarding hate-crime legislation:
A. Existing laws are OK if they only punish violent crimes based upon the victim’s race or religion, not gender or sexual orientation.
B. Existing laws are not OK.
People for the American Way asks:
Which is it? Yesterday [FOTF’s Ashley] Horne thought it was perfectly acceptable to have “special status” for “certain groups,” so long as they were limited to race and religion but now says that giving “special status to certain groups” is fundamentally unfair.
The religious right already enjoys “special status” under existing hate-crime laws. It is clear that they do not wish to share that privilege with those who are at greatest risk of violent attack.
So indeed, which is it? Is Focus on the Family willing to discard its special status and call for the repeal of existing hate-crime laws, or is the organization determined to protect some privileged groups at the expense of others?
