Apr 17, 2014
How does the Westboro Baptist Church get away with hate crimes?
If you commit a CRIME against the gay man in New York City - if you assault him, or murder him, for example - then it is a 'hate crime' if it can be shown that you did it simply because he belongs to a group of people that you hate.
If you just call him a name and walk away, you haven't committed a crime, and so you haven't committed a 'hate crime.' That's how WBC does it - they don't commit actual crimes; they're just assholes, which isn't illegal.
/u/apples-with-ella