The new hate crime law brought in by the Scottish Government has led to a flurry of passionate opposition. I’m not surprised.
The Hate Crime and Public Order (Scotland) Act 2021 creates a new crime of "stirring up hatred" relating to age, disability, religion, sexual orientation, transgender identity or being intersex. The maximum penalty is a prison sentence of seven years.
A person commits an offence if they communicate material, or behave in a manner, "that a reasonable person would consider to be threatening or abusive," with the intention of stirring up hatred based on the protected characteristics.
The bar for this offence is lower than for the other protected characteristics, as it also includes "insulting" behaviour, and as the prosecution need only prove that stirring up hatred was "likely" rather than "intended".
Much of the controversy has been over the exclusion of women from protected groups - presumably as a nod to transgender activists. This has led JK Rowling to describe the law as ‘ludicrous’. But there are other concerns. To me, the most shocking is that the law can apply to words spoken in a private space - a household, for instance. So if someone walks past your living room window and you say something that they consider insulting - perhaps the idea that trans women aren’t ‘real’ women - then that someone can go to the police. Even if you are not prosecuted, you could find your words registered as a ‘non crime hate incident’. This would go on your record and could affect your employment prospects.
One of the protected charactristics is age. As a rule, I have not had much experience of the oppressed groups, since I am a white cis male heterosexual. But I am old. Now I can think about what it feels like to be in a protected category.
Keep reading with a 7-day free trial
Subscribe to Tim Lott's Writing Boot Camp to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.