According to this Los Angeles Times article, hate crimes are up in the city of Los Angeles for nearly all identity groups. The Los Angeles County Human Relations Commission found that hate crimes in the city rose 28% over the past year to 763 incidents. The majority of these crimes is minority-to-minority (Latino on Black or Black on Latino) rather than majority on minority:
On its face, this is more evidence for people with nationalist impulses to advocate for reducing immigration. Los Angeles is perhaps the world's most global city. this vast melding of culture and peoples is destined to create tensions. But the bulk of these incidents appear to be gang related. It seems that many of the Latino on Black hate crimes reported are associated with an increased collaboration with White Supremacist gangs in prisons. How much of this is related to class issues and battles over turf and how much is really driven by racial animus?
What we're seeing is the democratization of hate crimes," said Brian Levin, who directs the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at Cal State San Bernardino. "We're not only seeing a diversification of victims but also increased diversification of offenders.
On its face, this is more evidence for people with nationalist impulses to advocate for reducing immigration. Los Angeles is perhaps the world's most global city. this vast melding of culture and peoples is destined to create tensions. But the bulk of these incidents appear to be gang related. It seems that many of the Latino on Black hate crimes reported are associated with an increased collaboration with White Supremacist gangs in prisons. How much of this is related to class issues and battles over turf and how much is really driven by racial animus?
2 comments:
The gang-related nature of this is important. If we look at demographically diverse areas of Los Angeles that do not contain gangs, do we still see a rise in hate crimes? What is the incidence of hate crimes in large cities where the Aryan movement is negligible?
Good point. We seem to paint inter-group relations with a broad brush. It's either a rainbow coalition or the "Bosnification of America."
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