2018 Saw Another Rise in Hate Crime; How You Can Help.
For the fourth year in a row, the Southern Poverty Law Center has reported an increase in both the number of reported hate crimes and the number of active racial hate groups since 2015. The organization cites a growing atmosphere of enabling radical views on race, and the continued social support of white supremacy groups in the US.
The Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at California State University published statistics from ten major US cities that showed an increase in bias crimes from 2017 by 14%, citing crime statistics from attacks on black, Jewish, and gay Americans.
The Anti-Defamation League, an organization that tracks antisemitism in the US, cited their own study showing links to extremist right-wing organizations in at least 50 murders in 2018. The number of homicides were a sharp increase from 2017, showing a continuing trend of hate crime targeting Jewish Americans.
In light of these statistics it is impossible to ignore the fact that 2018 was a significant year in hate in America, making the lives of minority groups in the US threatened on a daily basis. In the light of this information it is more important than ever to be aware of resources at our disposal to not only reduce the number of hate crimes, but to potentially stop one in progress, should you be witness to one.
Albion College’s “Green Dot” bystander training program is a widely recognized model for training effective intervention techniques should you be witness to an act of hate, and is used on both college campuses and as training tools for activist groups across the US. The program emphasizes shared responsibility for violence, that by not intervening to offer aid or to diffuse a situation a bystander is complicit in its act. Other bystander intervention programs exist and are taught at community centers across the US, and bystander intervention training is widely cited as one of the most effective means to curtail violence in social settings. By creating an environment of shared responsibility and being aware of possible hateful acts, perhaps 2019 can be the year to break the cycle of hate, and see a marked decrease in such offenses.
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