(by Kelly)

A hate crime is any act, motivated by discrimination, that aims to reduce the person acted upon to a lower moral ranking than the actor. A hate crime is an effort to degrade an Other. A hate crime is an act of subjugation.

When someone kills someone else for being different, that's a hate crime. When someone capable of caring for someone throws the person they have agreed to care for out onto the street, that's a hate crime. When someone calls someone else a name intended to express how inferior the name-caller regards the other person as, that's a hate crime. When someone laughs at someone else while they writhe in pain on a kill floor, that's a hate crime. When someone is called a "pest" for not running away from an invader, that's a hate crime. When someone in the oppressing class nails the body of someone in the oppressed class to a cross, that's a hate crime. When someone carves their name into the flayed flesh of a slave they dismembered, that's a hate crime. When someone crushes the life out of someone else's lungs for sexual pleasure, that's a hate crime. When someone verbally abuses the infant they just brought into their home, that's a hate crime. When someone shows off someone else's skin on their backs, that's a hate crime. When someone smiles for the camera next to the body of the person they just murdered, that's a hate crime. When someone tattoos someone else's head with the word "crap," that's a hate crime. When someone kicks at someone else on the street for not moving out of their way, that's a hate crime. When someone raises their hand to someone else for not performing as ordered, that's a hate crime. When someone orders someone else to perform for their pleasure, that's a hate crime. When someone is taken from their families for their captor's pleasure, that's a hate crime. When someone imprisons someone else just to look at them, that's a hate crime. When someone sells toy representations of the people they enslave, that's a hate crime. When someone in the oppressing class makes a joke about the oppressed, that's a hate crime. And when someone eats someone else's body, that is most definitely a hate crime.

So let's call these hate crimes what they are, and address them as such. If we would not sit silently while those around us made overtly homophobic, racist, or sexist jokes, how can we be silent when they are eating another oppressed person's body? If we would not peacefully stand by while people marched openly down the streets donning pointy white hats, why would we be silent when other people walk openly down the sidewalk wearing the skins of our cousins? 

We may have to switch off a lot of the time for sanity's sake, and we do have to pick our battles, but let's always push ourselves and each other to speak up with greater conviction and greater frequency. Let's build up a culture that applies pressure to people from as many angles as possible, with as much intensity as possible. Let's force people to confront the issue. Let's put the animals' voices on the table beside their bodies.