Where do we draw the line between hostile sentiments and outright hate crimes? This was a question that was addressed in a recently leaked Home Office report, commissioned by Home Secretary Yvette Cooper after riots over the Southport murders. The report recommended that authorities should record more non-crime hate incidents (NCHIs), and suggested that counter-extremism strategies should focus not on “ideologies of concern,” but on “behaviours,” such as Islamism, extreme right-wing views, or extreme misogyny, to name a few.
Because NCHIs, by definition, don’t involve a crime – only the perception that behaviours had prejudiced motivations – their validity as part of a counter-terrorism strategy is dubious. The leaked report itself suggests that criticism of two-tier policing is a form of extremism, a direct infringement on free speech. NCHIs could also justify undue state involvement for potentially trivial issues, reported on the basis that somebody just doesn’t like what’s being said.
The approach could also implicate entire communities; the government’s main counter-terrorism concern is currently Islamist extremism. The false presentation of religion as a unifying characteristic can result in associating an entire religious community with a perceived threat. Recording more NCHIs probably wouldn’t improve that perception, instead exacerbating it by broadening the definition of extremism.
The overarching concern that the leaked report sought to address, however, still persists. After the recent sentencing of the Southport murderer, PM Keir Starmer emphasised the need to revise terrorism laws, to deal with perpetrators whose violence isn’t attached to a definitive ideology. For now, the use of NCHIs doesn’t align with the government’s aforementioned concerns and hasn’t been accepted as a solution – at least not in the manner this report proposes.
But the report’s approach is ineffective at a more basic level. How can we define the threshold at which misogyny or far-right views, for example, go beyond the limits of socially tolerated political debate, and instead become extremist rhetoric? If NCHIs were recorded broadly to keep track of such rhetoric and ensure it doesn’t turn violent, it’s likely to become very convoluted, very quickly, much like the Prevent Scheme before it. Perhaps the objective should instead be to get to the root of extremist sentiment, rather than trying to decide when it becomes too problematic to ignore.
“Anti-G8 Edinburgh riot police marching_MMV” by andronicusmax is licensed under CC BY 2.0.