While understandable, I'll admit I'm a little bit disapointed my some of the reactions toward hate crime legislation. I was hoping I wouldn't have to comment, but it looks like I do.

I'm reminded of when I use to comment on the Ms. Magazine message boards 10 years ago, and a thread mentioned one of those tiresome cliched "Is feminism dead?" articles that seem to pop up every 3 years. One of the commenters there had a great response to the whole thing by stating, "I'll be 'post-feminist' when our society is "post-patriarchy."

I think some of the responders are engaging in "post-feminist" analyzing if ya know what I mean. As long as "but that faggot was looking at me too long and making me feel 'funny'" or "those Negros were getting to uppity with me" or the always appealing "she looked like a slut so she was asking for it" is considered by society a defensable reason to reducing, restrict and overturn conviction and sentencing of crimes, then yes we WILL need hate crime legislation. Basically it helpes prevent people from "getting away with it" (or at least getting reduced punishment for it).

By stunning coincidence, the same arguments are used to support torture too ("Oh it's ok to break the law, as long as it's done toward the "right" kind of people.)

I think it's less about "adding more laws" as much as it is trying to plug up the cracks in our legal system that racial/sexual/religious minorities fall through. This is similar to the arguments I, as a Black man sometimes have with White people (even the "well-meaning" liberal kind) about racism. These "isms" are embedded within the fabric of our society and can result in mitigating factors when it comes to conviction, sentencing and punishment of crimes. As a few others here have said, hate crimes aren't just an individual person against another person, but an act or terrorism entire social group that person belongs to, with unoffical, and sometimes offical backing by society, (because like torture, people think they can "get away" with these types of acts if they're done toward the "wrong" sort of people. That's why it "spreads terror" because that person might get off and do it again. THAT'S why makes hate crimes so frightening.)

Damn I went on too long again, so let me make this simple and refer to the headline of this letter: we need hate crime legislation because we still have things like racism and homophobia interwoven in our society. When our society gets "beyond" such things, then maybe we can get beyond hate crime legislation as well.

Sorry to bore you all yet again, but I just have a few more things to add.

1) In regards to Glenn's post (and Joan's similar post as well), Virginia "defenitly not sly like a" Foxx is an idiot.

2) Let member that Glenn points out that there is a deifference between hate speech and hate crime laws. I've noticed a few posters blurring the difference.

I get to talk about video games now. Yay!

In any case, I have to echo what a lot of people here have already said. Sex and sexuality NEVER "sold" a game (As the makers of such gems as The Guy Game and Playboy: The Mansion can attest), but it's an added "bonus" that can help a game stand out from the pack. Critics praised the first Tomb Raider because of it's innovative (at the time) gameplay. It sold on that. However, giving the protagonist "missle-silo boobs" helped transform the game from "game that sold well" to "pop culture phenominon." When the gameplay started to become stagnant (and the "novelty" of a mega busty heroine wore off) sales dropped. By the same token, the Dead or Alive games are actually pretty fun on their own. However, adding big bouncy tits kept the game from being though of as mere "Tekken clone" and helped it establish an indentity of it's own.

In addition, it should also be noted that many of these games are not made in the US, nor initially made for a US audience. A game made in Japan, for instance, is going to reflect it's cultural and aesthetic sensibilities. So something that might have more appeal "over there" (like, say panty shots) is going to be included in the games, regardless of what we think about it.