The harms of hate
| DOI | 10.1177/0269758017693087 |
| Date | 01 May 2017 |
| Published date | 01 May 2017 |
| Author | Kathryn Benier |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
Article
The harms of hate: Comparing
the neighbouring practices
and interactions of hate crime
victims, non-hate crime
victims and non-victims
Kathryn Benier
University of Queensland, Australia
Abstract
Studies have demonstrated that hate crime victimisation has harmful effects for individuals. Victims
of hate crime report anger, nerv ousness, feeling unsafe, poor c oncentration and loss of self-
confidence. While victims of non-hate crimes report similar feelings, harm is intensified for hate
crime victims due to the targeted nature of the incident. While there is some evidence that
experiencing or even witnessing hate crime may have a detrimental effect on residents’ community
life, the effects of being victim of a hate crime inside one’s own neighbourhood remain unstudied.
Using census data combined with survey data from 4396 residents living across 148 neighbour-
hoods in Brisbane, Australia, this study examines whether residents who report hate crime within
their own neighbourhood differ in their participation in community life when compared to victims
of non-hate crime or those who have not been victimised. This is the first study to focus on victims’
views on: how welcoming their neighbourhood is to ethnic diversity; their attachment to their
neighbourhood; their frequency of social interactions with neighbours; their number of friends and
acquaintances in the neighbourhood; and their fear of crime. Results from propensity score
matching (PSM) indicate that there are important differences in patterns of neighbourhood
participation across these three groups.
Keywords
Hate crime, bias crime, targeted crime, victimisation, neighbouring
Corresponding author:
Kathryn Benier, School of Social Science, University of Queensland, St Lucia, QLD 4072, Australia.
Email: k.benier@uq.edu.au
International Review of Victimology
2017, Vol. 23(2) 179–201
ªThe Author(s) 2017
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DOI: 10.1177/0269758017693087
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Introduction
Scholarship demonstrates that victim s of crime face physical, financial a nd emotional conse-
quences (Beaton et al., 2000; Langton and Truman, 2014; Macmillan, 2 001; Maguire, 1980).
Extensive research on the effects of victimisation from a hate crime suggests that perceiving
prejudice or hatred as a motivating factor for the incident heightens the effect of these victimisation
consequences. These consequences often lead victims to withdraw from society yet, to date, we do
not understand the lived neighbourhood experience of hate crime victims when they have been
victimised within this space.
Hate crime refers to unlawful, violent, destructive or threatening behaviour in which the perpe-
trator is motivated in whole or in part by prejudice towards the victim’s perceived race, ethnicity,
religion, sexual orientation, gender identity, age, impairment or homelessness (Federal Bureau of
Investigation, 2013; Green et al., 2001; Victorian Equal Opportunity and Human Rights Commis-
sion, 2010). Thus, crimes motivated by hate or prejudice are distinguished from non-hate crimes by
the underlying bigoted motivation of the act (Green et al., 2001) and involve words or actions
intended to harm or intimidate individuals because of their perceived membership of or association
with another group (Craig and Waldo, 1996). Although hate crime covers a broad range of
categories, this study focuses on hate crime motivated by a bias against a victim’s race, ethnicity,
religion or national origin.
Previous studies suggest that a number of racially motivated incidents take place in or around
the victims’ homes (Bowling, 1993; Brimicombe et al., 2001; Strom, 2001). Thus, the neighbour-
hood plays an important role in the occurrence of hate crime. The percentage of hate crimes
occurring near the home ranges between 70–90%of offences in the US and the UK (Harlow,
2005; Mason, 2005; Roberts et al., 2013;). Indeed, McDevitt et al. (2001) note that hate crimes are
more likely to occur in the immediate vicinity of one’s house than non-hate offences. Although this
is an emerging area of research attention, neighbourhood processes such as social trust, social
cohesion, community ties and participation in neighbourhood associations appear to be eroded in
areas that report higher levels of hate crime activity (Markowitz et al., 2001; Perkins and Taylor,
1996; Roberts and Indermaur, 2012). Despite the frequency with which hate crime victimisation
occurs in the victim’s own neighbourhood, the literature to date has not considered the individual
impact of hate victimisation that occurs within in this space; but rather considers victimisation in
general with no limitations on the location of such events. However, the neighbourhood in which
individuals live constitutes a space that they should perceive to be a safe area, and this neighbour-
hood may form part of their identity within the broader population of the place where they live.
Given that evidence shows that community social processes are important in preventing hate crime
in a neighbourhood (Benier et al., 2015; Lyons, 2007), it is prudent to determine how an individual
victim of hate crime participates in, interacts with and perceives his/her community post-
victimisation.
The literature on the effects of victimisation posits that victims of hate crime may move, alter
their daily routine and avoid symbolic dress as a result of their victimisation experience(s) (Barnes
and Ephross, 1994; Dreher, 2006; Poynting , 2002; Poynting and Noble, 2004). Perhap s most
significantly, victims are likely to avoid certain areas in the community by restricting their move-
ments to their immediate neighbourhood for fear of further harassment or victimisation. This paper
evaluates the neighbouring behaviours of respondents who have been victimised in their own
neighbourhood, compared to non-hate crime victims and respondents reporting no victimisation.
This is the first research to consider the harm of crime that occurs within the victim’s own
180 International Review of Victimology 23(2)
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