In the United States of America, it is not a crime to commit “wrongthink” and you can’t have your inalienable rights taken away because of it. However you can have your rights stripped away because your commission of “wrongthink” made a crime worse and and made you eligible for stripping you of your rights when merely being convicted of the crime, per se, could not. SB 89, which has just been passed by the Nevada Legislature, does exactly that, and reads in part:
202.360 1. A person shall not purchase, own or have in his or her possession or under his or her custody or control any firearm if the person
[…]
(g) Has been convicted of committing or attempting to commit a hate crime involving violence
But oh, it gets worse, especially for people who don’t even commit any included crime in the future…
The bill declares that you don’t even have to be convicted of a crime in Nevada, for Nevada to strip you of your Constitutional Right within the state:
(2) An offense under the laws of the United States or any state, territory or district:
(I) An element of which is that the conduct of the offender was motivated by the actual or perceived race, color, religion, national origin, physical or mental disability, sexual orientation or gender identity or expression of another person or group of persons; or
(II) For which a court of competent jurisdiction imposed an additional penalty pursuant to a finding that the conduct of the offender was motivated by the actual or perceived race, color, religion, national origin, physical or mental disability, sexual orientation or gender identity or expression of another person or group of persons.
But at least this won’t be retroactive, because ex post facto laws are Unconstitutional, right?
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