Stop Hate Crimes: Americans have had enough!

Hate crimes are probably some of the most evil of all crimes. Everyone loathes them. Someone attacks you simply because of your skin color, or culture. Someone may want you to die just because of it.

Usually, most racist people are too cowardly to commit a hate crime. They'll usually talk about how "they want to eradicate this ethnic group", or "I hate this ethnic group", but never actually are open about it and never commit anything. However, when a racist person actually decides to commit a hate crime on a large level, it can lead to tragedy.

On August 5, 2012, Wade Michael Page did the unthinkable. He actually went to a local Sikh temple in Oak Creek, Wisconsin, armed with a gun, and started shooting. This is a nightmare that Americans have dreaded. A massacre where all the victims are of one ethnic group and were targeted specifically because of their ethnicity. Wade Michael Page killed six people and injured three others before killing himself. Wade Michael Page was a known white supremacist who lead a Nazi band.

This is not the first time this has happened. Similar events have happened in the past.

In 1999, Budford O. Furrow Jr attacked a predominately Jewish-attended day care center, killing several, and killed a Filipino mail carrier.

In 2006, Naveed Afzal Haq killed 1 person and injured 5 others in a shooting at the Seattle Jewish Federation in the Seattle neighborhood of Belltown. This was because of his hatred of Jews and Israel.

In 2009, James von Brunn tried to start a massacre at the Washington D.C. Holocaust Museum. Only one person was killed, an African American security guard named Stephen Tyrone Jones.

It is a shame that the U.S. government has done little in trying to prevent these groups from causing violence. Instead, the U.S. government lets these groups flourish, hold public rallies, and recruit. I say enough.

It's time for the United States government to draw the line between free speech and racism. Although I believe in free speech and expression, if it leads to this, I believe it must be limited at least for racism. I am tired of racist groups able to take influence and try to take over our values. I believe that people can live freely without ever having to be harmed because of their ethnicity, and I believe the United States government has failed to uphold that right.