UK: Disablist Hate Crime Increase

For Those of you who have read my previous blogs you may know that I have a passionate interest in criminology and especially in hate crime.

Hate crime has been growing in recent times in the UK since the announcement of the Brexit referendum poll. It was sad to witness in the UK a staggering rise in the number of incidents following the result. I hardly want to recognise my British heritage when I read how my fellow countryfolk  treat some members of society. Hate crimes are crimes of difference. They are not perpetrated to make money or to gain goods – they are perpetrated to attack someone’s identity, to make them as afraid of their identity as they can be and to signal to others that they should be afraid. So called ‘signal crimes‘.

My subspecialty interest is disablist hate crime (DHC). Today the official figures are released in the UK for occurrences of hate crime. They can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/hate-crime-england-and-wales-2015-to-2016

The Report tells us that overall there has been a 19% increase in hate crime in the UK in the past year. Concerning disability there was a 44% increase in that year! An overall increase since 2011 from 1,748 recorded crimes to 3,629 in 2015-6 meaning that it has more than doubled in that period. Remembering that these are the recorded crimes – many more go unrecorded.

Not only is it distressing that so many people are willing to shatter the lives of others’ – that is bad enough. But that so many would actually go to the trouble of destroying the lives of people who are already impaired is almost beyond belief.

Let us start to realise how we are affecting other people’s lives before it’s too late – please!