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[kaijyuu]

Tangential Topic: Does anyone else get really nervous posting in this thread? I can't shake the distinct impression that every time I post I'm completely missing the point, because everybody seems so much smarter than me. I hope that didn't happen this time.

Heh, don't be nervous. People will take you seriously even if you say wacky stuff. So long as you're prepared to defend your position, nothing to worry about
Also no shame in admitting being wrong about something; debate would be really pointless if no one's opinions changed and no one learned anything. So don't worry about saying something "stupid" either.

[Vector]

Tangential Topic: Does anyone else get really nervous posting in this thread? I can't shake the distinct impression that every time I post I'm completely missing the point, because everybody seems so much smarter than me. I hope that didn't happen this time.

Yes.

[Vactor]

I guess what I'm trying to say in a rambling sort of way is that I can completely understand how much of a punch to the gut it would be to lose a church and it's totally understandable that you'd want to string the bastard up, more-so than usual, but justice can't work like that. It has to be equal. A church is, at the end of the day, just another community centre. The most important part of it is the community. If somebody burned that, well, that's kind of more serious.

Think on this a bit more, there is something to this that makes burning a church a more heinous crime than burning just any building.  By intentionally destroying something that is a center of any community you are willing the destruction of said community.  This is not a crime about property, the structure of the building didn't affront someone, it is the group of people who value it that are being attacked.

[Bauglir]

Tangential Topic: Does anyone else get really nervous posting in this thread? I can't shake the distinct impression that every time I post I'm completely missing the point, because everybody seems so much smarter than me. I hope that didn't happen this time.

This is why every so often I'll make a post with a giant disclaimer, yeah, or otherwise surround what I actually want to say with 3 or 4 paragraphs of clarification. I feel like I have to address everything possible, lest I miss addressing what people are actually talking about.

[Willfor]

I have to disagree simply because of Matthew 18:20.
"For where two or three come together in my name, there am I with them."
A church may be destroyed, but the actual church is in its congregation and as a gathering place, the church is just a building. There can be other gathering places. Never forget that even if you lose the Host (I'll admit I'm working from a Catholic perspective here because I don't know that much about the Protestant one) and the Altar and the Tabernacle and all the religious paraphernalia, that hasn't killed your religion. And if it has, was it ever really faith to begin with? Symbolism isn't as important as belief.

I guess what I'm trying to say in a rambling sort of way is that I can completely understand how much of a punch to the gut it would be to lose a church and it's totally understandable that you'd want to string the bastard up, more-so than usual, but justice can't work like that. It has to be equal. A church is, at the end of the day, just another community centre. The most important part of it is the community. If somebody burned that, well, that's kind of more serious.

On a theological level, I agree with you completely. For about 75-80% of the time that the church I attend has existed it hasn't had a dedicated building. My dad either rented spaces for it, or people volunteered their homes and such. It worked pretty well since the offering would often cover the cost of rent, and my dad has always worked another job as a better income source. The building we have now however represents a large financial investment that represents years of work, and it's a pre-owned building by another group that moved on. I have no doubts that the church could pick up after losing the building without missing a beat. However, the fact of the matter is that 70% of the congregation is made up of people who were either burned by other churches, or who are disillusioned with the standard church model. Trying to convince them that the building isn't important is easy, because it was never important to them to begin with, or because it has ceased to be important for them.

This is why I disagree with you on a cultural level. I would say there is a good deal of American Christianity that puts a lot of stock in the building, because there is a lot of American Christianity that is in love with the symbols more than the substance. One of the main things I've seen is that people are all too willing to invest meaning into the symbols. The church building is a symbol. And when you burn a symbol, you are sending a message to someone. So when you attack something that someone else has invested a good deal of their emotion into -- when you attack a symbol that someone has put a lot of their identity into -- you are making an attack on that person. And when you burn a home, you are attacking a single family. When you burn a church, you are attacking many families all at once, and their cultural identity.

Tangential Topic: Does anyone else get really nervous posting in this thread? I can't shake the distinct impression that every time I post I'm completely missing the point, because everybody seems so much smarter than me. I hope that didn't happen this time.

I've had to withhold saying anything to a discussion in this topic on numerous occasions because I didn't feel I knew enough on the subject to add to the discussion.

[scriver]

This discussion went of the rails fast. First I immediately misunderstood Nadaka (and got a little bit of history taught to me ), then Truean claimed somebody who burns down a charge is completely without scruples, and from discussing that we somehow went to argu(ment)ing about whether a church has "more value" than a random building.

We seemed to have gotten slightly rid of the iculous somewhere along that way. I don't think anyone can honestly say they don't understand how a church (especially a "black" church being attacked by white racists) has more value (and deeper meaning) than just a building, especially in light of the general public opinion and social taboos. Which is how we got into the current discussion.

I don't think it's true that if racists attacked a single black family it would be any less an attack against the black identity, though. Just not an as obvious one.

@Jackrabbit -
I often make posts which I delete, but mostly I when I've posted something I immediately feel like I'm being complete jackass for the very reason you described. I'm too big a fool to be stopped, though

[EveryZig]

I think I would say burning a house with somebody in it is worse than burning an empty church. (Of course, in a real situation you probably wouldn't know whether there are people inside or not.) Psychological attacks on a community are still bad, but can be plausibly recovered from, while death is much more permanent.

[Rose]

And if we compare an occupied house with an occupied church, or two empty ones?

[Vector]

I'm not sure why we're ranking crimes at the moment, other than explaining why burning a church is different than burning other buildings.

[Frumple]

And if we compare an occupied house with an occupied church, or two empty ones?

Would depend on how the church was being used. Church is still a church if 'occupied' just means 'there's a dude squatting in it'. Some folks convert churches into homes, business buildings, etc. Church is a style of building as much, if not more, than a function of one. Also what you mean by 'empty'; in the sense that there's no one there right now, or in the sense of an abandoned building. Former, in that case, would be worse than the latter.

Beyond that, depends on how much the building cost. Churches usually cost more to construct than your average house (Which smacks of either hypocrisy or heresy for some religions, but that's neither here nor there, I suppose.). From a strictly material point of view, you're usually doing more damage wrecking the former.

Then, it'd depend on whose house it was. Burning down the dalai lama's place of residence would be different from burning down, say, mine, as an example. It would also probably be worse than burning down some number of churches-of-equal-occupancy-status. The same might be said for a particularly effective doctor or scientist, depending on their accomplishments.

Last part, I guess, would be the status of the church. There's (active) ones in my area that a significant portion of the population would cheer from being burned down. They can be as much a source of dissension and strife as community building, sometimes. You'd probably not value a widely reviled church as much as a widely appreciated one (Though it depends on the reasons for each, of course. Hence the probably ).

Multi-variant situation! The answer is 'depends'

I'm not sure why we're ranking crimes at the moment, other than explaining why burning a church is different than burning other buildings.

Because it's fun! The original burning subject didn't even have anything substantial to do with the building being a church, really. Community center would have had the same effect (possibly more) in some areas.

[KaelGotDwarves]

Really, the only important part that needs to be answered is if the ass burning the blacks' church equals a hate crime or not - and whether it being a hate crime will garner a greater punishment under that state's law. It's the intent behind the action that matters.

I don't pretend to know the law, but to me it sounds like a hate crime.

[Frumple]

It was very clearly a hate crime, yeah, and the fellow got convicted for a hate crime. So there's that, ayuh.

[Phmcw]

More people use it, I suppose. I think that the arson of any community center is a worse crime and thus deserves harsher punishment than any private building, barring the accidental/purposeful death of people inside. It doesn't matter if the community center is a church or a youth center.

Ah, but you see, being an atheist requires that you value a church less specifically because it's religious.

@Japa, while I believe you were sarcastic, I feel the need to say that being atheist only require not to belive in God, whatever it may mean.

But yeah, burning a church, beside being property damage, is a strong statement, and must be punished as such, too.
But burning an home is one too, so no difference here.
What would be different, I guess, would be burning a building for fun, or a non spiritually/philosophically related one like some industrial building.

We're speaking, want it or not of thought crime here, because it's the mindset and the objective of the individual that matter.
But I've always been ok with that.

Edit : unrelated progressive news : Europe ban sale of product who may be used in lethals injections to the US.I guess it's time we move against countries that violate human rights so it's a good thing.

[Rose]

More people use it, I suppose. I think that the arson of any community center is a worse crime and thus deserves harsher punishment than any private building, barring the accidental/purposeful death of people inside. It doesn't matter if the community center is a church or a youth center.

Ah, but you see, being an atheist requires that you value a church less specifically because it's religious.

@Japa, while I believe you were sarcastic.

Indeed. I was using sarcasm and hyperbole to prove a point.

[Leafsnail]

I dunno, I thought the chain went:

It's a church attended by black people -> So it's clearly an attack on the community -> So it implies that this was a hate crime and that the culprit would likely do it again -> Therefore he deserves a long sentence

Rather than:

It's a church -> Churches are inherently more valuable than other buildings -> Therefore he deserves a long sentence

So... I'd have said it's kindof the case that it being a church resulted in a longer sentence, but what you think of the actual value of the church is irrelevant.  The fact that it was committed against a church merely helps show the intent of the perpetrator.