The colloquium I’m going to reflect on is titled, “Hate Crimes: Prejudice, Power and Personhood” which was presented by Professor June-Ann Greeley and Professor Alka Jauhari. The colloquia’s central theme was what is a hate crime? Is hate a crime? Who decides what that hate is? And How do you penalize this so called “hate crime”? The colloquia forces everyone to wonder why even in our country where we have Freedom of Speech and Freedom of Expression and even Freedom of religion, crimes due to hate still exist. In the beginning of the colloquia Professor Greeley gives us the definition of prejudice, power and personhood. Prejudice is known to be the kind of bias that leads itself to something much more profound and antagonizing to certain individuals. Power is mainly…show more content… Lastly personhood, which refers to the willful acts against a person by a person or group. This aspect looks at who is a person, the rights of a person and do we have the right to hate and the ethical dilemma behind it. Professor Greeley explains how religious hate crimes is the second largest most prevalent hate crime in the United States. The FBI, labels hate crimes as a traditional offense, murder, arson or vandalism with the added element of bias. The congress defines a hate crime as a “criminal offence against a person or property motivated in whole or in part by an offender’s bias against a race, religion, disability, ethnic origin or sexual orientation.” The FBI recognizes that hate is not a crime and they are mindful of protecting freedom of speech and other civil liberties. So altogether hate is guaranteed under the rights but what we do about it can become a crime. The colloquia then moves on to explain the history of hate crimes and where is all sort of began. The FBI investigated “hate crimes” as back as World War I and how its role increased after the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Professor