Rehumanizing the harms of hate

Abstract The harms associated with hate crimes pose complex challenges for societies across the world. Rising interest within criminology and associated disciplines has highlighted the nature and prevalence of these offences, although the range of physical, emotional and structural harms remains under-explored. This is particularly evident within disadvantaged and disconnected communities, where experiences of hate crime can be trivialized and dehumanized at times of political, social and economic crises. This article draws from fresh empirical research that rehumanizes the harms of hate from the vantage point of victims who have typically been peripheral to the development of conceptual and policy frameworks on the basis of being ‘hard to reach’—or perhaps more pertinently ‘easy to ignore’. It identifies how harms can be reinforced and enabled by an increasingly hostile political climate, institutional ‘indifference’, the haemorrhaging of support services and sustained austerity to the point where victims can feel trapped in a cycle of hopelessness borne from the inevitability of repeat victimization and flawed responses. In doing so, the article highlights the value of more nuanced analyses that centre the voices of the ‘voiceless’ within theory and praxis and that demystify notions of hate, harm and justice during times of increasing fragility.