It’s a slippery slope that is very hard to prove in most cases.
For example, 2 men were charged with stealing and burning a pride flag with hate crimes in California. I don’t by any means hate the lgbtq population but I certainly also don’t agree with a lot of what their groups advocate and lobby for. I think the crime in California should have been the theft of the flag, as nobody was harmed in the burning of it.
In this case, the man is claiming to be apart of the same community which is a conundrum when it comes to gender self identification laws that are and have successfully been passed as law and procedure in many states, hospitals and prisons.
There was man whom was breaking windows on gay bars in NY and claims to be gay himself. The shooter here is claiming to be non-binary whom used they/them pronouns.
The gender self identification laws or procedures trans advocacy groups are further attempting to pass onto states, hospitals and prisons are now working against their own population or community they advocate for in that anyone whom does harm to said community can just identify their way out of potential hate crime charges or atleast lesson their charges.
I do understand that there's an argument to be made that categories like negligent homicide versus regular homicide or things like involuntary manslaughter are also taking into account the perpetrators thoughts and increasing the penalties for intent, so if we already do that then it's not totally out of the realm of possibility to use "hate crime" to further criminalize intent, it just makes me uncomfortable, because that's a hell of a thing to prove.
This shooting was tragic because people died. It's also tragic if a community was specifically targeted, Even if that community was the perpetrator's own. It's tragic all around, And we should have a lot of compassion for each other in these moments.