The Scottish Parliament's Working Group on Hate Crime has recommended that Scotland be brought into line with the rest of the UK, where legislation outlawing anti-gay hate crimes was brought into law during 2003. The new legislation, if passed, will similarly cover disabled people.
This will certainly increase the sense of security of gay people in Scotland - there has been a rising incidence of hate crime against gays in many parts of Scotland in recent times. Even those who are not in any way gay are at risk if they are suspected of being gay; very recently, in a village only about five miles from where I live, two adult brothers who had not seen each other for many years were greeting each other warmly (embracing) in a pub when others in the pub, suspecting them of being gay, attacked them brutally. Ironically, and tragically, the reason one of the brothers was back in their home area was to attend the funeral of a close family member. This, and more, is an example of the dreadful price that mindless bigotry costs us as a society.
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