Introduction

During a recent seminar on hate crime with my first year undergraduates I found myself faced with an all too familiar student query. Having just delivered my lecture on the emergence and problem of hate crime, we sat down to discuss the many different categories that they might include in their own imaginary policy. The inclusion of religion, subculture and appearance led to a heated debate as students observed these to be changeable categories that might be chosen by the victim and not always intrinsic to their character. However, gender was fixed in their minds as a clear cut example of hate crime, which alongside race and sexual orientation, was an aspect of life that was central to daily experiences of discrimination. Of course hate crime scholars can unpick the flaws in the argument of my students, but it has always struck me as curious that in nine years of teaching on the subject, every year students query the exclusion of gender from hate crime policy and ask me why. For them it is obvious, gender is an intrinsic characteristic that cannot be hidden and people are attacked because of it. This discussion is not uncommon with those working outside of academia too who might over a cup of tea, ponder why violence against women is treated differently from violence on the basis of race or sexual orientation.

Aside from my personal experience of discussing gender and hate crime, there are also a number of high profile cases that raise questions about the nature of gender-related violence. In 2008 Levi Bellfield was convicted of the murders of two women and the attempted murder of a third. He has since been convicted of the murder of Milly Dowler. He was described as a ‘man with a hatred of women – especially blondes’, who had spent many years bullying, attacking and ultimately murdering women (Independent, 2011; Drew, 2008). He would often seek out young runaways from care homes or others whose lives made them particularly vulnerable. Yet his deliberate targeting of a particular group passed with very little comment in media reports.