Credit: Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA)
Jan. 27, 2020 By Allie Griffin
The Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) launched a new ad campaign today to combat an uptick in hate crimes on the New York City transit system.
The “Hate Has No Place in Our Transportation System” public awareness campaign will promote kindness, respect and solidarity across digital screens in subways, buses and commuter railroads.
The campaign follows a year spotted with hate crimes within the city’s subways and buses. There was a 42 percent increase in hate crimes last year from 53 reported in 2018 to 75 in 2019, according to NYPD Transit Bureau statistics.
Often the hate crimes are graffiti and vandalism that spreads messages of hate, the MTA said. However, the launch comes after a physical attack on a transgender woman on the C line in Harlem over the weekend.
The MTA launched the campaign on the 75th anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz concentration camp today.
“New York City Transit has zero tolerance for bias-motivated threats or harassment in our subway or bus systems,” said Sarah Meyer, New York City Transit Chief Customer Officer. “The increase in incidents we have witnessed is appalling. Let’s show our fellow New Yorkers how much we care and work together to combat these incidents.”
The ads share the message that “hate has no place” in the MTA network, along with the tagline “New York rides together.” They also provide information on how to report hate crimes.
Credit: Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA)
The ads will appear on more than more than 4,000 digital screens across the subway system, 2,600 screens on buses, and 550 screens on the Long Island Rail Road and Metro-North Railroad.
“New York is built on diversity, openness and inclusion,” said MTA Chairman and CEO Patrick Foye. “Every New Yorker should be able to travel free of harassment and feel safe while riding with the MTA.”
“We hope that our campaign will not only help reduce bias activity but will remind everyone of the core New York values of kindness, respect and solidarity.”
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10 Comments
The mentally ill will not stop and think before they do any hate crime. (Or after for that matter)
People should stop labeling offenders as mentally ill. How come a mentally ill person decides/knows who to hate, how to hate. How do they know the victim is jewish, muslim, hispanic, lgbt, etc? How come are they mentally ill if they are smart enough to know? Are we going to call anybody who hates for no season as mentally ill? These people are simply “bad”, violent people who are extremely inclined to commit a crime for no reason and they have to be treated as such. The banners on the transit?? They created and awareness and push other people to report such a behavior or do their best to help the victim..
The term “hate crime” is a misnomer because one does not commit crimes for love. The idea of a “hate crime” is a political thing, because one is able to emphasize certain crimes or in some cases, “crimes” more than other ones, leading to the creation of legal favoritism. Likewise, the concept of “potential crime” is very dangerous because it assumes a criminal act does not have to be committed, but based on some subjective formula, be a subjective thing instead of something with real proof. This places the situation of law into a precarious position because people can be convicted for things of which they never did or even intended to do.
For this reason, it should be of great concern to put the phrases together to form “potential hate crimes”, since this could be used to justify any number of abuses, for while hate is real, crimes are real, and people do conspire to commit crimes, without solid proof of a crime than one is only setting up the precedents for a practical surveillance state with fake trials and political arrests just like what happened in the Soviet Union and continues to happen in nations with surveillance states such as China, North Korea, and Turkmenistan. Yet this is what the Democrat Party in NYC stands for.
Helen- What’s your take on the $2 Million Trump stole from veterans and was forced to return??
Yeah…I wanna know that too!! Everyone’s on my back because my son made millions for a no-show job. So what he can’t speak the language or had no qualifications. Don’t they understand that’s called quid pro Joe
Wait, you’re supposed to pretend the president “didn’t” withold foreign aid for that info. Aren’t you arguing FOR him?
Is this relevant hate crimes in Astoria, or just a copy and paste rant?
Hit it right on the nail. Our socialists don’t like the truth
Ads are not going to stop people from assaulting innocent riders and transit workers. There are also ads on the trains about the MTA rather having your $2.75 than your $100 for turnstile jumping. That’s gone over real well – NOT! How about spending money on actually deterring lowlifes from hurting people by putting cops on the platforms and in the subway cars? Every time somebody gets arrested, they’re taken in for mental evaluation and taken care of or set free on bail to hurt again, yet the victims never get over the attack.
Ads might make the other people report the ongoing crime so it’s useful
I was called a “Cracker” on the N train last week. I had to explain to my daughter what it meant.