Not down with this at all

While I don't plan on ever hanging a noose in a public place and I can certainly understand the connotations a noose may have, I do not agree with Assemblyman Joseph Lentol's idea for a new legislation which will make a "displaying a Hangman’s Noose a hate crime". The dude is basically trying to pass a law to ban a type of knot. What will I ever do if I wanna hang myself?

If passed, a person who is found guilty of "displaying a noose", would face a sentence of 1 1/3 to 4 years in prison. Here's what your boy Lentol said:

“Displaying a noose can have very real emotional effect on people. The law should recognise that this is, without question, a hate crime and protect people from it. It should also punish those who would choose to display something so motivated by hatred.”

So what if I try to kill myself, right, and I fail. The cops find me in my living room hanging from a noose, do I have to go to jail now, too? That would blow.

I think all this hoopla over the noose only incites the situation further; it impregnates the noose with all sorts of hatred and personally, I've never ever thought of a noose in that way and I know I musn't be alone. I guess I'm just not inherently racist, I dunno. Regardless, now we're passing laws to ban nooses? C'mon now, fellas.

Lentol's legislation would put the noose in the same drawer as swastikas and burning crosses.

Am I being naive? Tell me if u think I am! Am I callous to what a noose symbolises to some people? Am I an asshole for not seeing it? Am I racist because I don't make that connection?!