Quote:
Originally Posted by Kindleing
Yes - in the US (at least the parts I am familiar with) the term "lynch", or "lynch mob" has only very recently been redefined to exclusively apply to racist hangings. As Leebase said, it has routinely been used as a slang term for "mob punishment" of anybody for anything and seldom refers to actual hanging - which would be illegal. It is still a little jarring to me that "hanging" now automatically carries a racial connotation since hanging horse thieves, among others, was once considered proper.
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As far as I recall and this is going back quite a ways, the punishments handed out by "Judge Lynch" included whippings, branding, conscription and property seizure in the 1780's but no mention of hangings or other deaths. Perhaps Judge Lynch was still affected by his Quaker upbringing?
This research was triggered by a line in Robert A. Heinlein's
The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, "
Oh, different today, but was 2075 and touching a fem without her consent—plenty of lonely men to come to rescue and airlock never far away. As kids say, Judge Lynch never sleeps."
A quick check on Wikipedia came up with
Lynching in the United States. To quote the first sentence: "
Lynching is the practice of murder by a group of people by extrajudicial action." So hanging is not the only method.
Groups such as the Ku Klux Klan did not exclusively murder black men, they were quite willing to lynch others -- Jews, immigrants, gays and lesbians and in their early history Catholics. Check the La Paloma raid in 1937 for an example. I would suggest that only those with strong stomachs read some of the descriptions of the KKK in action.