I'm not understanding what you mean by protective characteristics. I know that the hate crime statistics are self-reported, and the criteria can be wildly varied. I do agree that America is extremely polarized at this point.
My Dad is something of a WWII buff, and I grew up hearing about a battles in both the European and Pacific theaters. I'm aware that in addition to the 6 million Jews, Hitler exterminated disabled, mentally ill, gypsies and gays in large numbers as well. And I know of the Japanese internment camps. I know what the Japanese did to the Chinese. I'm not aware of any major battles in India or the extermination of 1 million Indians. I would like to know more about this little known piece of history, can you provide some links?
I personally think that the main comparison I see between Trump and Hitler is the fanaticism of their followers (although I'm seeing this in politics in general on both sides - if you don't agree with me you hate me! Everyone who thinks differently than me is stupid! If you don't like my "guy" you hate the country!). The things that otherwise intelligent Trumpsters will twist to justify has been shocking to me. To be fair, I saw the beginnings of this with Obama's followers too, I think it's just fully manifested with Trump.
Thank you for your interesting in learning more and it is beautiful to know that you have a very good understanding and knowledge of WWII via your father. They are important lessons, I could spend a very long time detailing a lot here however, I do not think this is appropriate platform nor do I dislike Mr Trump enough to spend a lot of my time discussing his matter.
In terms of WWII history, I would like to begin with what happened to Jews during that period was not nice at all only someone with worse than mental health problems would do that even the ones following the orders were as bad.
Due to this being a very sensitive topic and the way it is taught in the West, the Asia's involved in the WWII is erased. I believe this may be due to the prospection of Asia we are trying to sell to public such as "Terrorism", "Barbaric", "Third world countries", and so on, list is long. This than does not serve the purpose of showing what Asia's involved in the WWII was, there were over 1 million Muslim's killed against Germany and over 1 million Indian's killed also not long after under Winstain Churchill another 1 million people were killed India.
I'd like to point out I am not Indian. When France ruled parts of Africa, they took over their literature, they read it and then buried the originals. They than re-wrote what already existed with French authors - now what was the reason behind this? You tell me.
This exact same procedure was followed throughout the west and when scholars of the past realised their literature was being taken from them and burnt they began hiding the books. In recent years they discovered those hidden libraries.
I know we must not make so many statements without any evidence therefore, I am going to let you discover this information yourself internet is a big place.
How did I come to learn this? I was watching a documentary on BBC2 - When I first heard it I was shocked so I used google to do my research and what I learnt was very different from the history that is taught in the schools. Now why is other parts of history erased, is it due to lack of evidence supporting the argument? No, there is enough evidence, but the Western teaching curriculum just does not teach such subjects.
Why have I compared Mr Trump with Hitlor, purely due to comparison and the way protected characteristics are treated by Mr Trump and his government, he publicly made fun out of disabled people, mentally challenged people, people from different races and religions.