On Categorization Of Insulting Behaviors In Crime Of Insult

The Article 246 of Criminal Law stipulates that “those insult blatantly others by violence or other methods or slander others by fabricating facts, with serious circumstances, will be sentenced to no more than three years in prison, criminal detention, public surveillance or deprivation of political rights.” This provision simply expresses the behavior patterns and legal consequences of crime of insult. On the one hand, since the provisions of Criminal Law prescribe “insulting behavior” abstractly and vacuously, this leads to considerable differences in understanding and application of the crime. On the other hand, with the continuous development of society, a endless variety of insulting behavior occur, and hence it is difficult to define a insulting behavior and its severity. Therefore, it is necessary to introduce the research method, categorization of Criminal Law and study the insulting behaviors. The thesis tries to account for the necessity of categorization of insult behaviors, which is based on the investigation of the logic and function of categorization in criminal law, combined with problems of insulting behaviors in terms of theory identification and judicial practice. After a comparative study of categorization of insulting behaviors in foreign countries, the thesis proposes some construction ideas, which, in accordance with certain guidelines, takes into account legislative models of serious crimes and misdemeanor of Criminal Law in civil law system.The necessity of categorization of insulting behaviors results from limitations of theory, legislation and practice. Firstly, theoretically, what insulting behaviors infringe upon citizens’ legal interests is the right of reputation which is an important part of personality rights. And the understanding of insulting behaviors varies from time to time, from place to place. Secondly, from the text, Criminal Law expresses the crime of insult simply; its practicability is low. And therefore it calls for the clear standard of application through categorization of Criminal Law. Finally, in the judicial level, the fact that we have ignored insulting behaviors leads to all kinds of insulting behaviors in social life. However, the extant provisions are difficult to regulate them effectively. Thus, by the type of insulting behavior, the proper definition of the meaning of insulting behavior and insulting behavior against the construction of a reasonable degree of legal interest type, in order to enhance this crime in the judicial practice understanding and application of the norms becomes necessary. Thus, in order to improve the understanding and application of the crime of insult, it is necessary to define insulting behaviors properly and construct their severity reasonably through categorization of these behaviors.There are many foreign countries whose categorization of Criminal Law is very mature and typical, Germany, Italy, France, to name but a few, which can provide the reference. These countries stipulate insulting behaviors much more delicately and set up hierarchical categorization, and this makes judicial application more applicably and reduces occurrences of same crime with different judgments and sentencing differentiation, and is worth learning and reflection.Categorizing thinking of Criminal Law refers to the criminal cognitive mode which classifies some criminal phenomena through induction and applies this classification in the interpretation and application of some individual criminal behaviors. Its logical thinking is to analyze the type of the form of experience, then to be guided by the certain type of abstract idea, and form the final type of the criminal norm. Because of the hierarchy and generality of Criminal Law, it can in turn help identify and deal with criminal cases.During the process of categorization of insulting behaviors, on the one hand, from the principle of protection of legal interests, it is required to understand the notion of insulting behaviors and legal interests that they infringe upon. On the other hand, with the principle of legality and situational difference principle as a guide, insulting behaviors are subdivided into ordinary behaviors, serious behaviors and aggravated behaviors. Through the in-depth analysis of these three types, the judicial application of several special kinds of insulting behaviors is discussed so as to solve the problems of the legal determination of these types of special insulting behaviors.