Details of bathroom-stall vandalism graced the front page of the Daily Bruin on Nov. 2.

Under the headline “Anti-Semitism marks UCLA,” the paper reported an incident in which someone wrote “fuck Jews” on a Kerckhoff Hall bathroom stall and drew swastikas.

Sensationalist headline aside (the incident itself suggested that anti-Semitism characterizes our campus no more than the LaRouche presence signifies that UCLA is defined by conspiratorial politics), the real importance of this incident is its classification as a hate crime.

Nancy Greenstein, director of police community services at UCPD, told the Daily Bruin that the incident would likely be considered a hate crime.

“Usually the penalties are more severe if it’s hate-related,” she said.

With the headline “Anti-semitism marks UCLA” in mind, I sought to investigate what other attitudes define UCLA. Conducting an informal survey of campus restrooms, such as those in Young Research Library and Bunche Hall, I counted six derogatory comments about women (“women are nature’s punching bags”), three about Asians, two about Arabs and five about whites (“kill whitey”).

There were scrawlings denigrating gays, some about gay sex, and everything in between.

There was even a statement in support of Iran’s nuclear program and launching nuclear weapons against the United States.

Can you imagine police officers devoting themselves to investigating every obscene bathroom scrawling?

With hate crime legislation, previously minor offenses – such as petty vandalism – become criminal offenses. This is entirely due to the political content of the scrawlings.

In this case, the issue is an unpopular opinion, not the bathroom stall scrawling itself. Vandalism as a crime is merely a convenient excuse to punish these unpopular opinions that would otherwise be protected.

Congress defined “hate crimes” as crimes in which “the defendant’s conduct was motivated by ... gender identity of another individual or group of individuals.” The Violent Crime and Law Enforcement Act of 1994 provided stricter sentences for these crimes.

In the case of violent “hate crimes,” one could make the argument that these violent crimes constitute a sort of domestic terrorism. By targeting specific groups, the crimes may cause individuals in these groups to legitimately fear that they themselves might be targeted in future attacks.

But the general argument in favor of stricter sentencing for hate crimes glosses over crucial facts.

Victims of crimes driven by bigotry are no more or no less victimized than those of crimes where the perpetrator has other motivations.

Also, the nature of hate crimes – one person violating the rights of another – is incompatible with the practice of punishing the perpetrator for the repercussions of the crime on those not involved, such as members of the victim’s ethnic group fearing for their safety.

These third-party effects, themselves subjective, are not a direct result of the crime, which ought to be the criteria by which punishments are determined.

This argument holds less water in cases such as the Kerckhoff vandalism, where no violence was involved. For all we know, the person responsible for this incident may be a constipated high school freshman on a campus tour. Only the most paranoid could possibly fear for their safety as a result of this vandalism.

The penalty for “hate speech,” which is generally protected by the First Amendment, when combined with a crime, is worse than the penalty for the crime alone. In effect, the expression of an unpopular opinion is itself criminalized.

This is a path we can’t afford to follow. Our society confers the right to bigotry, however vile.

But the very logic that justifies additional punishment for hate crimes on the basis of third-party effects could be construed to outlaw mere expressions of opinion, destroying the foundation of our most fundamental rights.

Hate crime laws thus contradict the spirit, if not the code, of our Constitution. If current laws require that police treat incidents such as these as hate crimes, hate crime legislation needs to be modified, if not repealed.

Government criminalization of bathroom scrawlings on the basis of bigoted expressions of opinion, though laughably alarmist, may establish a dangerous precedent.

To share your favorite bathroom scrawlings, e-mail Lazar at dlazar@media.ucla.edu. Send general comments to viewpoint@media.ucla.edu.