Given that nearly 63 percent of Utahns approve of passing hate-crimes legislation in its present form, it would be fair to say that the new approach advocated by our Legislature to address this issue is a tremendous disappointment and disservice to our community. There is a fundamental disconnect between the "will of the people" and those elected to represent us on this issue. At the root of this disconnect is an invisible wall of privilege that perpetuates bias and prejudice that time and again prevents the passage of this legislation.

The critic might ask, what does privilege have to do with this legislation? When you boil away all the rhetoric, this bill gives law enforcement usable tools to punish those in our society who target victims for the sole purpose of oppressing them as individuals but more importantly as a class of persons. Protection of these potential victims is not venomous; it is humane. Privilege comes into play, then, when the people we have elected choose who among us gets protection and who does not. That is, of course, their job as legislators — to make tough choices.

However, we cannot forget that the rhetoric surrounding this legislation is exactly what doomed it to fail 10 years in a row. It is bias. The overwhelming discomfort elected politicians feel when the word homosexual is even mentioned creates a knee-jerk prejudiced response of distancing and aversion, as if protection is somehow an implicit endorsement of their lifestyle. At the end of the day, it is the desire of politicians to remain in power by taking a hard stance against anything homosexual that inculcates their privilege and prevents our leaders from doing what is right — protecting all members of our community. In perseverating on this one piece of the bill, the Legislature has lost sight of the other communities in need of protection and parity. We hope that our legislators would not abuse their power to discriminate but rather use the authority we have given them to build communities that are safe and inclusive.

We know, we know, a crime is a crime. But this argument is shallow at best because it fails to acknowledge the fundamental roles laws have in our society — deterrence and punishment. Penalty enhancements for criminals whose purpose is to oppress are merely a demonstration of our society's commitment to eradicating violent manifestations of bias. If we fail to address the motives of crimes, we can never even begin to have real crime prevention that removes the triggers of violence and effectively deters crime. This is one way we protect 14-year-olds from sexual predators, by enhancing the penalties for sexual assaults against minors. We have demonstrated our commitment to this class of people by legally acknowledging that targeting this group violates our most sacred societal mores. It is time to do the same for our other vulnerable populations.