I used to support the gays. In fact, when I was in high school and college, I was outspoken about being all for the LGB community. My high school’s drama club put on a production of The Laramie Project, a play about a boy named Matthew Shepard who was brutally murdered for being gay. It was an emotionally impactful story. The play opened a national conversation about why people should be able to be gay without being killed in America. After seeing this production, I couldn’t understand how any human being could not want legislation to be pushed forward to protect these people from hate crimes simply because of an attribute like being gay. Looking back on this now, I recognize this was likely a propagandist effort to prompt us to talk about gay and lesbian issues. As it turns out, the story in the play is not the whole story.
The actual happenings of the event occurred on October 6, 1998. Matthew Shepard went to Fireside Bar in Laramie, Wyoming, a local gay-friendly hangout. Russell Henderson and Aaron McKinney arrived shortly thereafter, and the three men hung out before leaving in McKinney’s father’s truck. After leaving together, Shepard was robbed, beaten, pistol whipped, tied to a fence, and set on fire. Henderson and McKinney left him unconscious, and 15 hours later, a student riding his bike found Shepard, barely alive, with tear streaked cheeks. Shepard did not survive.
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