Alex Befus

What The Hell Were They Thinking?

Laramie, Wyoming is described as a small jewel of the west and a quiet Midwestern city. Matthew Shepard was described as a happy man who smiled at everyone and cared more about his shoes than the football games on television and for the sole reason of difference faced death in the town of Laramie. Throughout the 1990’s Laramie was targeted as a city promoting hate crimes when a young college student named Matthew Shepard was brutally beaten and tied to a fence left to die. This occurrence was significant in the Midwest and eventually around the world. The beating took place because Matthew Shepard was a gay man. Hate crimes are defined as criminal offenses motivated either entirely or in part by the fact or perception that a victim is different from the perpetrator (http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/cius_04/offenses_reported/hate_crime/index.html). Though some believe there is more to a hate crime than hate. It can easily be considered that ignorance/intolerance, fear and personal backgrounds psychologically affect people’s actions and reactions to difference.

One of the key elements to hate crimes is that there is some difference, whether it is ethnicity, religion, race, looks, and in Matthew Sheppard’s case it was sexual orientation. To a small town like Laramie, Wyoming a gay man was an outsider. The town flourished as a farming city where good hard work was valued and masculinity was a common theme throughout the townspeople. It’s not as if they didn’t know what a homosexual was, though they never personally had the experience with one and with such a masculine background the thought of it disgusted them. According to psychologist George Weinberg, who conducted a research of the degree of sexual prejudice, people who are older, less educated, living in the Midwest or south and living in rural areas have less of a tolerance for homosexuals (http://0-cdp.sagepub.com.bianca.penlib.du.edu/content/9/1/19.abstract). Laramie fits into at least two of these categories, a rural area and Midwest, and with further research into the population quite possibly more. So their mentality of live and let live is already untrue according to scientific research. Even further most of the towns’ strict religious background plays into their intolerance. Laramie is mostly a Baptist town and almost everyone in the town went to church and studied the bible, which does condemn homosexuality. In the movie Amanda confronted the Baptist minister trying to understand his feelings and thoughts about the attention and murder of Matt and basically was told by the minister that he hoped Matt had time to consider what kind of lifestyle he had. This is significant and proves the idea that intolerance can lead to violent actions because before he stated this he was discussing that he and the town included were very tolerable people, back to the “live and let live” mentality.

Another idea that psychologists mention that control how people get to boiling point of committing a hate crime is personal background. People who are born into a certain kind of stereotype and prejudice don’t know anything different. In their eyes they don’t understand that what they are saying, and in this case doing, towards someone that is different from them is wrong. They are taught growing up that hating and being offended by homosexuality is nowhere near wrong. For example, a young man part of the skinhead “gang” in the United States came and talked to our schools’ athletes about why he committed so many hate crimes. He described the feeling of acceptance within his own gang, and was taught different morals and ideals according to the people surrounding him. To him it was perfectly fine to bash in someone’s head and to yell profane things. He said he didn’t know anything different and never even considered not doing it because of who he was surrounded by and what he grew up hearing. Likewise in Laramie, a town pretty much in the outer corner of Wyoming pretty isolated to itself, the citizens are not surrounded by a wide variety of people and ideals. The psychology department at the University Of Illinois conducted a research figuring out the main reasons hate crimes are committed (http://0-www.springerlink.com.bianca.penlib.du.edu/content/mnvk5416480p2678/fulltext.pdf). They found out 39% of crimes committed are not necessarily hate or anger but ignorance. So although we tend to think hate crimes are solely committed based on hate of a certain group or individual, it is apparent other factors are largely playing roles under the covers. In Laramie, ignorance was a key issue for the two local boys who murdered Matthew Shepard.

One of the last main ideals surrounding the study of hate crimes and why they exist is fear; fear of the unknown, fear of change, fear of difference. The study done at the University of Illinois suggested that 19% of hate crimes occur out of fear(http://0-www.springerlink.com.bianca.penlib.du.edu/content/mnvk5416480p2678/fulltext.pdf). Many things cause people to be fearful and when they are afraid they are at their weakest mentally. Psychologist Donald Green at Yale University mentions that people who are fearful turn to defense mechanisms such as hate crimes to keep themselves superior and confident in themselves. This justifies the reasoning for the hate crimes occurring in a place like Laramie, Wyoming. Along with the other characteristics pertaining to Laramie and the crime committed there this might be the most important one. Considering the perpetrators were men and highly conscious of their masculinity, they were truly afraid of Matthew Shepard.

During the interview of the perpetrator he was asked what Matthew was doing that made them want to rob and hurt him. He answered that he didn’t know what he was going to do, being a queer and all. Right there is the fear of the unknown, and in a distressful situation the only thing he could think of doing was to commit an act of violence towards Matt. He clearly didn’t think it was wrong. He wasn’t taught to stop and consider his words or actions towards a gay man, if he even thought he was a man. Many times throughout the film, The Laramie Project, Matt was referred to as the queer, fag, homosexual, etc.

So when citizens of the town ask “What the hell were they thinking”, it could be said that simply they were not and now it’s understandable that Laramie, Wyoming isn’t such an odd place for a hate crime to occur. The studies shown and information I’ve collected regarding hate crimes and their relationship to a place like Laramie really solidify that hate crimes are not just all about hate. Ignorance, fear, intolerance, and background do shape someone’s mentality about a certain subject; in this case the perpetrators reaction to Matthew Shepard being gay. Also, these characteristics of a hate crime can be easily molded specifically to Laramie, even more so then other places. They have strong masculine and religious backgrounds, the city was not raised liberal with the idea of flaunting your sexuality, and many people were afraid of the change and difference. So maybe the people of Laramie are right when they say “Hate is not a Laramie Value”, and in the end it’s as much their fault as it is Aaron Mckinneys’ and Russell Hendersons’.