It was October 17th, 1998; it was a day full of mourning in Laramie. It was the day of Matthew Shepard’s funeral. “On the day of the funeral was it snowing and raining so bad by the time I got there, there were already thousands of people there dressed in black, umbrellas everywhere and they had two churches set up and still there were hundreds of people outside that couldn’t fit into either one of the churches and they had this park set up and the park was full” (Laramie Project). People filled the streets in support of the lost life in their town. Across from the church there was a park and in that park stood Fred Phelps and some of his followers. Fred Phelps and his followers were having a protest. Phelps was preaching about hatred and how God does emphasizes hate. He and the people with him, including children, held picketing signs that said awful things. A few read, “Matt in Hell”, “No Special Laws for Fags”, and “God hates Fags”. the funeral everyone went home including Fred Phelps but it would not be his last appearance. On the trial date of Russell Henderson, Fred Phelps once again appeared. With the same sign and bring new people, still children were involved. What hit me the hardest about the signs were the signs the kids were holding, in particular the young boy in front by Phelps. The sign he was holding read in all caps, “USA” on the top of the poster, and “SIN” on the bottom and in the middle of the words, it was a vulgar picture of homosexual sexuality. This boy looked no older than ten. After Phelps’ first appearance, Romaine Patterson, one of Matthews’ friend, decided someone needed to stand up for peace and face Phelps. She along with other members of the community made angel costumes. The wings stood about seven feet high. They circled Phelps and they blocked him from the rest of the community. Patterson and the other angels stood there they did not speak but they portrayed peace and silence that was needed at that time. As, I watched the Laramie Project movie I felt disappointed and appalled to see that in his crowd of followers there were children holding signs of hate toward Matthew and toward the homosexual community. The children saw the angels but that did not stop them from being on the side of hate.
At this moment in the movie questions filled my head. How could anyone allow their child to be only taught hatred? Then I questioned, what makes people have so much hate? I believe that hatred is built into your being at a young age. I think parents instill all moral judgment and even if the child rebels in life once they are adult they will have similar views as their parents. I think that hate leads to violence and thus it can lead to murder. I think Father Roger Schmit said it best in the Laramie Project movie when talking about Matthew and the violence he received to the homosexual man and woman who were there to interview him. He said,
“You think violence is what they did to Matthew they did do violence to Matthew but you know, can I make this personal? Every time you are called a fag, or you are called a les or a, “a dike” yes a dike, you realize that is violent that is the seed of violence and I would resent it immensely if you use anything I said to somehow cultivate that kind of violence. “Well thank you father for saying that”, just deal with what is true, you know what is true. You need to do your best to say it correct”.
I think this quote is significant to how hatred is spread. Image kids hearing their parents, their role models, or even just older kids saying hurtful things, they will think that it is alright to say those kinds of thing when it is not acceptable. Hurtful words lead to hurtful or even violent actions. I think that the mental perception of children on people of another is race or another view of life is not noticed until someone being older, their parents mainly, tell them. Judy Shepard stated, “Hate is a learning behavior. Your voice is the most powerful tool in erasing hate”.
There is psychological evidence that shows that development of morality begins at an early age. “Prejudice is fostered through a belief that individuals of another group are homogeneous; working at changing that belief can be effective in reducing prejudice (Bigler and Liben 1993)”. In the article Racial Perceptions of Young Children: A Review of Literature Post-1999, it states that stereotyping begin from birth and until age seven. Meaning that the child will remain prejudice against people that do not look or act likes them until seven. Some children will not always hold the prejudice while others will, yet after age seven they start understanding social norms and what is acceptable and what is not. At this point in the child’s life is when the stereotyping either farther or ends. “Usually, by 8 years of age, children begin giving personal belief responses that diverge from dominant stereotypes (Aboud 1988)”. This means that the children that were with Fred Phelps picketing were forming their minds to think that it is acceptable to bash on homosexuals, and even hate them. I think that this is absurd. No child can make up their minds on such a touchy subject by themselves at age seven or eight. Those childrens parents have hate instilled in them probably from their parents and now are making decisions, like hatred towards homosexuals, for their children. I believe that this hatred that is built up with ignorance and lack of awareness is what leads to violence.
Violence like Father Roger Schmit said can be just saying words all the way to what Matthew felt the day he was beaten to his critical condition and left to die. Yet, I still believe that even when told that prejudice is right, one can still change. I think that this change comes from education and knowledge about the subject. An amazing example of this is in the Laramie Project. A student at the University of Wyoming auditioned to win a scholarship with a part of “Angels in America”, a play about homosexuality. His parents criticized him and did not even come to his performance. Later at the end of the movie we see this student again. The University of Wyoming decided to do “Angels in America”. When his parents asked about if he was going to try out for it he said, “Yeah I am, and a huge argument, alright it was like a huge argument. My mom was like, you know homosexuality is a sin, homosexuality is a sin”. He had just been in “Macbeth”, and he was a murder in it and he said to his mom, “Mom, I just played a murder tonight and you didn’t seem to have a problem with that”. In today’s society homosexuality is becoming more accepted and thus I feel like it will just get better through the years because of parents being accepting. This transformation from complete homophobia to mostly accepting homosexuals has come a huge way through education and cases like Matthew Shepard.
In the end, due to watching the Laramie Project, and learning about Matthew Shepards’ case I realized that hate is not something that grows as you make your own opinions. Hate is something that is presented to you right when you are born. Hate was infused in the minds of Aaron McKinney and Russell Henderson, when they beat and tied Matthew to that fence that night. Hate is in people’s minds when they speak hurtful words. Hate fills our minds at birth and as we grow we must learn to erase hate and love.
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