Laramie Project: Homosexual Analysis

In Pepper Schwartz article titled “ The Social Construction of Heterosexuality”, Schwartz writes about what she believe Americans define as Heterosexuality. Schwartz writes about the so-called body standard that movies and television show set for us about how we should look and dress. Schwartz writes about what she believes straight men have to look like in order to define their masculinity. Schwartz’s main argument is about all the gender stereotypes we have in our society. Stereotypes like in order to be straight or even gay you have to look, dress, and talk a certain way. Schwartz is trying to say that you do not have to meet the so-called standards we have set for sexuality. Schwartz does make some valid

Laramie, WY, is a modest town which became ignominious overnight in the fall of 1998, when Matthew Shepard, a gay college student, was found tied to a fence after being callously beaten and left to die, setting off a nationwide dispute about homophobia and hate crimes. My reaction to this moment in time initially is horror and shock that people did and do these unspeakable acts to their fellow human. However, I can also appreciate the many different views that were portrayed in the film.

After Mayor Newsom of San Francisco allowed many gay couples to marry beginning on Valentine’s Day in 2004, many Americans became more aware of the issue (Taylor 3). Newsom, a heterosexual, Jesuit-educated son of a prominent state judge, is an unlikely person to support the gay community in this fight (Breslau 40). Newsom was shocked after hearing President Bush’s comments about preserving the “sanctity of marriage” and stated, “I had just taken an oath of office not to allow discrimination. It was pretty darned clear what my obligations

Not all citizens of Laramie conveyed a negative view towards the LGBT community. Marge Murray, together with some of the citizens, gave a notion of live and let live towards homosexuals. Marge explains,

The death of Matt Shepard produced a profound impact on the community of Laramie and the entire state. This tragedy provoked numerous discussions and drew the attention of the public to the position of gay and lesbian community at large and individual representatives of the homosexual community in particular. At the same time, the general public was basically concerned on the death of Matt Shepard rather than on the problem of the homosexual community of Laramie. In such a situation, Beth Loffreda attempted to draw the attention of the public to this problem at large. In her book “Losing Matt Shepard”, she does not focus entirely on the death of Matt Shepard and its circumstances, but she rather to lay emphasis on the problem which remained practically unnoticed by mass media and the general public, the problem of hate and intolerance in regard to homosexuals and their position in the local community.

We get a glimpse of the hatred and unacceptance this community has towards gays. The Laramie Project is used to boost the emotional impact of the events. People tend to live in an “all about me world” where in a case they become the victim and start to ask why but when it’s somebody else they be the one who’s being the victimizer. The violence committed against Matthew Shepard is reflected by many as a hate crime because of someone’s own belief being transpired to someone else’s life. The evidence and witnesses from the case all suggest that Mathew was condemned because of his

Martin Luther King Jr once said “I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal."’ Many years later, racial segregation became less ubiquitous in society thanks to MLK Jr. But just like the people of the colored race, people who are either, lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, etc. were once and still are being discriminated today. However, heroes have risen to take a stand for persecuted people, just like how MLK Jr. did for the colored people, the LGBTQ community also fought for LGBTQ people. History of LGBTQ:

The film The Laramie Project discusses the truth behind the horrific death of one of the worst documented anti-gay hate crimes in American history. Prior to his death, Matthew Shepard, was attending the University of Wyoming, he had a great interest in political affairs, and was known to be an outstanding member of the community. On the night of October 6, 1998, upon leaving a bar in Laramie, Wyoming, Matthew Shepard was robbed, tortured, continuously beaten and terrorized by Russel Henderson and Aaron McKinney. According to the transcripts from over 200 people in the town of Laramie reported that many individuals in this particular town were raised not to agree with homosexuality, although many of them also reported that even though they

According to the Center for Disease Control, lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people face health inequities that often lead to poorer health outcomes compared with heterosexual people. Some of these inequities include stigma, a lack of healthcare access and difficulty finding doctors well-educated in LGBTQ health issues. If you are a member of the LGBTQ community, you may have encountered some of these challenges in your healthcare journey and may be seeking a comprehensive education on LGBTQ health issues. There are several easy ways to learn more about common LGBTQ health issues.

Laramie, Wyoming is a town really liked to keep to themselves, meaning they liked for private matters to remain private, therefore meaning they did not want all of the public attention for Matthew’s murder. Also, this town seems to have a sense of exclusion when it comes to change because tradition is a major component to this town, so breaking traditions causes some tension in the town. Also, breaking traditions seems to make people feel very uncomfortable, which is evident because many of the characters are repeatedly seen stalling or saying “um” in between thoughts in the interviews because they felt very awkward speaking about this sort of thing. There had always been gay people in Laramie, but most of them were in the closet, so people

A. Thesis. With their ideology and their demand for equal rights and personal freedoms, the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transsexual, and queer (LGBTQ) community has played a major part in the rise of identity politics in modern American politics.

I am very proud to say that I have helped to reintroduce our school's Gay Straight Alliance club. My freshman year our club shut down due to lack of interest and most LGBT students at Evansville High were uncomfortable coming out since there was not a lot of them. By my sophomore year, I thought it would be appreciable to reintroduce this club. I wanted to create a fun safe place where students to join as one. I worked hard finding information so I could relate to all, since we had all types of people. A large challenge at my school, which is awful, is students making fun of other people for simply being different.

Homosexuality has become accepted by many in our culture today. PBS estimates that there are 9 million members of the LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender) community (Greve, Joan. “LGBT America: By the Numbers.”). This makes up 3.8% of the US population. Some of these members identify as Christians. So this poses a couple of questions: does the Bible really condemn homosexuality, can you be a gay Christian, and can two people of the same sex be legitimately married? These are important questions for churches to have answers to as the LGBT movement is becoming very popular.

even though sexuality can be considered universal, the sexual behaviors affiliated with it offer different attitudes in various communities. Sexuality is aligned to sexual attraction where individuals can identify themselves with a broad range of sexuality that is bisexual, gay or being lesbian. Sexuality can change over time in a person depending on the circumstances surrounding him or her. It may be affected by the social circle and emotional imbalances that may occur in an individual. Interestingly there exists sexual inequality among many societies in the world. As observed, many societies encourage men to have multiple sex partners but forbid it in women. Moreover, pre-marital sex is promoted in men, but women are flaunted if they participate in pre-marital sex. Across the globe, Western Europe has embraced certain norms in sexuality such as homosexuality whereas African society embraces a negative attitude towards the same.

As a society, we feed off of each other for what a proper response to something may be. As children, we first look to see our mother’s reaction after falling down; if she is calm, I should also be. We look to each other for what a definition of things should be, as well. In the 1950’s, it was generally obscene for a woman on television to show her belly button, whereas today we will show nude breasts on primetime programming. This follows the sociological theory of symbolic interactionism, where society and individual social interaction provides a subjective meaning to deviant behavior. Many social definitions change for the better, however some change for the worse. One such example was once viewed as normal, with no second thoughts given