The Laramie Project

The Laramie
Name
Institution
Introduction
The story about Matthew Sheppard changed people’s view of Laramie. Telling the story of Laramie using Mathew Sheppard has changed the shape of the history of gay rights by minimizing hate crimes and intolerance. Furthermore, it resulted in legislations being enacted to protect lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender across America. This essay explains the importance of telling Mathew Sheppard story as it generates several perceptions about gay people in the town of Laramie and how people in the town reacted towards gays. The crime also highlighted how people value their town and their reputation as they denounce the crime. Laramie Wyoming was considered as a peaceful beautiful town, therefore, Mathew‘s story have changed the perception of the town bringing out some of the issues could not have been known before.
History behind the Story
The Laramie Project is a play about the town of Laramie Wyoming that attracted media attention after the murder of Matthew Sheppard in 1998 (Kaufman, 2012). Hate crime is the main theme in the story as a gay student is killed because of his sexual orientation. Kaufman and his team member of the tectonic theatre project set out to interview several people in a bid to come up with a story. Members of tectonic theatre project came to Laramie to conduct interviews as they wrote the Laramie Project which was a play. The team was received with mixed reactions from the people living in Laramie. The interview process highlights how intense the subject of gay is in Laramie. The play aimed at creating awareness of the prejudice faced by gay people and the high levels of intolerance displayed towards people who are consider being gay. This play has become one of the most performed plays in America in the recent times. Owing to high demand, the play was later turned into a film viewed by over 50 million people across the world (Kaufman, 2001).
How the Story Is Displayed For the Audience
The story is about dissolving prejudices by encouraging tolerance. According the author, the play reveals several characters to portray varied opinion of the towns’ people (Kaufman, 2001). The story is presented to the audience through short interviews generated from different people who associated with Matthew Sheppard. It does not just focus on Mathew Sheppard’s murder, but it also presents the town beautiful features like the important ranches in the US and the famous University of Wyoming as it displays students from different background who attended the university. The town’s attitude towards issue of homosexuality represents the perception of the majority of American, but the author narrowed down on the single story to illustrate the horrific experiences homosexuals undergo in the hands of people who perceive them as not normal(Kaufman, 2001). The towns’ reaction towards homosexuality, according to the author, represents a typical society where people rarely care until something tragic happens. For example, in one of the interviews, some people did not care about issues of gay; “As far as the gay issue, I don't give a damn one way or the other as long as they don't bother me and even if they did, I'd just say no thank you...