New book claims Matthew Shephard was killed by his bisexual lover and drug dealer. Riiiight.

[Jungle Red]

Posted: 9/12/13 at 5:36pm

"Award-winning journalist Stephen Jimenez is set to release The Book of Matt: Hidden Truths About the Murder of Matthew Shepard on Oct. 1. His book claims that the events surrounding Shepard's brutal murder and motivations of his killers are all incorrect."
Oh, brother...

[Kad]

Posted: 9/12/13 at 5:43pm

For an "award-winning journalist", it sure isn't that easy to find a lot of information on him.

Updated On: 9/12/13 at 05:43 PM

[Almira]

Posted: 9/12/13 at 6:05pm

I'm actually interested in this. Since day one of the Shepard story I've had a gut feeling that something was "off". Shepard was turned into the LGBT Anne Frank so quickly that any question about the what "else" could have happened was meet with (understandable) hostility.

I've long suspected there was more to the story.

[FindingNamo]

Posted: 9/12/13 at 6:31pm

The Latamie Project: 10 Years Later does a great job of illuminating and dismantling this folklore.

[Kad]

Posted: 9/12/13 at 6:45pm

It is also strange that he gleans this from an "anonymous letter" over a decade and a half after the murder, when the facts he presents would have drastically changed the case for the accused.

[Phyllis Rogers Stone]

Posted: 9/12/13 at 6:49pm

Right? I guess some people who feel the need to blame Shepherd for what happened will be excited, though, because if he had a drug dealer AND a bisexual lover, he clearly got what was coming to him.

Updated On: 9/12/13 at 06:49 PM

[Almira]

Posted: 9/12/13 at 7:44pm

The Latamie Project: 10 Years Later does a great job of illuminating and dismantling this folklore.

Thank you, Namo. I had no idea the Laramie Project had addressed the "drug" version of the story.. actually, until today, I didn't know there was a drug version of the story.

Your post lead me to do a google search where I found this five minute NPR profile of the Shepard story from 2009.

This bit really struck a chord with me:

Journalist JoAnn Wypijewski wrote an extensive article for Harper's magazine in 1999. She thinks the truth lies where the two versions overlap.

"Of course it had to do with homophobia. Of course it had to do with drugs. Of course it had to do with violence in the culture," Wypijewski says.

She says she has problems with The Laramie Project and with the 20/20 report. Both offer too narrow an explanation for why Shepard was killed, she contends.

"If you say 'It's just about hate,' or 'It's just about drugs,' you so simplify the story," Wypijewski says. "It's not either-or."

Wypijewski thinks the oversimplifications began as soon as Matthew Shepard was held up as an emblem for hate crimes.

"Emblematic stories need emblematic victims," maintains Wypijewski. "So Matthew needed to be an emblematic victim. And as soon as you have to do that, you start creating a kind of myth."


'Ten Years Later,' The Matthew Shepard Story Retold

[PalJoey]

Posted: 9/12/13 at 8:40pm

This guy is just recycling the same stuff John Stossel and Elizabeth Vargas claimed to have "uncovered" on ABC's 20/20 in 2004.

It's junk.




ABC plans to 'debunk' Matthew Shephard killing

Updated On: 9/12/13 at 08:40 PM

Posted: 9/12/13 at 9:18pm

Is it me or do more and more people suddenly have "a feeling" they know what "really" happened when in fact they have no idea whatsoever?

And it's not just Matthew Shepherd's murder: Obama's Birth, 9/11, the invention of the Quarter pounder....

Updated On: 9/12/13 at 09:18 PM

[Bettyboy72]

Posted: 9/13/13 at 2:35pm

Drug user or not-no one deserves to die that way.

People love making a fast buck inventing things. Even if you are selling lies and rumors, you still get a book deal. It's a sad shame.

[FindingNamo]

Posted: 9/13/13 at 3:10pm

Joe, in the second Laramie Project, a folklorist, (something I had not known existed) explains the cultural need for myths hat explain the unexplainable -- or in this case, gives distance to the complicit -- so that people are not implicated in a story of hate and prejudice.

[Almira]

Posted: 9/13/13 at 5:20pm

Thankfully, as far as I can tell no one is saying Shepard deserved to die because of drug use.

However if meth use was part of the murderer's history, that could explain the savagery of the killing.

Meth is ravaging our community. When AIDS hit, we had the honesty and courage to say unprotected, promiscuous sex could lead you to contracting hiv. It wasn't easy being honest with ourselves. It wasn't easy getting judged for our collective behavior. But we owned up to our out of control sexing, learned to accept ourselves that much more, and saved lives.

How meth is directly and indirectly killing our community is a life and death conversation. If meth abuse is part of the Shepard story, it needs to be discussed.


No shame.

Updated On: 9/13/13 at 05:20 PM

[best12bars]

Posted: 9/13/13 at 5:53pm

Almira, I agree with you about your opinion of the meth plague in gay culture, but I'm sad and horrified to say only a small part of our community "has the honesty and courage," as you put it, to face the AIDS epidemic responsibly.

Way too many people (way, WAY too many) wanting and often demanding to have unprotected sex now. Many of them are young and have that invincible delusion going for them, but not all. Others are already infected so they don't care. And many more think, "well, there's drugs for that now, so why worry? I probably won't die from it like they did in the olden days of the '80s."

[Almira]

Posted: 9/13/13 at 6:18pm

Sadly, that is very very true, Best12.

I suspect you and I are in the same approximate age group. When AIDS hit in the 80's I remember an intense feeling of pride that the Gay and Lesbian community was stepping up to the plate and taking care of our own. Education, visibility, free testing, counseling... we were united. From the horrors of AIDS came a stronger, more compassionate and mature community. But it didn't last long.

Today is exactly as you described. But I'd add to your list the increase influence of meth. Meth use is gasoline on the fire of already careless and self-descriptive sexual behavior. People using don't care if they get infected because their brains are sapped of the ability to care for themselves and others. Meth leads you to a very very very dark place.

If the this new light on the Shepard story can do any good, it can raise awareness of the tragedy of meth use in the gay community. Just as it once raised the awareness of the horrors of violence towards the gay community.

But for this to happen, we need the self-honesty and courage we showed during the 80s. Even if that means re-examining the stories that define our culture.

Updated On: 9/13/13 at 06:18 PM

Posted: 9/13/13 at 6:46pm

Namo thanks for that tip. I did a quick Google search and found TONS of fascinating stuff.

[uncageg]

Posted: 9/13/13 at 8:36pm

I was living in Denver at the time this happened. Sheppard, of course, had a connection with CO. He also had a lot of friends there and I knew some of them. They would have known if something like this was going on and I am sure it wasn't the case based on conversations I had with them.

[PalJoey]

Posted: 9/14/13 at 1:32am

If the this new light on the Shepard story can do any good...

It can't.

[FindingNamo]

Posted: 9/14/13 at 1:38am

I would like to reexamine the story that gay men didn't love themselves or each other enough, also known as The Larry Kramer Narrative, or going along with a concept like "owning up to our out of control sexing."