Matthew Shepard: Gay Bashing or Mugging Gone Wrong?

[Placebo]

ABC is preparing a major investigation of the Matthew Shepard gay-bashing murder that contends it may not have been a hate crime — but a mugging gone wrong.

Friends and family of Shepard — who became a national symbol of the senseless violence against gays — as well as gay activists are upset about the report, scheduled to air on "20/20" later this month.

Shepard, 22, was a gay college student who was brutally beaten, tied to a fence and left to die on the outskirts of Laramie, Wyo., in 1998 by two locals.

The killers, Aaron McKinney and Russell A. Henderson, pleaded guilty and are each serving consecutive, double life sentences.

But in their first interviews since they were convicted, McKinney and Henderson claim anti-gay bias had nothing to do with the crime.

In a press release promoting the show, ABC promised "surprising revelations, including Laramie's underground world of methamphetamine use that may have contributed to the crime and whether or not Shepard knew his killers."

"ABC News' press release about this show definitely raised our eyebrows, and we'll be watching," said Joan M. Garry, Executive Director, Gay & Lesbian Alliance against Defamation.

According to one person who has seen a rough of the episode, "20/20" raises the possibility that Shepard was mugged for his money, not because he was gay.

full article may be found here: http://www.nypost.com/entertainment/33855.htm

It really upset me to know that ABC is trying to rehash this story, as if it wasn't painful enough the first time.

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

1. Yes and James Byrd was just a tailgate party gone wrong

[Puglover]

59. Well of course it was...

don't most muggers crucify their victims?
:eyes:

[davidinalameda]

2. mugging?????????

what the fuck?

you don't tie mugging victims to fence to die

I guess ABC/Disney just wants every fag in this country to start marching on their doorstep. And gods know I'll be first in line

mugging?

I'm speechless--I can't believe that anyone would believe that this could be a mugging

[ProfessorGAC]

18. No, No! It's The Drugs, See? Not Gay Bashing, But Drugs!

You say, "you don't tie mugging victims to fence to die"! Correct. Unless one is a methamphetamine abuser. Then, apparently, one DOES tie a mugging victim to a fence to die.

See, it's all about the drugs. No gay hating at all! It all makes so much sense. The SCOURGE of drugs! Yeah, that's the ticket.

How conVENient!
The Professor

[Lenape85]

39. And this is why there is this nasty war against drugs

Those people that did that deserved to be punished and knew what they were doing.

[LatinManNH]

79. No, it was the Twinkies!

Not the twinks.

[mitchtv]

47. that's what you get for causing kerry to lose

you gays and abortionists. History is written by the winners

[Dogmudgeon]

3. Think it matters?

I was mugged once by a guy who was drunk and screaming that I was a "faggot" who was "looking at him". And he wanted my wallet, just for shits-n-giggles.

Yeah, lots of people who are mugged for their money are taken to a remote section of fence, tied to that fence, and beaten by three thugs until they die.

ABC had better have a damn good rationale, or the Nazi Party is going to demand equal time to prove that the Holocaust was a dry-cleaning service franchise gone wrong.

--bkl

[MarkTwain]

4. By the very specific facts and the nature of this crime...

... it was no mugging. "Muggers" do not engage in such subsequent vile, overwhelming, and disgusting violent behaviour AFTER the fact of the "mugging."

They may bash their victim on the head to render him or her incapable of opposition, BUT they do not beat their victim in such a brutal fashion NOR do they first, drive to a remote location and then second, tie that dying and bleeding victim to a fence.

They attack, they steal, and.... they run. They don't engage in the types of acts in which did these little freeper boys.

...Can anyone say "November sweeps" ?

[Not Me]

11. Exactly, I was mugged once, and they wanted nothing but cash.

I don't buy it, and I never will.
And I am saddened that the Shepard family has to be put through this all over again.

[hollywood926]

5. Oh that explains it...

The fact that they picked him up in a gay bar and told Matthew that they were gay before luring him away is just a coinky-dink!

[Lavender Brown]

6. Good lord

That's insane. No wonder it's in the Post.

[Cocoa]

7. is this a John Stossel piece?

an installment of "Give me a break!" ?

:puke:

[SheWhoMustBeObeyed]

46. There's a good question...wouldn't be surprised /eom

[Liberal Veteran]

8. Crucifixion of Jesus: Martyring of Messiah or Hazing Gone Wrong?

:eyes:

[klook]

12. Hahaha!

Dachau: Genocide or guest worker program gone wrong?

[pschoeb]

23. Didn't you hear the Romans invented methamphetamine

Now there is evidence that when Pontius Pilate asked the crowd who they wanted released, Barabbas also happened to be the Jerusalem street name for methamphetamine. So upon hearing it, the totally methamphetamine addicted populace yelled it out loud.

[DemoTex]

9. Revisionists.

Shameless.

[nostamj]

10. watch for MUCH more of this kind of thing...

if the fundies are allowed to continue their push for 'morality' you will see gay people VANISH from mainstream TV.

no Will & Grace (unless Will goes through a christian conversion program)
no Queer Eye for the Straight Guy

no positive (or sympathetic) gay portrayals at all. (Matt Shepard)

i remember reading about the Stonewall Riots as a young teenager. i came out during the disco days of "Gay Pride," watched the movement be sidetracked and tainted by AIDS (which also cost many of the leadership) and ultimately saw gay people come into the mainstream...

now, i fear a huge backlash is coming... old testament 'christians' who ignore the teachings of Christ... "GOD HATES FAGS" will be an acceptable attitude in bush's amerika.

send a DISTRESS message!

[Placebo]

17. I fear it too.

[fshrink]

13. For the majority of this country

it is the hand of god. Reframe this!

[patricia92243]

14. I thought he had his private parts cut/mutilated?

[hlthe2b]

15. I was in WY at the time... I think these guys were truly "bad apples,"

and they were not only homophobes, but racist. But, one still can not discount the anger they had at the "haves" of society, given they were clearly from the poorly educated "have nots" in a town which caters strongly to its university community. Many don't know, but the same day they attacked Shepherd, they also beat the hell out of a Hispanic man.

So, while I don't discount their anti-gay bias as being a major reason for what was clearly a hate crime to me, I do believe they were resentful and hate-filled for a variety of reasons. Bad apples but there are more like them and I think it is important to look at the entirety of issues driving their hate.

[Neshanic]

16. Next on Disney/ABC. "The John Stossell Effect"

Was Walt gay? What's with the mouse fetish?

[Dark]

19. Yes, they stole his money, then beat him to a pulp, then tied him to

a pole, and then left him to die. Sounds like a mugging to me.:crazy:

[kayell]

50. Then confessed to beating him because he was gay, and mounting a gay

fear defense because they thought that hate crimes were punished less severely than muggings gone wrong. :eyes: :grr:

I have been in a fury since hearing about this yesterday.

[Dark]

20. Also, why aren't they investigating Iraq's WMD's, or the Election?

[pschoeb]

21. Umm what about what one of the murderer's father said?

"McKinney's father told The Denver Post the accused men decided to rob Shepard because the younger McKinney had been embarrassed in front of his friends when Shepard flirted with him. The father maintains Shepard's beating was not motivated by his homosexuality. But the two women who allegedly helped McKinney and Henderson dump their bloody clothes, Kristen Leann Price, 18, and Chastity Vera Pasley, 20, reportedly told police the two men had made anti-gay remarks."

Just because they possibly knew Shepard, doesn't at all mean they were not motivated by anti-gay hate. Besides muggers like to prey on gay men because they know that if they get caught later, without evidence to the actual theft(that is they get pulled in from the person who got mugged description and id), they can claim the gay man made a sexual advance and then they beat him a little, but didn't rob him. In many places this is likely to get them off, or at least get them a good plea deal.

[Behind the Aegis]

22. Disgusting!

This is noting but a louder ring of the death knell of true journalism! WE are seeing the rise of revisionist history. What next...slavery: relocation of people to the land of opportunity! What a load of shit!

[tsuki]

49. Yes, slavery.

Bush calls it "guest worker" visas.

[Behind the Aegis]

54. the real thing

Actually, slavery was just "tourism" for underprivileged Africans. They were brought to see democracy in its infancy! Weren't they lucky? :eyes:

[sandnsea]

24. Yeah all robberies end up that way

First of all, in small western towns, they don't "mug" people. They rob them. We call it what it is. Second, people are robbed all the time in rural America, even knocked over the head and beaten up, even shot on occasion. They are never tied to fence posts and left to die. This is complete garbage and an absolute outrage that any supposedly credible news organization would go down this path.

[Placebo]

28. Don't they?

It is insane. This case is closed, there is no reason to start digging up all this pointless crap NOW.

[jackelope72]

25. Wait just a darn minute here...

Didn't at least one of the guys try to use the "gay panic" defense? Saying he became angry and scared when Matthew flirted with him? How does that jive with their new "mugging" story?

Methinks this is all just a way for ABC to distance itself from gays, so they don't get caught up in the whole mess when our current regime decides to start picking us up and putting us into their little "happy camps".

[LisaLynne]

27. Yes, unfortunately, I can't remember which one ...

but one of them did try to use the so-called "gay panic" defense. And one of their girlfriends said that they were trying to teach Matt Shepard a lesson that you can't come on to straight guys or something. This is such crap.

[JohnKleeb]

26. I heard it was a hate crime

I remember reading a year back Kerry's statement on this at the time, on par with how RFK responded to the death of MLK, it was simply touching to say the least. BTW who do those fucktards think they're kidding, calling it a mugging, it sounds like a simple and cold calucated murder to me.

[SemperEadem]

29. to my recollection, they claimed that the fact that Sheppard

'came onto them' was the reason why they killed him... it wasn't a mugging.

They are liars. I don't know of a mugger anywhere who sticks around the crime scene after getting the money... that would increase his chances of getting busted while in the act. Now, someone trying to send a message to his buddies (to prove how 'manly' he is)and the community in general would go out of his way to demonstrate that he isn't 'one of them'.

Liars.

[LeftHander]

30. Didn't they carve "fag" into his chest...

after they tied him up and beat him to death...

[blueblitzkrieg]

31. Unbelievable - ABC should be ashamed.

Mugging gone wrong my ass.

[WindRavenX]

32. what the flying fuck??

YOU DON'T TIE SOMEONE TO A FENCE JUST TO MUG THEM.
WTF is this shit??

[Placebo]

33. My thoughts exactly.

[WindRavenX]

36. I'm losing it

I just don't fucking understand this irrational hatred of our GLBT friends :cry: :cry:

[Placebo]

40. I don't understand it either.

:shrug:

[ProfessorGAC]

58. Um, WindRaven!

Not trying to be critical, but you said ". . .don't fucking understand this irrational hatred. . ." The operative word is IRRATIONAL. You CAN'T understand it. Neither can i. Neither can anyone else here at DU because we're thinking RATIONALLY! It doesn't make any sense. To try to understand it is a waste of mental energy.

Don't flog yourself for not getting it and don't waste energy trying. Folks like us CAN'T get it.
The Professor

[idiosyncratic]

34. I'm appalled. I'll never watch ABC TV again.

Of all the horrific stories over the years, this one had to be the worst.

"Muggers" don't do such heinous things to their victims. Only extreme hate causes people to engage in such unbelievable atrocities.

I'm going to cry again, just thinking about this and how hurtful it is going to be to his parents.

WHY, oh WHY would ABC feel the need to revisit this story.

BOYCOTT ABC!

[AlinPA]

35. It was a "moral" act by red state holy people teaching him a lesson.

[Zep]

53. "It was a "moral" act by red state holy people teaching him a lesson."??

Like gay-bahing never happens in New York City or San Francisco?

The perpetrators were caught and convicted in that "red state" very quickly. They are now in prison for life.

[AlinPA]

60. OK, sorry.

[Borgnine]

37. This is the beginning of something nasty, my friends.

Never have I witnessed such a backlash of all things gay in the media as I have since last Tuesday. I'm afraid this will only be the beginning. They're trying to take away Matthew Shepard's hateful and gruesome death, a clear example of what homophobic freepers ("the moral majority") are capable of.

Expect this garbage to continue.

[nikraye]

42. Feeding hate: The Rove Propaganda machine

Yes, Rove is behind this. As he was in the leak of the phony forged docs to Rather and CBS. And in getting the issue of same-sex marriage bans on 11 states' ballots, and in the the mass media saturation of anti-Gay rhetoric and election-loss blame in the days following Black Tuesday. All Rove's doing. This 20/20 piece is yet another, even more egregious, example of Rove's anti-Gay, "moral values" national campaign.

My same-sex spouse wrote to ABC's 20/20 (http://abcnews.go.com/2020/story?id=123566&page=1) asking them what kind of bribe, pray tell, did Rove promise ABC execs? I beg everyone reading this to do the same: write 20/20, voicing your outrage. Demand an explanation for airing this irresponsible, incendiary story. Demand to know why, WHY, after SIX long years, are they NOW choosing to pander to the disreputable claims of two unconscionable murderers, monsters who pretended to be gay so to lure the 105 lb, 5'2" Shepard to his chilling fate:

Before savagely beating Matthew Shepard with a pistol butt, one of his tormentors taunted him, saying, "It's Gay Awareness Week." Aaron McKinney then pistol-whipped the defenseless Matthew: His skull had been gashed in four spots. His nose was broken. The skin on his head and face was cut in 18 places. Some cuts went to the bone. The autopsy reported severe bruising in the groin, indicating Matthew had been kicked there repeatedly. The killers, McKinney and Russell Henderson, left Matthew to die a slow, agonizing death, hanging from the now infamous fence, alone in the freezing night. He was found, barely alive, 18 hours later by a cyclist. Matthew died October 12, 1998 from massive head injuries.

Germany, 1933. Witness: The slow but steady poisoning of a national mindset, the intentional feeding and careful nurturing of hate against an indefensible minority, perpetrated by one Joseph Goebbels, Propaganda Minister, with the full cooperation of Germany's national media. Message: Jews are evil.

United States of America, 2004. Witness: Karl Rove, White House Chief Political Strategist whose mission it is, as it was Goebbels', to design and orchestrate the rewriting of American history, such as the Matthew Shepard story, to fit his party's ideology. Message: Gays are evil.

Yes, this 20/20 piece has Rove's fingerprints all over it, which demonstrates that ABC is shamelessly on board with FOX in serving as the Bush administration's propaganda disseminator.

Yes, this 20/20 piece reeks of Rove's all-too-familiar smear strategy, meant to destroy the martyrous stature Matthew's memory has achieved, much as the racist Republicans did (with J.Edgar Hoover's help) to MLK in the years following his assassination. By smearing Matthew's name and denying he was a hate crime victim, Rove will give the Repubs the fodder they need to scoff at and dismiss Shepard's status as Gay America's poster child for tolerance. By reducing Matt to nothing more than a sleazy, drug-addicted member of the Laramie methamphetamine underground, Rove's 20/20 piece will give the RW and homophobes everywhere a de facto green light to openly discriminate, persecute, and assault Gays.

Rove's 20/20 piece will serve to smother and bury the positive legacy of Matthew's death: The changing of America's attitudes toward Gays. For the past six years, Dems have tried in vain to pass the Local Law Enforcement Enhancement Act (LLEEA) but the Repubs in both the House and the Senate have killed it everytime. This bill would finally add "sexual orientation" and "gender identity" to the current federal hate crimes act (passed in 1968). (Amazingly, most Americans do not know that, under federal law, Gays are not protected against hate crimes.) Matthew Shepard's parents have been highly visible in their attempt to get the LLEEA passed, and the memory of Matthew's brutal murder still remains, these six years later, the most compelling argument there is to pass this bill. This despicable 20/20 piece will serve Rove and the Capitol Hill republicans well: By smearing Shepard's name and stripping him of the status of "hate crime victim," the chance that the LLEEA will ever get passed is next to none.

I repeat: This is how it began in Germany. And so it begins in America. How many of we Gays will wait until we're slapped with forced deportation or, worse, being crowded onto cattle cars, carted away by trains to "relocation" camps where we'll come to find ourselves standing, obediently, in long lines whilst we await our turns to be burned in incinerators or lethally gassed. How many of us will die before those of us remaining shed our blinders and fully recognize the horror that is surely unfolding before us?

*********************

Republican House leadership under the majority leader, Tom DeLay, a Texas Republican, has refused to allow the hate crimes bill to come for a direct vote in the House. Rep. Jerrold Nadler, a Manhattan Democrat, said that the House representative for the conference committee, Tom Feeney, a Florida Republican, testified on September 14 before a closed session of the Armed Services Committee that he wanted LLEEA removed from the final bill because he considers it to punish thoughts rather than action, and treat similar crimes unequally.

Texas Eagle Forum is the state branch of the organization founded by Phyllis Shafly in l972 and it identifies itself as a conservative Christian, pro-family group. It supports the farthest-right wing of the Texas Board of Education and sends out a questionnaire to those running for office each election. Governor Bush answered the questionnaire, indicating he was for: phonics rather than whole language reading, the loser of a civil law suit having to pay all legal costs, term limits, and judges being allowed to display the Ten Commandments in their courtrooms. He also said he was against hate crimes legislation being "expanded to include sexual orientation."

Here is what Robert Knight, of the conservative Christian Family Research Council, said about the Wyoming hate killing of Matthew Shepard: "Every crime is a 'hate' crime." Here is what Governor Bush said about the Jasper hate killing of James Byrd: "I think all crime is hate, particularly the crime that went on there. I think the way to get rid of hate in people's hearts, the best course I know is religion."

[nostamj]

62. absolutely!

see my post #10.

just the beginning of a forced march back into the closet.

[restorefreedom]

38. right. Muggers always torture their victims first

this is scary stuff.

Bad enough the rethugs brainwashed half of Amerikka with their homophobic fear-mongering. Now they want to do revisionist history on one of the most vicious hate killings in recent times.

Shame on ABC.

[idiosyncratic]

41. ABC won't show "Private Ryan" but they do a show about this.

BOYCOTT ABC!

[Placebo]

67. The irony.

[NightOwwl]

43. My God.

What is the point of this? I hope this is all just speculation.

[PittLib]

44. From "The Laramie Project"...

from Moises Kaufman and the members of the Tectonic Theater Project

Aaron McKinney:
We drove out past Wal-Mart. He got over there, and he starts grabbing my leg and grabbing my genitals. I was like, "Look, I'm not a fuckin' faggot. If you touch me again you're gonna get it." I don't know what the hell he was trying to do but I beat him up pretty bad. Think I killed him.

Rob DeBree: (Detective sergeant for the Albany County Sheriff's Department, chief investigator in Matthew's murder)

What'd you beat him with?

McKinney: Blacked out. My fist. My pistol. The butt of the gun. Wondering what happened to me. I had a few beers and, I don't know. It's like I could see what was going on, but I don't know, it was like somebody else was doing it.

(snip)

DeBree: What did he say?

McKinney: After he asked me to stop most all he was doing was screaming.

DeBree: So Russ kinda dragged him over to the fence, I'm assuming, and tied him up?

McKinney: Something like that. I just remember Russ was laughing at first but then he got pretty scared.

DeBree: Was Matthew conscious when Russ tied him up?

McKinney: Yeah. I told him to turn around and don't look at my license plate number ' cause I was scared he would tell the police. And then I asked him what my license plate said. He read it and that's why I hit him a few more times.

DeBree: Just to be sure? (Pause) So obviously you don't like gay people?

McKinney: No, I don't.

DeBree: Would you say you hate them?

McKinney: Uh, I really don't hate them but, you know, when they start coming on to me and stuff like that I get pretty aggravated.


Nooo - not a hate crime. Read this (or see it if you get the chance) ... it'll break your heart.

edit for sloppiness.

[donheld]

45. It was Gay bashing without doubt

To say otherwise is gay bashing the memory of Matt. I'm petrified it will happen more and more after Nov 2

[sendero]

48. They're selling...

... but I'm not buying.

That said, I don't care what these monsters' motivation was, I hope they ROT in jail.

Ok, I know I'm not always a good liberal. As far as I'm concerned - there are some crimes that are just not forgivable.

[mitchtv]

51. NY post- Don Kaplan

"The murder of Matthew Shepard was and is a heinous and viscous crime," ABC News spokesman Jeffrey Schneider says."
It was "vicious" also; (slips by spell check).It's ok Don , I know what you were trying to say

[Magnulus]

52. Are you kidding?

Muggers don't tie people to fence posts exposed to the elements to die. This was a hate crime, a terrorist act to send a message to the gay community. Just because they took money out of his pocket doesn't change that.

[Clintmax]

55. We need to Blitz ABC with e-mail's

Just like we did with Sinclairs advertisers. When they killed Matthew, it was a dark day for America, and to try to change the whole reason for the crime is incorrigible!

Here's the link: [e-mail]

Let's do it, DU!

[Cheswick2.0]

64. here is my letter..., PLEASE EVERYONE WRITE TO THEM NOW!

Dear ABC,

I am amazed at the idea that you would try to paint Matthew Shepard as a drug addict who was simply victim of a mugging gone wrong. Have you read any of the interviews with his killers where they talk about why they killed him? The hated him because he was gay and in addition they claimed “gay panic” as a defense. How dare you try to rewrite this story? I am truly disgusted.
You are gay bashing and you are blaming the victim and I blame the resurgence of the worst radical right wing backlash in history. We have elected a radical right wing Messianic republican to office and now every ignorant right wing point of view is to be reexamined as being reasonable. Let me guess, this is a John Stossel segment.

Why do I suddenly feel like dancing to swing music and speaking German?

<name and address>

[demodonkey]

69. Here's Mine

Dear ABC:

I understand that you intend to do a story raising the possibility that Matthew Shepard was only the victim of a simple robbery or mugging, rather than a victim of one of the most vicious hate crimes in American history.

What is next? Will you do a story that Martin Luther King was shot because somebody thought a black man breaking into a motel?

ABC, I expect you to report the news, and possibly comment on it in an intelligent manner if you can. That is all.
DO NOT RE-WRITE HISTORY.
And do not -- EVER -- condone any story that implies it is somehow "OK" to violate any American's civil rights or civil liberties.

[xchrom]

56. that must have been the longest mugging in history.

[ianrs]

57. have tried but am too angry to post anything kick

[noonwitch]

61. I don't care what the motive was, they still beat him and left him to die

The idiots deserve to pay for their crime.

I do think this is likely bullshit, however.

[windlight]

63. BU#$$!%^

I was in Laramie when this happened, and even though I didn't know Matthew personally my friends did. Those two jerk@#$% KNEW exactly what they were doing, and why, when they took Matthew out into the cold Wyoming night...

[nikraye]

65. kick!

[nikraye]

74. kick

[Plaid Adder]

66. That's fucking nuts.

I'm sorry. They want to put this out NOW? I'm so sure they're motivated purely by journalistic integrity.

That's unbelievably pukeworthy behavior even for mainstream media.

The Plaid Adder

[noiretextatique]

68. vile revisionism

be prepared for more...

[idiosyncratic]

70. Kick!

:kick:

[nikraye]

71. Kick again

[idiosyncratic]

72. I emailed them. How many others have/will email ABC?

n/t

[nikraye]

73. Email contacts for ABC, 20/20, Affiliates, GLAAD & MSF

When sending your email protests to ABC, please copy the following as well:

ABC: [e-mail]
ABC News: [e-mail]

20/20:
Online Form: http://abcnews.go.com/2020/story?id=123566&page=1 (Warning: copy your message before hitting submit; some people have reported it can take 2 or 3 times before the page successfully submits.)
OR EMAIL: [e-mail]

Local Affiliates: click on your state in the map for a list of local affiliates and call, email, or fax them as well.
http://abc.go.com/abc/utility/localstations.html

GLAAD (Gays & Lesbians Against Anti-Defamation)--so far GLAAD has taken no action on this; perhaps if they get copied on *enough* emails, they'll get off their asses and take a stand against ABC:

Joan Garry, Exec. Director(mentioned in article): [e-mail]
and/or use the website form to report media irresponsibility: http://www.glaad.org/contact.php

The Matthew Shepard Foundation:

The Matthew Shepard Foundation
Judy Shepard, Foundation Executive Director
Tina Nations, Programs Manager, Grants Administrator
301 Thelma #512
Casper, WY 82609
307-237-6167
fax [phone]
[e-mail]

[ibegurpard]

75. Wow, that's an awful lot of effort to expend for a simple mugging.

What rot.

[laylah]

76. Matthew was well known

by many of us in Ft. Collins, CO. That ABC would EVEN try to spin this story makes me want to :puke:! I met Matthew, a diminutive young man, full of life, love, and laughter. He was bright, accepting and harmless. His MURDER was not a "mugging gone wrong". You don't tie a freaking human being to a log-pole fence on a windswept plain in the middle of freaking NOWHERE just 'cuz you want his money OR his shoes! Assholes! :mad:

Jenn

[nikraye]

77. kick

[AlienGirl]

78. This new story DOES NOT wash...

The killers may have been meth addicts; but so what? Unreasonable aggression is a known side-effect of meth. No way do I buy the story that it was a mugging gone wrong.

Tucker

[nikraye]

80. This is starting to look VERY suspicious...

Does anyone else find it odd that this ABC "press release" was run in only one mainstream newspaper, namely, Ruppert Murdoch's NY Post?
Yes, the story's been picked up by a handful of GLBT sites (advocate, 365gay, digital spy) but the only mainstream media I've seen it in is the Post.

The Post is the equivalent of FOX News, both owned by Murdoch, and both known for spinning, even distorting, facts to suit the conservative agenda.

That the Post printed this "press release" a good two weeks before the segment's airtime, gives plenty of notice and time for controversy to stir, increasing its viewership. Reminds me of the Sinclair Broadcasting "press release" announcing the controversial airing of the anti-Kerry propaganda film, "Stolen Honor." Again, I can't help but feel this 6 y.o. "news" story is plant by Rove, intended to further divide this already split nation.

There's also a very likely political motive behind this: Conservatives, fundamentalists, and BUSH himself oppose adding "sexual orienttion" to the existing Federal hate crimes law. They believe, in fact, that ALL crimes are "hate" crimes; thus "hate crime" laws are unfair as they "treat similar crimes unequally."

But I had to ask myself, "Would ABC knowingly air this anti-Gay, anti-hate crime piece?"

I did some googling. Here's what I found:

--Disney owns ABC. Disney's 2nd largest shareholder (Euro Disney) is the Saudi Royal Family, long time cronies of the Bush Crime Family. (http://www.bupipedream.com/012704/wire/w2.htm)

--Since 2000, there have been several changes to Disney's board of directors. One is Aylwin B. Lewis, who also sits on the board of Halliburton, Dickhead Cheney's corrupt war-for-profit company. (http://corporate.disney.go.com/corporate/bios/aylwin_lewis.html)

--The other Disney board director is John Bryson, a director of The Boeing Company, another war-for-profit US contractor ($100B) currently under federal criminal investigation ala Halliburton. Even more interesting, he is the Chairman of the Board and President/CEO of Edison International, the parent company of Southern California Edison, an electric utility, since 1990. Bryson wrote the deregulation legislation which gave Enron the greenlight to rob Californians of billions during the artificially created Enron-induced California energy crisis. Bryson also founded NRDC, a former front organization for Enron, funded in part by the neoconservative Pew Foundation. (http://corporate.disney.go.com/corporate/bios/john_bryson.html)

So let's sum it up:

ABC is owned by Disney who's board members are tied to Boeing, Halliburton and Enron.

We know that Rove was instrumental in getting the anti-gay measures on 11 states ballots...

We know that Rove was behind the media saturation of anti-gay rhetoric and blame in the days immediately following Nov. 2nd.

We know, too, that Rove, in Bush's 2000 campaign, hired Ralph Reed, the former executive director of the anti-Gay Christian Coalition, who was paid between $10,000 and $20,000 per month by Enron while he "volunteered" his full-time work on the Bush campaign. Rove’s alleged deal permitted Bush to solidify his political position among anti-Gay, radical-right groups of voters and simultaneously appeal to centrist voters with a moderate public image. http://www.sgn.org/2002/02/01/enron.htm

We also know, or most of us suspect, that Rove was behind the leak of the forged Killian docs that humiliated Rather and CBS, and simultaneously boosted Bush's ratings AND quashed CBS's airing of the REAL forged docs, the Niger docs, which would have exposed Bush's "WMD" justification for the Iraq War as the lie we all now know it to be.

Okay, I'm almost done here...bear with me...

Rove puts pressure on cronies sitting on the Disney board to direct ABC to tell 20/20 to run this "breaking" news story (six years "new"): Matthew Shepard wasn't a victim of a hate crime after all! Rove then gets his surrogate Ruppert Murdoch to print this two weeks before air date. Murdoch includes just enough info about the segment to cause a stir among the gays and...voila! By the time the segment airs, there will be so much controversy a-swirl that EVERYONE will watch-- wingnuts, lefties, and gays--and once again, we gays we'll be backed up against the wall, fighting like hell to defend our right for hate crime protection. Of course, we'll be alone because by now the Democrats and Leftwingers are all wanting to appear a little closer to the center due to Rove's phony polling result of "moral values."

And here comes the best part: When the repubs start to abolish all and any hate crime legislation, at the federal and state levels, the Dems won't put up even the hint of a fight for fear of looking like "gay sympathizers", which does not keep with Bush's mandate of "moral values". With the blink of an eye, states red and blue will be revoking what hate crime laws there are, and the Local Law Enforcement Enhancement Act that the Dems for years have been trying to pass through Congress will die a quick, silent death...never to be mentioned again.

To my GLBT brothers and sisters: Do not let this happen. Do not let BushCo and Rove get away with this. We've fought too hard, too long, to get hate crime laws passed in the few states they're in.

To my straight cousins--Dems, Indies, and moderate Repubs--please, please, please don't let the RW, the neocons, and BushCo steamroll you into abolishing hate crime laws or dismissing that which Matthew Shepard died for. Matthew's murder was hate-motivated, without question, because he was Gay. Please don't let anyone, through the despicable act of rewriting history, force you to believe otherwise.

Remember, this isn't just about Gays. When Bush, as governor of Texas, said, ""I think all crime is hate...I think the way to get rid of hate in people's hearts, the best course I know is religion," he wasn't talking about a GAY hate crime, but about the truck-dragging murder of James Byrd Jr., who was Black. If hate crime laws go away, it affects ALL minorities--gay, black, hispanic, asian, muslim, disabled, transgendered--all of us.

Write to ABC, Disney, 20/20, Oprah, Rosie, Ted Kennedy...ANYONE who'll listen, anyone who can help. We must STOP Bush, Rove, Disney, and ABC from running this anti-gay propaganda piece, fight it just as hard as we fought Sinclair.

Save Matthew's legacy. Don't let his death have been in vain.

[Name removed]

81. Deleted message

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[Piperay]

82. That theory is BULLSHIT! nt

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