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I'm Judy Shepard. I am a co founder of the Matthew Shepard Foundation, named after our son Matthew, Matt, to us. Um, we're here sort of visiting embassies and consulate posts to talk about our son Matt and his, uh, murder in an anti gay hate crime in October of 1998. We're just hoping to raise awareness about marginalized communities, um, around the world. So 1998, that was over 25 years ago. [00:00:30] What has kept you going for that length of time in this work? Well, I'll answer that because I think it's, the work isn't done. We thought when all the rights were granted to the LGBTQI plus community, You know, our work would be over, right? That their equality would exist in the U. S. And maybe by some extension, the world would be the, uh, community better as well. [00:01:00] But in the U. S., we've taken a hard turn to the right, and our work is ongoing. We still had, the LGBTQ community still does not have all the, all the rights of an American citizen. that are granted to them, uh, for the straight citizens. So, our job is to try and bring the equality up towards evil across the board, like it's supposed to be for all American citizens. And I'm reminded very much of [00:01:30] even the death of Nix Benedict early this year, and just how current this stuff still is. Right, it's an ongoing problem, um, aggravated by bullying and, uh, young people losing their self esteem. So, suicides are still an issue, and we've, we just feel like we could reach equality through the laws, that maybe kids would feel, um, more accepted, um, because [00:02:00] legally they'd be recognized. I don't know that we can change people's hearts and minds, but if we could get a good start at it, that would follow. Sadly, what we're seeing is, rather than doing what's best for all the citizens in their particular, uh, community or state, they're, a lot of these people are doing whatever they can, To render fear, just so they can get voted back in again and stay [00:02:30] in elected office instead of having to go out and be part of the regular community. So they're trying to top each other on the, to me, evil laws, bills that they're introducing and the laws that are being passed around the country. Particularly against the transgender community. You're in quite a privileged position where you are seeing how different countries respond. Can you [00:03:00] talk to me about how, um, what are some of the commonalities and what are some of the differences between say, here in New Zealand and Australia and, and the U. S.? Well, I think you, I think you've surpassed us, uh, in time wise of several things. Um, I certainly think the size of the U. S. sort of contributes to our problem because we could actually be like five countries because of the, uh, ideology of the separate parts of the U. S. [00:03:30] But the, you're, you're better, y'all are better at it than we are. Um, the acceptance part of it, still facing issues, of course, but you did marriage before us. Um, I don't know, I think size plays a role there, but we've found that y'all just have outpaced us in everything. The recognition of diversity in Australia and New Zealand, um, and the way you've handled it with the laws accepting, uh, the LGBTQ [00:04:00] community, same sex marriages, everything, uh, really, you lead the world in acceptance of everybody. And letting everybody here know that they are an equal to everybody else. The one area of weakness I see is that you do not have any specific hate crime laws that need to be put on the books so that [00:04:30] people know that if they do commit a crime, and that it is. Designated a hate crime. There are enhanced penalties, severe enhanced penalties in that respect. As long as they understand and learn the definitions between hate speech and hate acts and how hate speech can also be, uh, used for [00:05:00] prosecution because it leads into violent acts. Can I just make a correction? I understand we had marriage before y'all. A couple months. So, but the rest of it, you beat us. But the problem is, your, your marriage was by law. Ours was by court decision. The difference is, that court decision, like we saw in Roe v. Wade about abortions, can be immediately taken away. But by having it as part of [00:05:30] your national law, it's going to be a lot harder to take that away from, from people. True. Well, speaking of marriage, one of the most touching things I read, um, was in 2018, you donated some of Matthew's items to the Smithsonian. And one of those items was a wedding ring. Can you, can you talk about that? It was a ring. Yes. [00:06:00] Um, we are not aware if he bought that ring specifically, uh, or in preparation of, um, he didn't have a boyfriend at the time. Um, uh, that was a, um, Matt very much liked to be in style, right? So, if he saw this ring and he thought it was attractive and would look nice on his hand, he might, that's why he might have bought it. We're just not really sure about his motivation, [00:06:30] but if he bought it because he thought in some future time that even then he would not have even considered a possibility, I think that is really cool. He talked about how you and he, he talked about that. About marriage? Well, he said he thought he would never be able to The term marriage and to be legally responsible for one another would not happen. But in the late 90s, well in the 90s when Matt was just coming out, it was still very negative. Uh, [00:07:00] environment for the gay community and, you know, the AIDS pandemic was raging then and, uh, really gay pride parades were the only thing the straight community were aware of, uh, on, in a media sense. So, um, I just, he didn't have very much optimism then that equality would be reached for the community. His goal then was just fighting to be left alone, basically, uh, fighting against the violence and to, to stop legislators from taking things away from the gay community. [00:07:30] Why was it important to donate some of Matt's items to the Smithsonian? Well, we were approached by the museum folks in D. C. They were putting together a collection of LGBT memorabilia from all kinds of, um, Folks, um, past activists from way back in the 60s and 70s, and, uh, Matt had become sort of, um, an [00:08:00] iconic name associated with the community. So they came and took some, they took all the cards and letters that we had received Um, for the paper part and then the other part was a few objects. One was a Superman cape and the ring that you mentioned in a shoe and, um, a few other things meant for the collection at large, not meant specifically, but they, they felt he should be represented in this collection. How do you navigate, [00:08:30] um, The Matt, the talking about Matt publicly and holding on to Matt privately. I mean, you've, you've been with the foundation for 25 years. How does, how does that work? Uh, it is kind of a combination because everybody talks about Matthew and we talked about Matt. That's the difference. Matt is our son. Or brother or friend, Matthew is somebody that [00:09:00] represents the LGBTQ community and the violence and lack of respect and equality. So, when we, we are able to keep Matt separate in a way by talking about Matt. Um, in a way it also helps us grieve. Because, After we lost Matt, I went back to Saudi Arabia to work. Judy [00:09:30] stayed in Wyoming to start the foundation. And our younger son went back to boarding school. So we never did get to grieve together. And I think for us it was probably beneficial that way. Because even when you're together, you really aren't grieving together. You all have your, everybody has their separate memories and reasons for grieving. Mourning the loss of that person, whether personal or professional, whatever it might be. So, by talking [00:10:00] about Matt as we do, using him as an example of what needs to be done, not just in America, but around the world when we travel to try and make it better for everybody, uh, it keeps him alive. Um, Keeps him fresh where he wouldn't be otherwise. So we always have Matt with us So we can talk about the things we were so proud of as well as the things that irritated us so much [00:10:30] Which you know, all kids do that to their parents. Yeah, so It helps because it keeps you fresh it makes it easier for us to talk about him to others To make it relate to others. There are stories we have kept just to ourselves. Um, we consciously made a selection of which ones we would share about Matt and which ones would just be ours. Um, Matt's younger brother won't do any media because he says all his memories are [00:11:00] just his. One of the really lovely things I came across online was a poem written by Matt called I Am and just reading that I get glimpses of his personality and often I think it's actually really nice to remember, well it's important to remember what happened to Matt but also Matt as a, as a person. I'm wondering, can you talk to me about [00:11:30] the poem and then possibly read it for me? And we found, uh, after Matt passed, we collected his things from his apartment. We found several, um, Matt was not a very organized person and we found many notebooks where he had made, uh, jots of thoughts and, and, I guess some people are considering it poetry, I'm, I consider it scribblings. I consider it journaling. That's the way he journaled. He, he just [00:12:00] Talked about life and him. We'd write down things as they came to him and not any kind of organized pattern. And there was a particular poem that has become, um, Quite well known, uh, in the, in the media. It was used in, um, the performance of Considering Matthew Shepard, a, a choral piece, it's one of the songs, in one of the songs. And it's also in a, uh, a craft brewery in Denver, Colorado came out with a special beer called I Am, and on the side of it, it had part [00:12:30] of his journaling also. This particular poem on the side was very cool. Yeah. So, um, I don't know if he, uh, These are his own thoughts at some point in time in his life, so. The poem begins, I am sensitive. I am honest. I am sincere. I am not a pest. I am my own person. I am warm. I am funny, nice. Hopeful, energetic, giving. Understanding, sometimes selfish, [00:13:00] sincere. Generous, irritable, gay. Cute, interesting, intelligent. Poor. Humble and outgoing. I am Matthew Shepard. I am Matthew Shepard. What was it like reading that for the first time? I had not realized that Matt was introspective. Um, Matt was such a talker. I never really thought of him as also being a [00:13:30] thinker. I didn't think he'd have time to write anything down. He was always so busy and, as Judy said, Oh, he's so outgoing with people that when did he have time to do that? It's just like, I was shocked also, yeah. We're not really sure the time frame this was written either, whether it was when he was in Denver or Casper or Laramie. Laramie, right? You bring up Laramie and one of the, um, key, um, kind of [00:14:00] creative works to, uh, reflect on, on Matt is the Laramie Project. And I saw that, um, Dennis, you, you were actually in the Laramie Project in Sydney recently. Yes. Playing, playing yourself. Yes. Can you talk about that? Um, it was quite an honor. Tectonic Theater, when we first met Moises Kaufman and his husband Jeff LaHost, they said they were in Laramie to do interviews, to see if there was something [00:14:30] there that might justify a play. And Judy asked them, is it about us? And he said, no. Is it about Matt? And they again said, no. He said, have at it. And, um It was about the issues surrounding why we lost Matt, uh, why they thought it was open season, uh, to do anything they wanted to, to the LGBTQ community, because [00:15:00] around the country, law, uh, law enforcement basically shrugged off anything that ever happened to anybody within the LGBTQ community. Um, so when. They did the play and they, they interviewed everybody. They actually included a small portion of my victim impact statement. My victim at impact statement is actually four pages long talking [00:15:30] about Matt and who he was and what a loss family and friends thought, uh, because He was now gone and what he was going to do to change the world. So to have that small piece put in there, uh, I thought was, uh, rather shocking to me that, and then I have only done that, uh, read my piece twice. I did it in 2018 [00:16:00] in Tectonic Theater, uh, itself in New York was the first time. And then I was honored again. When I was asked to do it in Sydney, um, about a week and a half ago. And again, it was, uh, quite extraordinary to do it because you bring it back, brings back memories of me being in the court, talking to the judge and jury, and reading this, and the flashbacks of, of Matt [00:16:30] himself, um. What he, his dreams and goals and him growing up with us and everything. So, yeah, I was rather honored they've asked me to do that. It's interesting when you're talking about kind of dreams and goals, because I, I was, I was thinking before this interview in terms of why does Matt's story in life still resonate now, 25 years on? And [00:17:00] I was thinking about it. It is about the hopes and the dreams. Um, why do you think Matt's story still resonates? Well, there's, there's, as Dennis often says, there's something about Matt everyone could relate to. Um, he, he was, um, he could have been anybody's son, anybody's neighbor, anybody's child's best friend. Uh, he Blonde haired, blue eyed, white kid, [00:17:30] um, in an iconic location, Wyoming, which is not well known, even in the U. S. Not many people live there, for one thing. The wild, wild west, so to speak. Yeah, the wild west, yeah. And, um, the level of violence was extreme, so the article remained, um, the press remained very interested in Matt's story from beginning to end, and then a lot of creative, um, pieces have been done about him still. So the story, the story remains and, but it's still relevant today, [00:18:00] unfortunately. Hate crimes have grown exponentially in the U. S. since 2016, and so what happened to Matt, even if it's not the exact set of circumstances, hate crimes are definitely on the rise in the States. I explain it this way, Matt was both iconic and exotic. He was iconic in that, you know, he was born in the middle of Wyoming, which is cowboy country. He hunted, he fished, he camped, [00:18:30] he was on, he was on his first horse when he was ten months old. Um, he represented the state by the governor, the governor had him on a commission for recycling, representing all the students. He loved politics. And he was involved with it from the age of seven. He was involved with the theater, both backstage and onstage, from the age of ten. Both the adult community and the university theater. [00:19:00] Um, He wasn't an athlete according to the true definition. He did individual sports because he didn't want teammates to depend on him and disappoint him. So he ran, he swam, things like that. He, uh, wasn't very big, 5 foot 2, 105 pounds. He had braces on when he died, that he got at 13. He died when he was close to [00:19:30] 22. So all of that was the iconic part, you know. The outdoorsman. And he had the indoorsman because he did so much indoors too. And then, uh, the exotic was that we lived in Saudi Arabia. And he went to school in Europe because there were no high schools for Westerners in Saudi Arabia. So he went somewhere else in the world. And all his classmates were from the U. S., Europe, Middle East, Asia. He spoke five languages and was [00:20:00] taking a sixth when he died because he wanted to work for the State Department overseas to try and bring the same what he thought were equal rights and responsibilities to other countries. Uh, compared to the country that he, he was from and loved so much. So you, that's, so everybody, regardless of age and gender or race, religion, they saw something in him that they could relate to themselves or a family member [00:20:30] or a close friend. And that story based along with everything else has come out with the plays and the, and the documentaries and Judy's book and the choral piece. Um, other books by, and music, um, Elton John, uh, Randy Driscoll. Um, all that has kept his story fresh. As Judy said, it's still relevant [00:21:00] today and his story is still relevant because it, it describes everybody. All these young people see something. Reflecting back over the last 25 years of the foundation. What are you most proud of? Well, the biggest piece certainly is, um, we're still here. Again, I don't know that I'm proud of that. We are still here. I sort of wish we had been able to close the doors because things were fixed. In 2015, that's what we're going to do. Yeah. [00:21:30] Then the election 2016 happened. In, uh, 2009, uh, President Obama signed into law the federal hate crime bill named after Matt, Matthew Shepard, James Byrd, Jr. hate crime prevention act, and probably that's the one piece that will just be there forever. Uh, and what happened to James Byrd and Matt certainly illustrated why we needed to expand hate crime laws in the U. S. Um, so I think I'm most proud of that particular [00:22:00] accomplishment that we were part of. I'm proud of that also, but I'm also proud of the fact that President Biden recognized Judy, uh, three weeks ago, giving her the, uh, Medal of Freedom, you know, the Medal of Freedom for her work all these years, Presidential Medal of Freedom.
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