Acceptance and Tolerance in the Laramie Project, Essay Example

In the Laramie project, Moises Kaufman depicts various themes in the story. The play comes after the violent and brutal murder of an openly declared gay, Mathew Sheppard that greatly affected the entire Laramie town. Upon embarking on interviews to seek peoples’ opinion regarding the issue, Moises Kaufman comes up with a number of views, which in turn largely expresses the theme of acceptance and tolerance in the town.

The play brings into consideration two opposing social forces; these are the hatred towards ones sexual orientation and hatred towards the brutal murder. Looking at the situation presented in the play, the theme of acceptance and tolerance is largely depicted. This essay therefore takes into account the manner in which the themes of acceptance and prejudice have been expressed in the face of the brutal murder. The essay will put into consideration the various interviews, courtroom transcripts and journals that reported the incident.

Introduction

In the normal social setting, certain characters and habits are prohibited. The most common ones include choosing the gay or lesbian lifestyle. Most of these are often condemned and the people practicing such considered lacking social morals. The other normal groups often consider the relationship between these types of people sour. Such lifestyles are often condemned and these people are always on constant run; their lives are often in danger since most members of the society never welcomes them. In other instances, such persons are killed or hurt and publicly condemned. This was the case in the Laramie project. The young gay, Mathew Sheppard was open about his sexual orientation and the entire town knew he was gay. This openness in sexual orientation could probably have triggered a series of reactions from the public. People feel differently about such people, others feel they should be left to choose their own lifestyle; others feel such lifestyles are against their social and spiritual beliefs and others feel that practicing such is the modern trend. However, a large population is greatly against such lifestyles, which they consider inappropriate, and against the general social norms.

The murder of Mathew was expected to trigger a series of mixed reactions from the members of the town; with a section supporting and the other condemning. The normal trend would be that those supporting gay rights would be protest such while the other group against the gay would support killing. Ironically, this never came to be, the entire town responded with disappointment over the manner in which he was murdered.

From this irony comes the theme of acceptance. Acceptance into any social setting demands that a person should fulfill all the social obligations, most of which relate to the general rules of nature. Going against such would attract prejudice and disownment. Mathew’s death was probably sparked by the people’s hatred for gays hence making him to be brutally murdered. This is a sign of rejection by the members of the society. However, after the people learnt of the manner in which he died, the story changed and everyone was filled with compassion and mercy. During the interview, many people condemned the murder claiming it was unrealistic and much uncalled for.

Sarcastically even the spiritual leaders admitted that the act was not acceptable, and everyone asked the same question, “why is there such hatred in the world?” Killing a person because of his sexual orientation is not a solution. Such bitter reactions depict the theme of acceptance. After having been rejected by the society for a long time, finally people come together and condemn the act that ended one of the people whose acts lifestyles were largely condemned. Acceptance also comes in where most members of the town agree that despite him being a person that went contrary to the social norms in that town, he did not deserve the type of death he died.

The theme of acceptance therefore comes in where people close their eyes shortly to the social norms and push for the enactment of various legislative laws. For instance, the death of Mathews elicited a spirited discussion regarding hate crimes legislation in the US. The unity into pushing for implementation of the hate crimes legislation acts shows that the people felt the agony of losing one of their social members into such a brutal murder. Such togetherness towards fighting for a common good depicts the theme of acceptance in the society.

In regards to the theme of tolerance, there are a number of instances and ways through which it has been presented. In real life situation, tolerance means the willingness or the ability to put up with something especially behaviors or opinions that you may not necessarily agree or believe in. in the Laramie project, the town members find themselves on the side of the gay man. Despite the act of becoming a gay being considered a socially ill behaviors, and gay people not earning everyone’s acceptance, the people choose to lay such differences aside and fight for a common right. This shows tolerance, the people come together, both the gays and the straight people choose to work and advocate for social rights.  This is largely unexpected since such actions in most cases would trigger wars or hatred towards the people of the opposite behaviors.

The occurrence of tolerance is more of an irony in the play; while it is expected that the killing of the gay man would trigger hatred between the two groups of people, unity if brought into the picture with each group embracing the other irrespective of their contradictory beliefs in culture. What comes out of the story is that the Laramie citizens were as shocked as anyone else about the manner in which such, a terrifying tragedy would happen between them. Inflicting undeserving punishment on the young Mathew by the two young men who wanted to prove their point did not work as it were planned; instead, it left the community mesmerized at what other people are capable of doing.

Kaufman was therefore very keen on the manner in which he integrated the themes of acceptance and tolerance. These are the overriding theme in the story and they come in with a great irony that was least expected. Thus, in the statement made by Kaufman that certain events bring people together alongside their beliefs and cultures into focus is true. The murder of Mathew Shepherd brought two different opposing forces together and placing them into the centre of focus. Kaufman also asserts that the events preceding the occurrences of instances such as mentioned above may not only bring an impact on individual’s life but also on the community at large. These impacts are the birth of acceptance and tolerance that came into being after the murder of Mathew.