Judy Shepard says campaigning for gay rights keeps slain son, Matthew, alive

udy Shepard has a frog in her throat.

She hasn't been home to Wyoming in two weeks, and the back-to-back speeches are taking their toll. Allergy season in Texas isn't helping, either.

And now, dozens of whooping and hollering teenagers are clamoring to have a word with her.

Shepard, an everymom, petite, with a perky blonde bob, wearing jeans and a crisply ironed black button-down shirt, will hear them out, just like she always does. She'll offer each some encouragement, sometimes wrapped in a clever punchline. She speaks from hard experience.

Nearly 10 years ago, her college-student son Matthew was fatally beaten in a gay-bashing murder that shocked the country. In the decade since, Shepard has been traveling the country pleading for acceptance and lobbying for gay rights and tougher hate-crimes laws.

And, from the reception she got at Houston's High School for the Performing and Visual Arts last week, she's also a surrogate mother of sorts to a generation of young gays.

After her speech at HSPVA, attended by hundreds, many of those students line up backstage to meet her. Most throw their arms around her and tell her in a gush about coming out to their parents or describe their horror at homophobia. Several just want to tell her how much her work means to them. There's a sense of urgency to share with her because she somehow will agree and, most of all, understand.

Ten years ago in October, Matthew Shepard was robbed by two men and savagely beaten with a .357-caliber Magnum, then tied to a rural fence and left to die in the cold. His nearly lifeless body was discovered 18 hours later. It was a watershed in the fight for gay rights, opening the eyes of many to anti-gay violence.

As Matthew lay in the hospital dying, Shepard was catapulted into the international spotlight.

Now 55, she's embraced the job she never wanted, as an international spokeswoman, activist and executive director of the nonprofit that bears Matthew's name, created in part with funds sent by family, friends and strangers to help defray Matthew's medical costs.

"I'm just somebody's mom who got really angry at the system and felt I had the opportunity to make a change," Shepard said.

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Houston Chronicle - United States