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Article milestones
DateProcessResult
May 8, 2008Peer reviewReviewed
On this day...Facts from this article were featured on Wikipedia's Main Page in the "On this day..." column on April 5, 2004, October 6, 2004, October 6, 2009, October 6, 2010, October 6, 2013, October 6, 2018, and October 6, 2023.


Requested move 12 October 2018

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The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: Not moved: no consensus to do so, and proposer verges on withdrawall of the proposition. (non-admin closure) Kevin McE (talk) 20:31, 20 October 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Matthew Shepard → Murder of Matthew Shepard – WP:VICTIM: Shepard was not a notable person, he was the victim of a crime. The crime is what is notable, and the information about Shepard is background. HandsomeFella (talk) 07:26, 12 October 2018 (UTC)[reply]

For reference, such a proposal occurred here ten years ago, as included in this archive and its subsequent section. —ADavidB 09:35, 12 October 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment: Nor would his parents likely have attained notability under such a situation. Would the same logic suggest we prefix their article titles with "Murder victim parent"? —ADavidB 06:23, 14 October 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose: While WP:VICTIM, which is being cited as support for renaming, included a section on article titles when it was a proposed guideline, it no longer does. If Shepard's notability is truly questioned per the current guideline, the article content should be considered for a merge with another article (or made a sub-article to it due to size), instead of being given simply a "murder of" naming prefix. —ADavidB 07:57, 14 October 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support - Matthew Shepard was not notable before being killed, his notability is solely as a murder victim. And I would also support a move for Emmett Till on the same grounds. --Khajidha (talk) 18:48, 14 October 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose. It's often true that for people who are notable only for having been murdered, an event article about the murder is more appropriate than a biographical article about the person. However, there can be exceptions in certain circumstances — and Matthew Shepard, a person whose murder turned him into an international icon of human rights, who 20 years after his death is still more household-name hyperfamous than virtually any other not-already-notable-in-life murder victim in the entire history of human death, is legitimately one of those special circumstances. There's been a lot written in those intervening 20 years about his life before his murder, far, far more than most other murder victims have ever seen. And this has been proposed before, but failed for exactly this reason — it's not solely a question of whether he became notable by doing something or by having something done to him, in and of itself, but a question of where the reliable sources do or don't enable us to place the balance of content. And the sources do enable us to write a lot more about Matthew Shepard as a person than we can about most other murder victims, and his name is much more instantly and sustainably recognizable to the general public than the names of most other murder victims are.
    Matthew Shepard is a special case who can't simply be treated the same way as most others, because for one reason or another his notability as an article topic transcended the circumstances of how it was initially established in the first place — very few other murder victims can honestly claim to have become enduringly megafamous symbols of human rights in the way that Shepard has. Out of all the gaybashing deaths that happened before Matthew Shepard's, for whatever reason his was the one that made the world stop and really look at the fact that people were getting killed for being gay — his was the gaybashing death that changed history in a much deeper way than any other gaybashing death ever had before. That's why he's special: he transcended the circumstances of his death to become the ultimate symbol of the fact that nobody else should ever die this way again. Bearcat (talk) 17:26, 18 October 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose. per Bearcat and also the fact that the Britannica [1], lists him under biography, so we're not establishing precedent here, it's just common sense. GuzzyG (talk) 03:00, 19 October 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose. per Bearcat. MS's notability was triggered by his murder, and if this discussion was taking in the immediate aftermath of the murder then "Murder of MS" would be the appropriate title. But 2 decades, his life has been written about at least as much as his death. We can write a reliably-sourced encyclopedic article about his life, and we already have one. So no need to narrow the scope. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 04:45, 19 October 2018 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

His murder had nothing to do with the fact that he was gay

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He was killed during a robbery because he was a drug dealer 2600:8805:C08:7100:91F9:6E98:A1B8:C1CE (talk) 10:51, 11 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]

This view is already included in the article's "Subsequent reporting" section. —ADavidB 11:46, 11 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Not really. Most of the article implies otherwise. And that is only mentioned described as an allegation by one person. North8000 (talk) 12:38, 11 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
The "emperor had no clothes " statement is that there is no basis for the the widely accepted and broadly asserted Confirmation bias meme that it was because he was gay. The big story here is how widely it was accepted as fact (per Confirmation bias) despite having no basis. North8000 (talk) 00:55, 12 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
These people create martyrs out of victims, they’re silly and low intelligence. 75.169.129.47 (talk) 23:58, 13 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Curious: Who are "these people?" 2601:19E:4180:6D50:65F5:930C:B0B2:CD63 (talk) 23:59, 13 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Folks: Talk pages are a place to discuss changes to articles, not a platform for personal views on a topic.

The theory that this incident was about a drug deal is mentioned in the article and covered in the book promoting that theory. There's significant criticism of that book's theory.

I question the neutrality of an experienced Wikipedia editor would say "there is no basis for the the widely accepted and broadly asserted Confirmation bias meme that it was because he was gay." That assertion is easily refuted by a cursory read of the article. For example, the killer's defense asserted that he killed Shepard because he was gay while under a state of temporary insanity. Furthermore, the various reliable sources cited in the article present that his sexuality was related to his murder.

I sense that people have strong feelings about this and related topics, but I recommend stepping back and keeping WP:ADVOCACY and WP:NOTABOUTYOU in mind. Davidwbaker (talk) 16:27, 15 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]

My statement was about the widely accepted meme that the murder was because he was gay. Not that it was unrelated. For example, that is how they lured him. "Related" is not "because". Your added "because" was not in the article. The only place where because was mentioned was a statement by the girlfriend which was later recanted. Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 19:14, 15 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Just one example from the article: "McKinney's lawyer attempted to put forward a gay panic defense, arguing that McKinney was driven to temporary insanity by alleged sexual advances by Shepard."
That is a pretty clear causal relationship between the killing and the victim's sexual orientation. Your argument that there's no basis for this causal relationship is easily refuted. Davidwbaker (talk) 20:14, 15 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I said what I have to say and stand by it. Not going to go in circles or repeat. Wish you the best. North8000 (talk) 21:46, 15 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]

"He was killed because he was gay" is unsourced and not in the article. But that narrative was promoted and was and is still widely believed. It looks like more sources are starting to point all of that out. North8000 (talk) 21:20, 27 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Source to consider integrating in

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[2]https://www.thefp.com/p/the-story-of-matthew-shepards-murder-92b Pengortm (talk) 20:24, 27 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Looks like a reliable source. I'd think it should be reasonable to go ahead and add it as a reference. Michael-Zero (talk) 16:17, 25 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Requested move 22 December 2024

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Matthew Shepard → Murder of Matthew Shepard – Per WP:DEATHS and WP:ONEEVENT. This is going to be controversial but still it should be done. He has no notability besides his murder. He became famous because he died and before that he was a complete unknown. People might say he has been notable in other things but that is only a consequence of being murdered. People should leave their emotional bias behind and look at the facts. Another option is to split an article called "Murder of Matthew Shepard” about the death itself while the notability and legacy will remain in the main article. Theparties (talk) 08:59, 22 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose. I think Bearcat said it best under #Requested move 12 October 2018 above, but particularly: [T]his has been proposed before, but failed for exactly this reason — it's not solely a question of whether he became notable by doing something or by having something done to him, in and of itself, but a question of where the reliable sources do or don't enable us to place the balance of content. And the sources do enable us to write a lot more about Matthew Shepard as a person than we can about most other murder victims, and his name is much more instantly and sustainably recognizable to the general public than the names of most other murder victims are.--Trystan (talk) 16:38, 22 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose. There are numerous cultural depictions of the person, so many that a separate article was created. Many of these depictions are about the person, not the murder. This subject is not only known in connection with a criminal event, but for many other things that his life inspired. For that, I don't believe WP:VICTIM applies. Given these depictions and other elements of his legacy, I believe that Matthew Shepard is more widely known that the murder itself, and thus per WP:ONEEVENT, the article should be named after the person. Davidwbaker (talk) 21:12, 22 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Comment As it was deemed helpful and appropriate in the previous move request, I've alerted WP:LGBT. Davidwbaker (talk) 21:20, 24 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Support. There are cases where people with a far more compelling case to a biography-structured article were moved to event based ones. Every single article, every single book that has ever been published about Shephard is about or as a result of him being killed. While I believe there are other reasons for an event article to be focused on a person (for example, IMO if a person was notable prior to being murdered, the article should always be biographically focused, or if it's exceptionally complicated, or if there's some other misc reason) none apply here. Every single thing his life inspired was a result of him being murdered. The reason we can write more about him as a person is because of the motive for the murder and his personal life were very intertwined - and this doesn't actually seem like an exceptional amount of biographical information for a murder victim. I have seen ones with far more that were event based. PARAKANYAA (talk) 20:35, 23 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Support. The notable portion of the article is the murder. Makes sense for the article to be about the murder. Michael-Zero (talk) 19:45, 24 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Cautious support provided the article isn't eviscerated because of the move. It should be slanted to be about the tragic and unpleasant murder, but the biographical details are important, as is the aftermath. I've always felt it strange that this was about Matthew the person, not the death, but it was also such a major event that this was probably inevitable. I think sufficient time has elapsed to allow this change. 🇺🇦 FiddleTimtrent FaddleTalk to me 🇺🇦 23:35, 24 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Question. This article has a sub-article, Cultural depictions of Matthew Shepard. If this article is moved as proposed, what would happen to that article? Would it be similarly rescoped to Cultural depictions of the murder of Matthew Shepard? It wouldn’t make sense to have an article covering cultural descriptions of someone not notable enough to have a stand-alone biography.--Trystan (talk) 18:36, 25 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
That article already seems to be about depictions of his murder. PARAKANYAA (talk) 22:51, 25 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Many of the depictions focus on the murder, some focus on both his life and the murder, and some focus on his life, so wouldn’t fit if the scope of the article were narrowed to his murder.--Trystan (talk) 00:38, 26 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
If it was moved his life would be a subtopic, so I see no reason it could not be included. Victims and killers are obviously highly interrelated to the crime itself. PARAKANYAA (talk) 00:48, 26 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose per Davidwbaker. KmartEmployeeTor (talk) 11:34, 28 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Weakly oppose, but support eventual split. I think there is enough information about both Shepard and his murder to support two separate articles under WP:N and WP:NOPAGE. This has been done for a few other homicide victims who became posthumously notable—George Floyd (murder of) and Trayvon Martin (killing of) come to mind—and I think it would be a wise step here if anyone wants to ever bring this article to GA or FA. A clearer delineation between Shepard and his killing would both present information better to readers and avoid reducing the man to the circumstances of his death, when there's a lot to say about both his life and legacy. But that can't really be done till someone takes the time to do the expansion. So for now this should stay one article, and I think it's kind of arbitrary whether it's a bio with a lot of event focus or an event with a lot of bio focus, but with that in mind, let's stick to the status quo. -- Tamzin[cetacean needed] (they|xe|🤷) 19:10, 29 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
That seems like a good plan for the article, as there is a lot more content available in reliable sources on both topics than is currently in the article. Breonna Taylor (Killing of) is another article example where that approach works well.--Trystan (talk) 15:45, 30 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support - once you remove the murder and aftermath (BLP1E) what would be left would likely fail a AfD for GNG reasons (regardless of reliable sources). On the other hand, say he was notable, but simply not discovered by Wikipedia yet (eg an article created), and the murder is what brought more attention to him. For example, say that he made some sort of important discovery in college or otherwise notable who would have a BLP article, prior to his murder, then I would oppose this proposal. However, this article is largely about (ie WEIGHT) about the murder and response, with generally biographical/historical information about the individual, all of which is not notable in itself. This is further supported by the fact that none of the sources predate the murder. About the only other reason per 1E that would make sense is if this was considered a “major event”, instead of a minor one, and herein lies the problem, those who are personally involved in these types of events or issues (hate crimes, victims, LGBT, etc) feel like this was certainly major, and those who are disconnected from it do not feel this way. While there was coverage by 20/20 and some laws were enacted as a response, I would argue that it doesn’t automatically make it a major event. In other words, every person who was the subject of a 20/20 article and/or cause for legislation, does not automatically make it meet GNG for an article (effectively reverse-WAX) TiggerJay (talk) 16:45, 30 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
    @Tiggerjay: If your reasoning here is based on the assumption that Shepard's death is only a major event in the eyes of queer people, that's simply incorrect, and kind of astonishingly so, like saying that the beating of Rodney King or lynching of Emmett Till wasn't a major event. Shepard's murder is probably the most infamous and politically influential hate crime since the 1960s in the U.S. That's not just influence in the queer community; it's influence everywhere. It was part of my high school's American history curriculum. I appreciate that this is a good-faith misunderstanding, but it really frustrates me when someone comes to a discussion about a topic they apparently don't know anything about, and then uses the fact they know nothing about it as evidence that it is not notable/significant/important. It's okay to not know things (that's what Wikipedia is for after all!), but it's not fair to other editors or our readers to ask for decisions to be made on the basis of you not knowing about something. -- Tamzin[cetacean needed] (they|xe|🤷) 17:56, 30 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
    I actually astonished that you chose to respond that way. I might understand that behavior if you were responding to someone who did not cite policy and guidelines, didn’t reference the articles, or threw out transphobic no sense or was a newer contributor to the community.
    Now you can disagree with what I said, but it is very uncivil to lob such accusations and to further state that someone who has contributed to many RMs is just coming into this blindly.
    It is interesting that you seems to focus on last item on a list to presume that was encompassing my entire position on the matter: hate crimes, victims, LGBT, etc. Now perhaps you equate me saying “hate crime” with him being gay but let me assure you that to a large number of people, hate is not isolated to sexual orientation. May I proffer that you are reading that backwards. My point was since Matthew was likely targeted, regardless of the reason, is going to appear a bigger deal to those who follow such things because of their own experiences and biases. (Eg people who have been targeted by ANY form of hate crime.) As someone who has personally been criminally targeted (multiple times) and has been legally found to be a victim of a certain type of discrimination, I most certainly see other people who are victimized in similar realms as a bigger deal than most people would. As would other people in my position. As I presume you do… because it is natural. While we strive to be NPOV we cannot deny that we have a POV that impacts our perceptions. It’s a lot like when we look at PIA issues are to those involved people who live in that part of the world are hugely significant to them, but to the large percentage of the world they aren’t even a blip on the radar. I’m not saying that a murder is a small event, but rather the large scale significance of an issue is often inflated by that community (whatever the type of community… race, gender, geographical, political, etc). For example take Polly Klass which was a murder your probably not familiar with but absolutely shook that San Francisco Bay Area that led to the three strikes law in multiple states. It was a massive deal to a bunch of people but realistically, while infamous to many, not actually significant to most. That is not to devalue the person, or undermine the heinousness of the crime, but rather to apply proper weight to naming. And I shouldn’t have to point out that in both my example and yours, WP:WAX rarely is compelling for RMs. TiggerJay (talk) 19:37, 30 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
    @Tiggerjay: Indeed you are an experienced contributor, which is why I was giving you the chance to say, "Oh, wow, I clearly misjudged the importance of this event, my bad" but I guess if you want to double down on this argument that, by knowing less about this, you are in a better position to assess its importance, I mean... You do you, I guess? If I'd been looking for a fight, I could have talked more about your weird insinuation that everyone who thinks it's notable is biased because they're queer and/or have been victims of crimes, which I honestly don't know what to say to other than "wtf", but good to double down on that too I guess.
    We all have our own competences and lacks thereof, and that's true of all of us, newbies or old-timers, 1 edit or 100,000. I commented on this not to attack you as a person, but to make clear to the closer that you were not arguing from a place of competence in the subject, but rather your own misunderstanding of the significance of a watershed event in both LGBTQ history and the history of hate crime laws. I think your response actually reframes your argument in a significantly less charitable light than I had—one that borders on dismissing others' views based on queerness and/or assumed life experiences—so, I think I've said all I need to. -- Tamzin[cetacean needed] (they|xe|🤷) 20:18, 30 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
    Notablity is derived from his life receiving signficant coverage in reliable sources independent of the subject, not by him having achieved some specific accomplishment that we deem important. Per WP:1E, However, if media coverage of both the event and the individual's role grow larger, separate articles may become justified. There is a quarter century of sustained coverage of both Shepard as an individual and the murder, so if that guidance doesn't apply here, it doesn't apply anywhere.
    As for whether the murder is a major event, I think it clearly is. Decades later, it continues to receive significant attention and discussion in scholarly sources. We have several articles related to Shepard and his murder, and sources available to signficantly expand the ones we have.--Trystan (talk) 22:53, 30 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Subsequent Reporting

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Michael-Zero pointed out on my talk page that several of the sources in the Book of Matt subsection are in fact responses to the 20/20 piece, and pre-date the Book of Matt by several years. While Jimenez was the producer of the 20/20 segment, the sources do not mention Jimenez, and so can't be used as citations for a sentence about reactions to his views, or framed as a response to a book that came out years later. I have moved the earlier sources into the 20/20 subsection, and added detail for what they say.

In reviewing these sources, I think the Subsequent reporting section should also cover JoAnn Wypijewski’s 1999 Harper’s piece, as the secondary sources (especially O'Donnell) treat that as a major piece of subsequent journalism, in addition to the 20/20 report and the book.--Trystan (talk) 19:57, 26 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

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