When I was 15 years old, a gay man named Matthew Shepard was brutally tortured and murdered. That was 25 years ago, today, October 6, 1998.

This was not called a hate crime at the time, and it was another 10 years before gender, sexual orientation, and disability were included in federal hate crime legislation.

I'd like to say that the world has changed. In some ways, it has. (Hi! I'm gay! — and I'm an engineering manager at a major global corporation, which I couldn't have imagine would be possible in my lifetime.)

But in many ways, the world hasn't changed. The same intensity and depth of stigma is still there in many parts of the world. We've created little channels of tolerance here and there, but bias and the stigma that powers is are still swirling around us, like an airborne virus barely held back by positive pressure.

Keep it up, and don't let your guard down. I can't.
#MatthewShepard #Stigma