Laramie Project Research

I found a New York Times article from 2010 that bears a painful resemblance to the incident in Laramie.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/09/nyregion/09bias.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

A young man was lured into a trap and tortured simply because he was gay.
This being accompanied by a site i found that talks about a study published that shows that since 2009 that hate crime murder against members of the LGBT community has increased on a yearly basis.

http://www.towleroad.com/2012/05/hate-crimes-against-lgbtq-people-highest-in-14-years.html

However, media as a whole has been more accepting of the LGBT community as shown by a study that shows that the 2012-2013 season on television has the highest rating of regular, not recurring, LGBT characters.

http://www.glaad.org/releases/glaad-study-records-highest-percentage-ever-lgbt-series-regulars-broadcast-television-cable