Here's a newspaper column I wrote a couple of years ago in Wyoming when the trial was going on for the murderers of Matthew Shepherd.

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Feel Some 'Man-Panic' Coming On?

Some time ago my son got a job as a bus boy in a nice restaurant. He didn't know when he applied for the job that the restaurant was a watering hole for the gay community. He just knew that he was a college student, the pay was good and the hours worked for his schedule.
Since he was a great-looking kid, it was inevitable that sooner or later a gay man would express an interest in him. Over the two years he worked there, several gay men variously flirted with him, hit on him or just looked at him appreciatively as he walked past with his trays of dirty dishes.
Not once did Austin, who is straight, react violently, angrily or even rudely, as far as I know. He simply either ignored the behavior or said politely, "No thanks, I'm straight." The only time he got testy with someone was when the person ignored his refusal and tried to insist. Then, Austin said firmly, "Look, I said I wasn't interested and that's that." And it was.
He did come away from that experience with one abiding conclusion: Most men have no idea what it must be like to be a woman and to be so constantly and openly observed.
This particular bit of family history came to mind this week as I heard repeated references to the "gay panic" defense in the Aaron McKinney murder case. The logic of this defense -- used, apparently, in several cases in addition to this one -- is that the accused becomes so enraged by being "hit on" by a gay man that he flies into a violent rage and "defends" himself by beating his victim senseless, sometimes to the point of killing him.
I can understand the viewpoint of the attorneys who are defending the perpetrator's lives: They want to pull out all the stops and use whatever they can to present the accused's motivations and emotional state in the most sympathetic possible light. Sometimes men do respond with panic and terror at the idea of another man being attracted to them. Sometimes the victims-who-become-perpetrators have been abused and violated by other men at some point in their lifetimes, as was the allegation by McKinney's attorneys, and they "snap" when they are aggressively approached later in life by another man.
I completely understand the impulse.
I just find it odd that we've never heard the converse in any defense of a woman accused of a violent crime against a man. Given the much greater frequency with which women are hassled and ogled and subjected to inappropriate touching, how come we haven't heard a lot of "man-panic" defenses in courtrooms throughout the land? Heck, given that, in this country, one woman in four has been the victim of a sexual assault, how come we don't hear reports daily of women-on-men violent episodes, with women snapping right and left in bars, restaurants and grocery stores throughout the land?
Partly because we live in a land in which the very worst thing is a man being attracted to another man. Only in such a culture could the idea of a "gay panic" defense even arise. Otherwise, men would simply learn what women know, and what secure men like my son know, which is that just because someone invites doesn't mean you've been insulted. It just means they're interested. If you aren't, you can just say, "No, thanks," and go on about your business. The insult is someone who is crude, belittling, hostile, presumptuous or physically aggressive in expressing that interest. Someone who touches you before being invited, someone who won't take "no" for an answer. These someones can come in either sex.
It's an interesting conundrum of modern life, isn't it? How to express interest without being taken the wrong way, how to start something to see where it goes without being accused of something you don't intend, how to introduce yourself to a stranger when you have no idea how that introduction is going to be received.
We have to figure out some way to do this, otherwise we'll all just sit around making mooney eyes at each other and no one will ever end up with anyone. But it's a delicate process, requiring respect, humor and at least some measure of dignity on the part of the invitor and the invitee.
(The best example I've heard was from a friend of mine who traveled to Ireland for a vacation by herself. The day she arrived and was walking down the streets of Dublin trying to find her hotel, an adorable Irishman stopped in his tracks as she walked his way, dropped to his knee, doffed his hat - tweed, of course - and said, "Lady, I would die for you." They became, um, friends. But that's another story.)
Then again, if panic and rage are appropriate responses to someone flirting with us or making a move on us, and if acting on that panic and rage is somehow excusable or makes a violent attack more comprehensible, then the door ought to swing both ways. But woe unto this world if man-panic takes its rightful place in the Hall of Useful Defenses.
The dating scene could get really ugly.

Copyright 2000/K.C. Compton

Line Breaks <br> added.
-Joe Offer-