Those who weren’t right there when a lesbian couple’s show of affection got them kicked out of Safeco Field last month will have to rely on second- and third-hand accounts for their understanding of what really happened.

There is no shortage of second- and third-hand accounts. They dominate Seattle’s talk radio scene and blogfare. But in the sideshow that has evolved from that May 26 Mariners game, that’s all most of us have. The truth may be impossible to discern.

Sirbrina Guerrero says that unlike the heterosexual couple who were “making out” a few rows in front of them, she and her date merely exchanged a few innocent kisses.

The Seattle Mariners organization, however, described the behavior as “groping” and said the usher acted appropriately in enforcing the team’s family-oriented code of fan conduct. Guerrero and her partner got the heave-ho in the third inning; even Lou Piniella usually lasted longer than that.

The Mariners insist that sexual orientation had nothing to do with it. Overly demonstrative behavior, even after having been admonished to “tone it down,” was the issue, they say. That and a profane tirade allegedly leveled at the usher by the couple.

In an era when gay and lesbian citizens are making long-overdue gains in their quest for fair treatment, there will be inevitable skirmishes between old public attitudes and new. There also will be a temptation among those who have strong feelings surrounding the issue to race to the ramparts in each instance.

But members of a reasonable society should be willing to double-check information before rushing to unfounded conclusions based on emotions and ideologies rather than facts. Equal rights are balanced by equal responsibilities, and if members of traditionally disadvantaged classes misbehave, victimization doesn’t get them off the hook.

Which takes us back to Safeco Field, where Mariners officials insist they don’t discriminate. How often are heterosexual couples removed from a game for kissing, or even groping? Who knows? That’s just one more element of an elusive truth.

But by the Mariners’ own account, the usher confronted Guerrero and her date on the complaint of another patron who didn’t want to hear kids asking why two women were kissing each other. If that means enforcement of the behavior rules at Safeco Field is triggered by other fans’ complaints – rather than the ushers’ independent observations – then the policy is just a reflection of prevailing public attitudes.

Attitudes that may not match up with the baseball team’s stated commitment to “strict nondiscrimination.”

This incident has put the Mariners in the spotlight. But as society comes to grips with a needed acknowledgement of equal rights, more such incidents will happen. The administrators of movie theaters, shopping malls, public transit, municipal parks and other public and quasi-public facilities have to be ready with principled responses.