Particularly now, nearly 50 years after the Stonewall riots ushered in the modern era of LGBT rights, and almost three years since the Supreme Court’s decision in Obergefell v. Within the community, too, many find the practice of public cruising irredeemably dangerous if not altogether distasteful - isn’t life as a gay man difficult enough, we ask, without courting the indignity of arrest, public humiliation, and the scarlet letter of sex offender designation? Though the park has, for decades, had a reputation as a cruising area for men looking for sex with men, a casual risk/benefit analysis fails to pass muster with even the gay community’s most ardent and sympathetic allies. A recent spate of arrests at Fort Worth’s Gateway Park for public lewdness and indecent exposure has left some residents of Panther City scratching their heads.
