And much of THAT is because you can't tell at a glance whether someone is gay; you can't have a "Straights Only" lunch counter because there's no way to verify who's there illegally (in fact, this and the Fourth Amendment is part of what screws (so to speak) anti-sodomy laws). However, if a man can be so savagely beaten that his assailants think him dead, then left tied to a fence post until he ACTUALLY dies from exposure, JUST for being gay, I'd say the plight is much the same; it's just harder for bigots to identify their victims. In some ways it's worse, because the inability to tell sexual orientation on sight means ANYONE can be subjected to that treatment just for "acting gay".