Whether it was a "peck" as the woman who shared it with her girlfriend claimed, or a full-on kiss, or what Mariners spokesperson later claims was a case of "groping," an incident at Safeco Field last week just got a lot more attention.

Summary: An usher at Safeco Field last week told Sirbrina Guerrero and her date that someone had complained that the two women were kissing. The usher told them to stop.

Guerrero complained to Safeco's guest services and later told her story to KOMO4.

"I was really just shocked," Guerrero told Associated Press. "Seattle is so gay-friendly. There was a couple like seven rows ahead making out. We were just showing affection."

KOMO4 broke the story that was picked up by the PI's Big Blog and by The Stranger's SLOG.

They've driven the story locally, but the Associated Press wire ran a story last night on the controversy, and it's one that's been picked up by dozens of media outlets in the US and Canada, including Sports Illustrated's SI.com, and the national Canadian paper, Globe and Mail.

The AP gets a quote on the incident from Josh Friedes, advocacy director of Equal Rights Washington:

"Certain individuals have not yet caught up. Those people see a gay or lesbian couple and they stare or say something," said Josh Friedes of Equal Rights Washington. "This is one of the challenges of being gay. Everyday things can become sources of trauma."

It's probably not the kind of publicity that Mariners would want, but it's about the only way anyone outside of the northwest is going to hear anything about the team.

In the AP story, Dan Savage who has helped to drive the story with his posts on SLOG is identified as "the sex-advice columnist." That's a true enough description and its what the AP's national readers are likely to know him as. But it would really have been more appropriate to identify him as "editor of a local weekly" or "editorial director" since that's the role he generally assumes in most SLOG posts.

From the AP story:

After the story broke, the Mariners were blasted by the sex-advice columnist Dan Savage, who wrote about the incident on the blog of the Stranger, an alternative weekly paper.

"I constantly see people making out," Savage said. "My son has noticed and asked, 'Do they show the ball game on women's foreheads?"'

Savage called for a "kiss-in" to protest against the Mariners.

Websites have been swamped with blog postings for and against Guerrero and her date. And the story has people talking in Seattle.

"I would be uncomfortable" seeing public displays of affection between lesbians or gay men, said Jim Ridneour, a 54-year-old taxi driver. "I don't think it's right seeing women kissing in public. If I had my family there, I'd have to explain what's going on."

"It all depends on the degree," Mark Ackerman said as he waited for a hot dog outside Safeco Field before Wednesday's game. "Even for heterosexual couples."

Since the incident, Guerrero's job and her past have come under scrutiny. She works at a bar known for scantily clad women and was a contestant on the MTV reality show "A Shot at Love With Tila Tequila," in which women and men compete for the affection of a bisexual Internet celebrity.