double-standard honor?

Last week, a friend of mine sent out this article to a small group of people. A woman in Lucknow, India severed a man's head when he tried to rape her while she was cutting plants. My friend later told me she thought carefully about who to send it to given what type of responses she may get in return from some of her friends. Despite the censorship, she was still taken aback by some of the comments. The general responses found the article laughable - the thought of a woman beheading a man and then carrying his head through town is a ludicrous image, I'm sure. But why laugh at a woman trying to defend her honor? Although we may not condone it, we at least take seriously honor killings that occur by men. Women burned with their husbands, women killed after being raped - they're disgusting but they're not comical. Is it because we are accustomed to men doing the killing in the name of honor? Perhaps this is a generalization, but most women think about and understand (consciously or not) that they represent the honor of the family, community and culture. And while they are vulnerable to their honor being tainted, it is the men whose place it is to traditionally defend it. Is there something humorous, then, about these roles becoming convoluted and a woman deciding how she will defend her honor and dignity - as horrific as it is? One of my friend's characterized the incident as "a real honor killing". Horrific, yes. Humorous, hardly.