Young People Are More Likely To Be Openly LGBT, But They're Leaving Traditional Labels Behind

They are also more likely to identify outside the traditional gender binary compared to older generations, according to a new GLAAD survey shared exclusively with BuzzFeed News.

By
Sarah Karlan
by Sarah Karlan

BuzzFeed News Reporter

Young people between the ages of 18 and 34 are twice as likely to openly identify as part of the LGBT community compared to the generation before them, according to a survey conducted and released by GLAAD today.

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GLAAD's third annual Accelerating Acceptance report, which was created in partnership with Harris Poll, surveyed 2,037 US adults (ages 18 and older) in November 2016. The survey found that 20% of millennials identify as openly LGBT, while only 7% of the baby boomer generation (ages 52–71) would openly label themselves as such. Acceptance of the LGBT community was also found to be at an all-time high.

"America is the most accepting that it has ever been. Having 20% of millennials identify as LGBTQ is pretty groundbreaking," Sarah Kate Ellis, GLAAD's president and CEO, told BuzzFeed News. "What I want to see is that they continue to flourish and blossom as their true and authentic selves."

GLAAD

While the Acceelerating Acceptance survey questions shift each year, the goal remains the same — to measure how comfortable or uncomfortable the public is with the LGBT community.

"It’s important to understand how comfortable people are with certain situations – everything from how people feel about their neighbors being LGBTQ or having a transgender child on a sports team with their own kid," said Ellis. "You can’t change what you don’t measure – and so this report is critical to the work that GLAAD does."

The survey also found that 12% of millennials identify outside the gender binary, as either transgender or gender-nonconforming.

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That nearly doubles the number of transgender and gender-nonconforming people reported from Generation X (ages 35–51).

"We’ve seen at GLAAD for years that youth are more and more identifying outside the binary — so the data itself isn’t surprising," said Ellis. "But we are very pleased to see that more and more youth are feeling like they can freely express who they are."

But although more young people openly identify as LGBT, the study found that non-LGBT millennials are less likely to know someone who identifies as simply “gay” or “lesbian."

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Older people in the LGBT community are more likely to use more traditional binary terms, such as "gay/lesbian" or "man/woman." Young people have vastly expanded the vocabulary.

This could be due to the fact that labels outside those traditional categories (bisexual, asexual, queer, etc.) have become more commonly used, accepted, and understood.

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"Youth now feel more free than ever to express who they are – and oftentimes that exists outside the binary," said Ellis.

Additionally, millennials are the age group most likely to consider themselves allies to the LGBT community.

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The study found that an overwhelming 63% of young people identify as allies to the queer community. While that age group was the most likely to be accepting, the majority (53%) of Generation X and the majority (51%) of baby boomers were also likely to consider themselves allies.

Ellis attributes the increase in both acceptance and the number of people openly identifying as LGBT to both representation in the media and overall visibility.

"When someone knows a person who is LGBTQ – whether it’s in real life or onscreen, they are more likely to be accepting of them," Ellis said. "It’s important for people to see themselves reflected in the media."

You can check out the full survey results here.

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Other perspectives on this story

  • 1
    1/7
    “I wonder at what point queerness gets so common it's not queer anymore.”
  • 2
    2/7
    "I know people hate labels, but I love them (for myself MYSELF! Don't worry) If I didn't find asexual I'd probably hate myself. Genderqueer made me super comfortable with saying my gender. Queer makes me happy, I'm queer and proud. If you don't like labels then it's okay, I won't use them for you. Just don't shame me for using them."
  • 3
    3/7
    “How much more non-traditional can we get? Demi-quasi-positronic-hyper-mega-turbo-queer? I get it, you like people. We don't need to update the dictionary based on who you're attracted to. It's cool to have self respect, but there's no need to make lables. Labels only further divide us as a people.”
  • 4
    4/7
    “*banging pots and pans over my head* this generation isn't any gayer, we are just more educated on lgbtaq identities and more open to coming out!! i repeat!! more oPENLY LGBTAQ FOLK!!!!!”
  • 5
    5/7
    “"Acceptance of the LGBT community was found to be at an all time high." So of course people within the community are less scared to be open about it”
  • 6
    6/7
    “One in five identifying as part of the lgbtqia community, and more than one in ten identifying as something other than cisgender...why aren't bathrooms gender neutral yet?”
  • 7
    7/7
    “One sample of 2,037 U.S. adults does not confirm 20% of all millennials are indeed identifying as LGBTQ. I agree with the premise of the article but we should be careful about such surveys while encouraging more data and research (unlike the opposite which is occurring with this administration).”

Outside Your Bubble is a BuzzFeed News effort to bring you a diversity of thought and opinion from around the internet. If you don’t see your viewpoint represented, contact the curator at bubble@buzzfeed.com. Click here for more on Outside Your Bubble.

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