People Coming Out Yonger and in Larger Numbers

More bad news for the Christian Taliban: people are coming out younger and in larger numbers than in the past. The world is moving on even if the Christianists and the bitter old men in the Vatican want to stay in the 13th century. A new survey in the United Kingdom indicates that the average age of coming out has plummeted by twenty years and the younger generations are not buying the poison peddled by anti-gay religious denominations and Neanderthal politicians (think John McSenile). Obviously, there are many people who remain in the closet to please family members, out of job fears and for other reasons - I frequently hear from some of them from all corners of the globe - but the trend is so very different than when I was in my teens or twenties. The anti-modernity forces like NOM and its allies may be winning some rear guard actions, but time (and the dying off of older homophobes) is against them. Here are some highlights from the Guardian:
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The average age at which people come out as gay, lesbian or bisexual has fallen steadily over the last four decades, according to Stonewall, the gay rights group. A poll for Stonewall of 1,500 people who were already out found that among the over-60s the average age they had come out was 37. But those in their 30s had come out at an average age of 21, and in the group aged 18 to 24 it was 17.
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The survey, conducted via social networking sites, does not take account of the numbers of people who know they are gay or bisexual but have not come out. But Stonewall said it nonetheless revealed a pattern of people having the confidence to come out earlier.
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[T]he change was likely to be because young people today were given a lot more information about sexuality, and were more likely to see gay people in the public eye, in TV programmes such as Sugar Rush, and soaps such as Emmerdale and EastEnders, with whom they could identify feelings they might be having. . . . "What we're seeing is an explosion of role models and people talking about being gay, so people are more able to associate what they're feeling with something they can see."
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Changes including the introduction of civil partnerships and the end of Section 28 – which banned the "promotion" of homosexuality in schools – had also helped, she said.