LGBT Americans Continue to Increase in Numbers

Even as the Republican Party and the Christofascists in the party base renew their jihad against LGBT Americans and seek to purge LGBT themed books from school and public libraries, the number of self-identified LGBT Americans is surging according to a new Gallup survey, particularly among the younger generations where nearly 1 in five say they are LGBT.  Try as they might, the Christofascista re losing this part of the culture wars and the GOP stands to further alienate younger voters. Hence the GOP effort to restrict voting rights and/or subvert democracy itself in America since otherwise over the long term the GOP is headed toward constant minority party status - a result that has been delayed due to the defects of the Electorial College and two senators per state which exaggerates the power of small, rural/backward states.  The take away from the Gallup findings is that the GOP and the Christofacists are waging a war against a growing portion of the populations.  One can only hope this ultimately isdetrimental to long term GOP prospects.  Here are highlights from the Gallup findings:

The percentage of U.S. adults who self-identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender or something other than heterosexual has increased to a new high of 7.1%, which is double the percentage from 2012, when Gallup first measured it.

Gallup asks Americans whether they personally identify as straight or heterosexual, lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender as part of the demographic information it collects on all U.S. telephone surveys.

The increase in LGBT identification in recent years largely reflects the higher prevalence of such identities among the youngest U.S. adults compared with the older generations they are replacing in the U.S. adult population.

Roughly 21% of Generation Z Americans who have reached adulthood -- those born between 1997 and 2003 -- identify as LGBT. That is nearly double the proportion of millennials who do so, while the gap widens even further when compared with older generations.

Gen Z adults made up 7% of Gallup's 2017 national sample, but in 2021 accounted for 12% as more from that generation reached age 18 over the past four years. In contrast, the proportion of those born before 1946 has fallen from 11% in 2017 to 8%.

Since Gallup began measuring LGBT identification in 2012, the percentage of traditionalists, baby boomers, and Generation X adults who identify as LGBT has held relatively steady. At the same time, there has been a modest uptick among millennials, from 5.8% in 2012 (when some members of the generation had not yet turned 18) to 7.8% in 2017 and 10.5% currently.

The percentage of Gen Z who are LGBT has nearly doubled since 2017when only the leading edge of that generation -- those born between 1997 and 1999 -- had reached adulthood. . . . . Now a much greater proportion of Gen Z, but still not all of it, has become adults. The sharp increase in LGBT identification among this generation since 2017 indicates that the younger Gen Z members (those who have turned 18 since 2017) are more likely than the older members of the generation to identify as LGBT.

Should that trend within Gen Z continue, the proportion of U.S. adults in that generation who say they are LGBT will grow even higher once all members of the generation reach adulthood.

More than half of LGBT Americans, 57%, indicate they are bisexual. . . . Bisexual is the most common LGBT status among Gen Z, millennials, and Gen X, while older Americans are about as likely to say they are gay or lesbian as to say they are bisexual.

Overall, 15% of Gen Z adults say they are bisexual, as do 6% of millennials and slightly less than 2% of Gen X.

The proportion of U.S. adults who consider themselves to be lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender has grown at a faster pace over the past year than in prior years. This is occurring as more of Gen Z is reaching adulthood. These young adults are coming of age, including coming to terms with their sexuality or gender identity, at a time when Americans increasingly accept gays, lesbians and transgender people, and LGBT individuals enjoy increasing legal protection against discrimination.

Given the large disparities in LGBT identification between younger and older generations of Americans, the proportion of all Americans who identify as LGBT can be expected to grow in the future as younger generations will constitute a larger share of the total U.S. adult population. With one in 10 millennials and one in five Gen Z members identifying as LGBT, the proportion of LGBT Americans should exceed 10% in the near future.