Safe Space » Stats about LGBT Youth
33% of teenagers who commit suicide
are lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender. [6]
50% of all male youth suicides are gay or bisexual. [6]
42% of teenagers who are kicked out of their homes are lesbian, gay,
bisexual or transgender. [7]
20% of high school students who drop out are lesbian, gay, bisexual
or transgender. [8]
Almost half of all LGBT youth are rejected by their parents after
coming out to them. [7]
97% of students hear anti-gay comments in school. [10]
80% of students harassed for being homosexual actually identify as
heterosexual. [4, 9]
Students accused of being gay are 5 times more likely to attempt
suicide. [9]
160,000 youth skip school out of fear of being harassed each day.
[4]
#1 reason students bring weapons to school is protection against
bullies. [5]
One school-related killing occurs in the U.S. every 7 days. [1]
66% of youth involved in school shootings have been bullied. [2]
Every recent publicized school shooting (Columbine, Santee, Moses
Lake, and West Padukah High Schools) contains reports of
perpetrators being bullied with anti-gay epithets. [3]
One in three LGBT individuals has a drug or alcohol dependence
problem. [11]
One in four gay men and one in seven lesbians will be physically
attacked at some point in their life time. [11]
LGBT individuals are seven times more likely to be attacked. [11]
16.4 %* of total single-bias hate crime victims were attacked
because of the offender's prejudice against the victim's
sexual-orientation; among these victims, 65 % were victims of an
anti-male homosexual bias motivation. [12]
*Only 23 states include sexual
orientation in their definition of hate crimes, and only 4 states
(including Missouri) include sexual orientation and gender identity.
The Federal Government does not classify hate crimes committed
against individuals because of their gender.
SOURCES
1. "School homicides highest
after breaks." 2001 CDC School Violence Report, quoted in
www.cnn.com, August 10, 2001. On the web at:
http://fyi.cnn.com/2001/fyi/teachers.ednews/08/10/school.violence.ap/index.html
2. "Persistent Problems" quoted in The Miami Herald, July 8, 2001.
3. Quoted in "Violent Reaction: What do teen killers have in
common?" Chase, Anthony. In These Times. Vol. 25, Issue 16. July 9,
2001. On the web at: http://www.inthesetimes.com/issue/25/16/chase2516.html
4. "The Intersections of Racial, Gender and Orientation Harassment
in School and Health Risk Behaviors Among Adolescents." Saewye, Phd.,
Singh, MD, et. al. University of Minnesota.
5. "Research In Brief," National Institute of Justice, October 1998.
On the web at:
http://www.ncjrs.org/pdffiles/172857.pdf
6. "The Homosexuality Factor in the Youth Suicide Problem." Pierre
J. Tremblay B.Sc., B.A., B.Ed. Presented at the Sixth Annual
Conference of the Canadian Association for Suicide Prevention,
Banff, Alberta, October 11-14, 1995, (c) Oct 1995. On the web at:
http://www.qrd.org./qrd/www/youth/tremblay/main.html
7. "Adolesecent Homosexuality: Issues for Pediatricians," G.
Remafedi, Clinical Pediatrics 24.9 (1985): 441-485.; "Gay and
Lesbian Homeless/Street Youth: Special Issues and Concerns," J. Bucy
and N. Obolensky.; G. Kruks, Journal of Adolescent Health 12.7
(1991): 515-518.; and Safe Horizon Victim's Services, "The
Streetwork Project Study," New York City, 1987-1990 (quoted in the
"Prevention of Health Problems Among Gay and Lesbian Youth", p. 28,
the Health and Human Services Report to Governor's Commission on Gay
and Lesbian Youth. Massachusetts, 1994).
8. 1999 Massachusetts High School Students and Sexual Orientation
Youth Risk Behavior Survey (conducted for the Massachusetts
Governor's Commission on Gay and Lesbian Youth, Boston,
Massachusetts). On the web at: http://www.state.ma.us/gcgly/
9. "83,000 Youth Survey: Selected findings out of eight
population-based studies." Safe Schools Coalition of Washington
State, May 1999. On the web at: http://www.safeschoolscoalition.org/83000youth.pdf
10. Lincoln-Sudbury Regional High School Survey conducted by the
Governor's Commission on Gay and Lesbian Youth, February 1993,
quoted in "Making Schools Safe for Gay and Lesbian Youth: Breaking
the Silence in Schools and Families," Education Report to the
Governor's Commission on Gay and Lesbian Youth, p.9, Boston,
Massachusetts. On the web at: http://www.state.ma.us/gcgly/
11. "Straight Talk about Homosexuality" by Diversity Works, Inc.
Statistics from Pride Institute Report, National Gay and Lesbian
Taskforce, Pennsylvania Justice Department. On the web at
www.projectyes.org
12. “Hate Crime Statistics Index 2002” by the Federal Bureau of
Investigations. On the web at http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/cius_02/html/web/offreported/02-nhatecrime12.html#t233
