Now, this hardly comes as a surprise to me, but I live here. A recent study indicates 12.9% of Seattle’s population identifies as gay, lesbian, or bi.
Among the 50 largest U.S. cities, Seattle is second only to San Francisco in the percentage of residents identifying themselves as gay, lesbian or bisexual, a new study reports.
A researcher used census and other government statistics to offer an estimate of a segment of the population in cities, metropolitan areas and congressional districts nationwide whose size has only been guessed in the past.
The study reports found that 12.9 percent of Seattle residents — roughly 57,900 people — identified themselves as gay, lesbian or bisexual.
My feeling that rather than an upswing in the number of gayfolk, more people are feeling comfortable being out for these studies.
I don’t know if Seattle will ever be the gay Mecca that SF is, but we definitely have a presence. A strange presence, to be sure- I’m never quite sure how to describe the gay community here. It is, by turns, embracing and selective. I’ve gone out some nights and made friends (and gotten phone numbers), and other nights no one talked with me at all. Strange how that works, but I suppose it’s no different elsewhere.
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Huh… At first I was like, No Way! Palm Springs (Gay Index 720) is so much gayer than Seattle (Gay Index 341) even more so than SF (Gay Index 479!)but then I reread the first sentence “Among the 50 largest U.S. cities…” of which we are proudly not (pop. 42,807.) But really, we’re SOooo gay here. It’s almost too, too much, but never quite.
How come Long Beach gets mentioned but Los Angeles and San Diego—wow, totally off the chart.
That’s a fun link, MJ. Carlsbad is awfully low: Gay Index 89. San Diego city is higher: Gay Index 186. Way lower than Palm Springs or Seattle. I thought the city of Los Angeles would be really high, but it’s only Gay Index 168. Lower than San Diego!