To answer the question of how many homosexuals there are, you have to answer a prior question: What is a homosexual?
Gary Gates at the Williams Institute is doing his best to answer the first question in a new report. And while the results are a bit more clarifying than what has come before, they’re still no better than the imperfect answer to the more fundamental question.
Gates goes with the most minimal approach to the question of whom to count: people who identify as gay, lesbian or bisexual. That’s fair, but is obviously underinclusive. There are still probably millions of people in the country who are homosexual but in the closet in some measure. It’s also a bit overinclusive, since the fluidity of bisexuality can sometimes give them a hall pass out of the laws (at least) that disadvantage those whose sexual orientation is more fixed. Gates separately counts the number of transgender people, whose sexual orientation is independent of their gender or gender presentation.
Timothy Kincaid has some thoughtful criticisms of Gates’ methodology over at Box Turtle Bulletin, and Gates defends himself (but not his methodology) at the Washington Post.
The twin problems of whom to count and how to count them seem insoluble to me. As with race, the number of confounding personal and subjective factors means that the very best we can do is approximate an approximation. And with sexual orientation the subjectivity almost eclipses any objective criteria – except, of course, identification. That is the one part of sexual orientation that is most clearly visible and public, and as close to objective (though still not truly objective) as science can accept.
What this new chapter reveals has less to do with sexual orientation than with our current cultural preoccupation with the biases of social science. Gates says that it is important to have an accurate count of homosexuals “because legislatures, courts and voters across the country are debating how LGBT people should live their lives.” But how do, or would, those discussions change if Kinsey’s old guesstimate that 10% of the population is homosexual is instead 3.5% or 1.7%?
The anti-gay folks are already subdividing the numbers Gates arrived at, and are trying their best to use his scientific candor to their advantage. But their game exists in the same parallel universe that Gates inhabits. The debate in those legislatures and courts is not a demographic one, nor is it a scientific one. It is a moral debate about equality, and a legal one about the meaning of some pretty specific state and federal constitutional guarantees. Numbers are, in fact, a distraction from that discussion, a detour some politicians are all too happy to take.
Nothing in the legal notion of equality requires a statistical threshold. Journalists, in particular, are eager to entertain the social scientists because numbers always sound like they are meaningful and objective. In this case, though, they are deceptive at worst, and flawed at their very best. The only numbers we need are among voters and politicians. Let’s devote our efforts to counting what counts.
15 Comments for “Counting What Counts”
posted by Houndentenor on
Often we read in diatribes against gay rights that we don’t deserve rights because we are only X% of the population. My response is always: how many of us do their need to be in order to deserve equal protection under the law? I’ve never gotten an answer for that one.
I don’t think you’ll ever get a count that satisfies everyone, but what we can get is an accurate count of how many people at the time of the survey self-identified as gay or straight or bisexual or transgendered. Other than for marketing demographics, does it really matter?
posted by Mark James on
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posted by Jorge on
I knew the 10% statistic came from Kinsey, but I thought it was the best guess of the entire population at the time.
With “less” of us it’s a harder road politically and morally. The interests of the many outweigh the interests of the few, except only when basic rights are in question. The courts will help us, or not, no matter how many or few we are.
posted by Throbert McGee on
AFAIK, the “10%” figure does not come directly from Kinsey — regardless of whether you take the figure to mean “10% are homosexual” or “10% are non-specifically queer“.
Going from memory, what Kinsey actually claimed was that something like 2% of males were exclusively homosexual, but if you counted every man who’d ever had an orgasm with another male even ONCE after the age of 15 (in other words, if you included the very, very “occasionally bisexual”), then the figure was something more like “30% of adult males are not totally hetero.”
Well, the low figure (2% or whatever) was disappointingly small from a political standpoint. On the other hand, the high figure of 30% seemed like a huge boon politically, but it was perhaps TOO high — most people wouldn’t find it plausible even if it were correct. Moreover, that 30% (or whatever the exact number was) included a lot of men who averaged about one homosexual encounter per decade — and presumably these guys who had “gay sex” once every 10 years were not going to stick out their necks in political defense of the 2% who were exclusively homosexual.
Thus, there was a felt need to “split the difference” and settle on a figure that encompassed more than just the exclusively homosexual, but that didn’t included the “very slightly bisexual.” And “10%” was settled on because Ten is a nice round number, and 10 out of a 100 is a percentage that’s not too big and not too small. (And if anyone objected that “10% sounds too high,” activists could retort that “Kinsey actually claimed a significantly higher percentage, so we’re erring on the conservative side.”)
Again, I’m pulling the exact percentages out of my wazoo, but the above is approximately how the 10% figure came to be.
And “10% are not strictly hetero” isn’t necessarily an unreasonable claim, although in the retelling it got turned into “10% are homosexual.”
posted by Jorge on
In other words I thought it came directly from Kinsey
posted by Throbert McGee on
By the way, I could’ve Googled for the exact figures that Kinsey claimed, but I didn’t see any point, since I’m well aware that Kinsey’s methodology has been criticized (e.g., he may have relied too much on samples from male prisoners), and thus his exact numbers might not be very meaningful anyway.
The general point stands, however, that the 10% figure is not to be found directly in Kinsey’s published studies, but rather “splits the difference” between the Kinsey estimates for exclusive homosexuals and “occasional bisexuals”.
posted by george on
When you factor in guys like me, who ran from being gay for at least 25 years, only to finally capitulate to reality, I wouldn’t be too surprised to find that a full 10 per cent is gay. I simply didn’t believe in my own reality – despite my attraction to men and a craving for sexual activity that I attempted to sate only a couple of times in the early “stage,” I convinced myself that I was straight. Years and years of fantasies later, I deemed it appropriate to step out and found that I’m perfectly happy that I did.
Remember, some of the best lies you’ll ever hear have been created by statistics, and the percentage of homosexuality in society is certainly one of those, oft-repeated. Those who damn us will rely on the 1.5%, while those of us with eyes and hearts that understand will recognize that there is a larger percentage.
posted by BobN on
“To answer the question of how many homosexuals there are, you have to answer a prior question: What is a homosexual?
Gary Gates at the Williams Institute is doing his best to answer the first question in a new report. “
First of all, that wasn’t his question. Secondly, his study certainly isn’t an answer to that question.
posted by Tom on
The interests of the many outweigh the interests of the few, except only when basic rights are in question. The courts will help us, or not, no matter how many or few we are.
The question is what legitimate interest of “the many” is served by restricting rights of gays and lesbians? What legitimate interest of “the many” is served by criminalizing oral and anal sex? What legitimate interest of “the many” is served by job discrimination? What legitimate interest of “the many” is served by DADT? What legitimate interest of “the many” is served by keeping gays and lesbians from being foster parents or adoptive parents? What legitimate interest of “the many” is served by denying gays and lesbians hospital visitation, the ability to make medical care and end-of-life decisions for their partners, and inherit from them? What interest of “the many” is served by denying marriage equality?
Social conservatives have been fighting a losing battle to try to articulate sensible answers to those questions, answers that pass the smell test. And that is why the house of cards has been falling down for social conservatives and will eventually collapse.
posted by Jorge on
The question is what legitimate interest of “the many” is served by restricting rights of gays and lesbians? What legitimate interest of “the many” is served by criminalizing oral and anal sex?…
That’s been answered ad nauseum by the likes of Maggie Gallagher and all the rest, and there’s no rule that says their answers have to meet with anyone’s satisfaction–except the majority of the people and five of the nine justices on the Supreme Court. So once we’re past the five justices, what legitimate interest is there in protecting and recognizing the rights of gays if gays barely even exist? The population question is important because the more of us there are, the more of a stake we “legitimately” have in this country’s rules and culture.
posted by Tom on
That’s been answered ad nauseum by the likes of Maggie Gallagher and all the rest …
Yup. The more Maggie & Company talk, the more people come over to our side.
posted by Tom on
So once we’re past the five justices, what legitimate interest is there in protecting and recognizing the rights of gays if gays barely even exist? The population question is important because the more of us there are, the more of a stake we “legitimately” have in this country’s rules and culture.
I thought about this overnight, Jorge, and it seems to me that your basic premise — that a group of citizens must reach a critical mass before it is a sufficient stakeholder in this country to enjoy the benefits and share the burdens of citizenship on an equal basis with all citizens — is exactly backwards.
The social contract that is at the heart of our system of republican democracy is that all citizens should enjoy the benefits and share the burdens of citizenship equally unless there is a legitimate reason for our society to treat a particular group (“class”, if you will) of citizens differently from the rest of the citizenry.
It is for that reason that the question I posed (“What legitimate interest of “the many” is served by restricting …”) is pertinent and the question you posed (“What legitimate interest is there in protecting and recognizing …”) is not.
I understand that in our political system, as in any political system, clout makes a difference — that the majority assumes that it should enjoy the benefits of citizenry without questioning or thinking much about what that means, and also assumes that it dispenses both the benefits and burdens of citizenry upon the minority, again without questioning or thinking much about what that means, either. But I would suggest to you that the assumption, however human in might be, is flawed and runs contrary to our social contract.
Another, somewhat related, observation: Numbers — and the studies that suggest that the number of gays and lesbians is somewhere in the 4% range are remarkably consistent worldwide, regardless of culture, so we are stuck with that demographic — are increased by leverage.
Gays and lesbians have gained what we’ve gained, not by increasing our numbers, but instead by increasing our leverage. By coming out and becoming visible in our families, work places and communities over the years, we’ve given lie to the social conservative arguments for treating us differently than other citizens (for example, who, any more, believes that gays and lesbians should be rooted out from teaching because they will “turn” kids gay or lesbian, except for the hard-core irrational), and little by slowly moved the trend lines in our favor.
The trend will increase over time, because as the irrationality of the so-called “religiously neutral” arguments for treating gays and lesbians differently than other citizens becomes more and more evident, the anti-gay social conservatives are getting more and more shrill and less and less rational. Maggie & Company are becoming our best spokesmen, in an odd twist.
posted by Jorge on
I thought about this overnight, Jorge, and it seems to me that your basic premise — that a group of citizens must reach a critical mass before it is a sufficient stakeholder in this country to enjoy the benefits and share the burdens of citizenship on an equal basis with all citizens — is exactly backwards.
On this we have a basic disagreement. It seems to me that each individual has the same power and voice in the voting booth or community regardless of the situation, and that no one person has any right for his view or perspective to carry the day at all. On a basic level it is not possible to please every single person at once. So it is better to please as many people as possible or let the collective wisdom of the community speak. We have a Bill of Rights and similar provisions that guarentee that no matter what, some things will not be denied. One those rights are assured, for what cause, then, should we place minority desires above the desires of the majority?
posted by Houndentenor on
The interests of the many outweigh the interests of the few.
I didn’t realize that The Wrath of Khan was now part of the Constitution!
posted by Jorge on
Did you miss eminent domain?