Percent of Populations thats Gay or Bi

Okay, well in Canada our regular census says only 1% of Canadians who filled out the census card declared themselves homosexual:

Now is this accurate at all? Because I keep hearing that old 10% number.

I don't think censuses take into account people in the closet, people not filling out the census, people lieing on their census, etc.

So what is it really?

What % (in general) of the American/Canadian population is gay? What percent is bi? What is the percent of gay and bi people combined?

1% just seems off base.

 

1% is way too low. In 'general' its that old 1 in 10 number but in reality more than half of the population is in one way or another 'bi'.

A quote from Ron White in his show 'They call me Tater Salad':
"We're all gay, man. It's just to what extent are you gay."
He says, "That's bullshit man, I ain't gay at all!"
I said, "Yes you are and I'll prove it."
He says, "Fine, prove it."
I said to him, "All right. Do you like porn?"
He says, "Yeah, I love porn, you know that."
I said, "Do you only watch two women doing it?"
He said, "Naw, I'll watch a man and a woman make love."
I said, "Oh, do you want the guy to have a tiny, half-flaccid penis?"
He said, "Naw, man, I like big, hard, throbbing co-- I did not know that about myself."
"Do you like chocolate?"

 

It's not exactly determined, not even ascertained within an order of magnitude. It also seems that lesbianism and male homosexuality occur at different rates. I'll focus on the latter for a moment.

http://www.adherents.com/adh_dem.html

According to this link, gay men are 0.70% of the total US population, which would mean 1.4% of the male population (2,000,000 total). Now, this figure for total US population includes not only adults but children. Therefore, it is necessary to reduce this figure even further.

http://www.censusscope.org/us/chart_age.html

From here, about 15% of the US population is under 18, so using the the original figures I'll do:

#gay men / ((Totalpop(0.5)(0.85)(0.01)) = %

2,000,000/((284,800,000)(0.5)(0.85)(0.01)) = 1.65%

Now, this is only those who, on the 2000 census, identified themselves as gay. As social progress is being made, this out number may well have increased. Let's say it has. Let's say that number is 2%. From here, to determine the actual figure, all we need is the percentage of people who never come to grips with their homosexuality. Obviously, this is an impossible figure to ascertain, so we'll just need to guess. I don't find it implausible that about half of gay guys either: didn't identify as such on the census, suspect it but don't ever identify as such, deny it, or haven't even discovered it. So that would make our figure as high as 4 or 5 percent.

Of course, on the first link I provided this question is actually answered in the exit polls:

(as my physics teacher would say after solving a difficult problem for the class and checking the answer, "Mayn! Are we good!")

j/k

But seriously, this is less reliable a figure, because considering the small percentages, it's quite possible that it's been the subject of jokes (people saying "yes" when they really aren't.) But this is also in conjunction with those people aforementioned who are gay but will never identify as such. Saying that both exist but at uncertain rates leaves our end range somewhere like 4-6%.

And this last figure also includes lesbians, who seem to be present at a lower rate, so it may well be a little closer to 6%.

(and if you want to include bisexuals, who were not included in either of these figures (except perhaps in the last one, where they might have been prompted to answer in the affirmative anyway), the number is a bit higher.)

 

I live in Canada and I'd guess around 20-30%? shrug who does these surveys anyways?

 

lol. I guess Canada is 5 times as gay as the US.

 

K, so I think these stats are not "accurate", because of:

a) People in the closet/denial
b) People not disclosing that information
c) People lieing and saying their straight
d) People not doing the census
etc.

So what would you margin to estimate what it really is? Is 10% correct?

 

No; that's a bit much, I think. The 10% figure has its origins in the work of Kinsey, which was inherently flawed. There's no evidence at all in its favor.


My estimation is 4-6%.

 

I go along with the 4-6 % .. 1 is way low and 10 is kinda high IMHO

 

Of the male population:

2% - 1 in 50 sounds low

10% - 1 in 10 sounds high

So somewhere in between.

Exclusive and mostly exclusive gay that is.


As to the number of guys that go there at least once in their adult lives, find it hard to believe most of them don't

 

.. "IF" the criteria is exclusively gay .. not a one time thing when one was 14, then a low number ie 4-5%... higher if one has 'ever' done anything with a member of the same sex ie (25-30% or higher)