Gay BYU Students

[Integrating Editor]

I don't personally know any gay BYU students.

This is almost certainly not true. Unless Luciana's BYU ward is a statistical anomaly, there are gay BYU students in it. If she doesn't interact with just about anyone in her ward or classes, I guess it might actually be true. But what she's most likely really saying is that no one felt comfortable enough to come out to her. Which is a pretty sad statement on BYU culture, that people don't feel they can tell the people in their lives.

[Zedability]

That's a huge reason I came out as bi. It's way too easy for people to think that nobody they know is LGBT. Especially in a married ward.

[TheBlackSheep]

That was my first reaction too, IE. Yes, she does know gay people, and bi people and trans people and intersex people and questioning people and all types of different people. And it is sad that in BYU culture everyone is so afraid that people who are out are exceedingly rare. I myself was not publicly out when I was a BYU student. I'd talk about mental health and suicide, and later faith crises, but never the fact that I am bisexual.

I once wrote an answer that said that my gay friends (and I, though I didn't say so) thought that 10-15% of BYU's population was some flavor of LGBT. Oh the blowback I got on that answer. Things are starting to open up (thank goodness) but there's more proof all the time that BYU culture has an incredibly long way to go on this issue.

[Zedability]

Yeah the number of closeted LGBT people I know...a lot of the people who know them probably don't think they know anyone either. But I can't blame them for not wanting to deal with it. My family's reaction was relatively mild but it was still one of the more stressful things that have happened this year.

[Marduk]

I see no reason to believe that percentage of BYU students who are not heterosexual is any higher or lower than the rest of the country/other college campuses.

[TheBlackSheep]

Well, when I wrote the answer I was talking about, most of the gay people I spoke to posited that there might be more gay people than average at BYU, the reason being that LGBT people who want to stay Mormon cling tighter than average to the church in hopes that they will be able to be healed/find a way/make it work. Many of them said they came to BYU specifically to surround themselves with the church so as to strengthen themselves/be cured of the gay. I could see that being the case.

[Zedability]

I could also see a lot of LGBT students being in denial about it -- not out even to themselves. Or maybe I'm just projecting.

[yayfulness]

Not exactly what the question was about, but the other week I was with a friend celebrating his birthday over dinner, and a few minutes into the conversation I realized that out of seven or eight people at the table, I was the only one who was straight. It was kind of fun seeing the usual situation turned on its head like that.

Knowing how many gay, trans, and bi people I've met on my mission and at BYU, and knowing that in almost every case, I didn't find out until years after I first met them, I can back that up - no matter who you are or what sort of friends you have, I guarantee you have at least one gay or otherwise Not Straight friend.