A 2023 LGBTQ+ youth report by the Human Rights Campaign found that 55.1% of surveyed LGBTQ+ youth screened positive for depression, and those that were transgender or gender-expansive were screened at 60%. Although 9 in 10 felt proud to be LGBTQ+, more than 4 in 10 of them felt critical of their respective identities.
The same study reported that 6 in 10 respondents reported being bullied and harassed at school because of their identity. While trends in the survey showcased improvement and hope for the future, queer youths are still statistically heavily marginalized in the real world at a detrimental level.
It is also hard for young people, especially those who are LGBTQ+, to receive mental health treatment. A 2023 national survey by The Trevor Project saw that 56% of LGBTQ+ youths seeking mental health care were unable to receive it.
Thirty-eight percent of the studies’ participants felt their home was affirming toward their identity, and 1 in 3 felt mental health depravity from anti-LGBTQ+ legislation and proposals.
With many feeling a general lack of acceptance in person, many LGBTQ+ youth have turned to social media, to find community and content that can be geared toward their personal identities. The Trevor Project’s survey found that 68% of LGBTQ+ youth felt that the online world provided affirming spaces, compared to just 38%, 54%, and 16% for home, school and community events, respectively.
A separate Trevor Project survey stated that out of the major social media platforms, TikTok and Instagram were in the lead for safety among LGBTQ+ youth, even more so for people of color. TikTok sat at 54% for people of color, and 45% for white people, and Instagram had 41% and 38%. Although these numbers do not appear high, the study said that while there were differences in where LGBTQ+ youth felt safe, 80-81% of LGBTQ+ youth who were people of color and those who were white felt that they had safety and understanding in at least one online platform.
Social media has the power to connect people of different backgrounds from all over the world on one site. People can access the ability to feel connected in ways they may never have before. Queer youth specifically have found online spaces to be more welcoming than their in-person communities.
With that power of globalizing and connecting, there also comes the risk of online harassment and hate, which can become widespread and detrimental to queer youth that use social media.
Gerardo Salgado-Martinez, a public health data professional, reflected on current trends with queer youth on social media.
“With queer youth, they have historically been at risk for poor mental health outcomes,” Salgado-Martinez said. “Technology can exacerbate these outcomes. I think that those who work in the fields of technology, psychology, politics, and activism are trying to actively minimize these risks and create spaces for folks to be able to express themselves and explore their identities in safer ways.”
Salgado-Martinez adds, “I don’t myself engage a whole lot with this data for online queer usage specifically, but I work with youth services, and online worlds can provide a lot of relief for them, especially when they are finding out who they are and entering into society for the first time on their own. It’s important that we look into these regulations to avoid the risk of poor mental health that we see already affects queer youth on such a large scale.”
A 2023 social media safety index from GLAAD found that Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, YouTube and Twitter, the five major social media sites, all failed to safeguard LGBTQ+ content and users. While four out of five of these platforms had improved from anywhere between 9-15% from the previous year, none of them rose above 63%. After right-wing billionaire Elon Musk’s acquisition of Twitter and subsequent rollbacks of provisions for queer safety, the site had been the only one to worsen, from 45% in 2022 to 33% in 2023.
“It currently feels like there’s some weird double edged sword-fighting with social media,” says Damien Rodriguez, a queer Philadelphian who regularly uses TikTok and Instagram to stay connected.
Rodriguez said, “ I think in the past four, maybe five years, I’ve used social media to help me understand myself, because I can look up coming-out stories or videos of people explaining how they knew they were gay, and then suddenly I feel much less alone in the world.”
“But at the same time, I don’t know how to even address the opposition that on social media can feel so much louder,” Rodriguez added. “You have bots and the ability to spam messages which I have seen affect queer folks on social media. There are, for sure, certain gay creators or trans creators who when you look at their post comments, it’s just all hate. People can pretty much do whatever they want in any which direction with that.”
Another fight that LGBTQ+ people find themselves in online is the possibility of their favorite social media site becoming banned in their country, effectively losing their online community, which for many may be the only way they feel seen and heard.
This past year, many U.S. lawmakers sought to put an end to TikTok, the leading site for visibility among LGBTQ+ youth, and the third most improved site for safety provisions for LGBTQ+ users from 2022. The House of Representatives voted in favor of pursuing this ban. There has been much pushback on this decision from many LGBTQ+ online creators and users.
When sites that provide security for LGBTQ+ youth may be in danger of going away overnight, a larger question comes into play with how marginalized individuals, especially youth, can be better protected and not reliant on any one finite or unstable resource.
“The possibility of TikTok getting banned at first made me conflicted, because I think I’ve gotten so tired of just seeing so much negativity spewed at queer people online, and the misinformation that can come with that is crazy,” said Emma Chen, a young queer advertiser in the Philadelphia region.
She added, “I also feel as someone who has engaged in community organizing both in-person and online that we have become too reliant in our communities on the safety of online platforms that could theoretically vanish overnight. We don’t have a lot of physical systems set up in the event that we actually need to meet face to face.”
Chen went on to remark, “I do feel that social media is a good starting-off point though, and so I came around pretty quickly on that first-hand impression of banning TikTok. I feel so much less alone when I see others like me, especially when they are queer people who have similar cultural heritage and experiences as I do. There is such a beautiful community to be a part of online, I just wish we’d be less afraid to use that to make more in-person action.”
This story is part of the Digital Equity Local Voices Fellowship lab through News is Out. The lab initiative is made possible with support from Comcast NBCUniversal.