Study Shows More Than 1 Million Americans Identify as Nonbinary

There’s more than a million adults in the U.S. who say fuck gender roles and identify as nonbinary people. The first-ever study of its kind, published Tuesday by the Williams Institute at the UCLA School of Law, confirmed there are more people than previously thought who live outside of the gender binary in the U.S. Until now, there’s been hardly any research on nonbinary people.

The Williams Institute examined two large-scale studies, and their findings revealed that the current estimate of nonbinary people living across the U.S is more than one million. The Williams Institute is a highly reputable resource for LGBTQ demographic data, publishing the first-ever, population-based estimate of the number of nonbinary people in the country.

“That number says, ‘This is part of who you’re talking about when executive orders are signed to protect people against discrimination,’” study co-author Bianca Wilson says in a statement.

The rough estimate comes out to about 1.2 million, and out of those nonbinary people in the nation, 58 percent are white, 16 percent multiracial, 15 percent Latinx, and 9 percent are Black. Seventy-six percent of these nonbinary adults are between the ages of 18-29. The study’s findings directly correlated with previous studies stating the younger generations are more comfortable rejecting heteronormativity and gender roles, with more openly identifying as LGBTQ. The study noted that not all nonbinary people identify as transgender. 

The Williams Institute jumped right in and dove deep, analyzing the nonbinary community and finding 89 percent of respondents reported living in urban areas, 68 percent of respondents reported not having enough financial income to make ends meet, 55 percent of respondents reported they’ve been physically or sexually assaulted during adulthood along with percentages reporting emotional abuse as well, and, unfortunately 11 percent of nonbinary adults have undergone anti-LGBTQ conversion therapy. Ninety-four percent of respondents reported experiencing suicidal ideations. 

Taking the bad with the good, on the brighter side of things, 53 percent of respondents reported being “pretty happy,” and 42 percent of respondents described themselves as being satisfied with their life. 

Although authors of the study acknowledge that their data, collected from 2016 to 2018, “reflects a particular historical moment,” it’s worth noting that identifying as nonbinary isn’t just a “trend.” 

Being nonbinary isn’t a new trend; beings outside the binary have been gracing this Earth for centuries. This nonbinary study may be the first, but there’s surely more to come.