Taken from the Campus Climate for Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgender People, 2003 The Policy Institute of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force Crimes committed in 2002 due to bias against the victim’s perceived sexual orientation represent 16.7 percent of reported hate crime incidents – the highest level in the 12 years since the agency began collecting these statistics—according to data released Oct. 27 in the FBI report "Crime in the United States in 2002." Sexual orientation bias represents the third-highest category of reported hate crimes
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More than one-third (36 percent) of LGBT undergraduate students have experienced harassment within the past year, as have 29 percent of all respondents.
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Those who experienced harassment reported that derogatory remarks were the most common form (89 percent) and that students were most often the source of harassment (79 percent).
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Twenty percent of all respondents feared for their physical safety because of their sexual orientation or gender identity, and 51 percent concealed their sexual orientation or gender identity to avoid intimidation.
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84 percent of respondents identified as LGBT. 16 percent of respondents identified as heterosexual or uncertain
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71 percent felt that transgender people were likely to suffer harassment, and 61 percent felt that gay men and lesbians were likely to be harassed.
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Forty-three percent of the respondents rated the overall campus climate as homophobic.
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Every two years the Massachusetts Department of Education conducts a version (MYRBS) of the National Youth Risk Behavior Survey, exploring the health-related attitudes and behaviors of high school students. The 2003 survey found that LGBT students, when compared with their heterosexual peers, were:
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over 5 times more likely to have attempted suicide in the past year;
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over 3 times more likely to have skipped school in the past month because they felt unsafe at or en route to school; and
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over 3 times more likely to have been threatened or injured with a weapon at school in the past year.
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