The UCLA School of Law Williams Institute, which describes itself as “the leading research center on sexual orientation and gender identity law and public policy,” claimed in a report that Kentucky was the state with the highest percentage of gay adults — at 10.5 percent.
The media seized upon this unexpected finding. Into, an LGBTQ+ publication, wrote the following: “Time to plan your next vacation to the hottest new gay destination: Kentucky? Yes, you read that right. According to a new study from UCLA, Kentucky is officially America’s gayest state in terms of LGBT population.” The article continues, “That means every 1 in 10 people walking down the streets of Louisville and Lexington is queer, a fact you’d never guess from the state’s reputation or its conservative voting habits.” Newsweek published an article titled “Kentucky Is the Gayest State in America,” and another titled “Republican States Are Gayer Than You Think.”
Perhaps unsurprisingly, the report was spectacularly wrong. The Williams Institute apologized that the Bluegrass State is just, well, moderately gay. A public statement begins, “We made a mistake, and we apologize to Kentucky and to you.” The institute retracted the claim and issued a correction for the “data error,” stating that the actual percentage of LGBT-identifying adults in Kentucky is 4.9 percent, below the national average of 5.6 percent. Apparently, the initial estimate was based on (erroneous) data from the CDC that had been corrected in July 2023 — but the Williams Institute had missed that correction. (In simpler terms, the Williams Institute says its mistake isn’t that big of a deal, since it was someone else’s mistake first.)
“Did we question when Kentucky came up as the top state? Yes, of course,” reads the apology. “But we know the number of people who identify as LGBT is growing in all regions of the country. So, our research team questioned the data, as we always do, but ultimately, we trusted it.”
I do think most people would detect such an unreliable claim without an entire research team; the supposed scholars seem to suffer from statistical illiteracy, not merely sloppiness. The state with the next highest percentage of gay adults was Oregon, trailing far behind at 7.8 percent. The outlier was apparent, and Kentucky was a rather strange state to be that outlier. Could any sane person — let alone data analysts — believe that Kentucky’s percent of gay adults was more than double that of California?
It is perhaps funny to imagine the 4.9 percent of gay Kentuckians chanting, “Stop the steal!” Don’t worry, Kentucky, you’ll get ’em next time.
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