Thursday, October 21, 2010

Survey: More than half of transgender bullying victims have attempted suicide :: EDGE Boston

Survey: More than half of transgender bullying victims have attempted suicide :: EDGE Boston:

"A new survey indicates more than half of transgender and gender non-conforming people who were bullied, harassed or assaulted in school have attempted suicide.

The National Gay and Lesbian Task Force and National Center for Transgender Equality conducted the National Transgender Discrimination Survey. And the results are particularly alarming, in light of the spate of recent LGBT teenage suicides.

'From our experience working with transgender people, we had prepared ourselves for high rates of suicide attempts, but we didn’t expect anything like this,' said NCTE executive director Mara Keisling. 'Our study participants reported attempting suicide at a rate more than 25 times the national average.'

Forty-one percent of respondents reported they had attempted suicide, compared with an estimated 1.6 percent of Americans."