London is the LGBTQ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer/questioning) capital of the UK and one of the gay epicentres of the world. In the 2021 Census, 4.3 per cent of the capital’s population aged over-16 identified as lesbian, gay, bisexual or “other sexual orientation” compared to 3.2 per cent across England and Wales. In the City of London, Hackney, Lambeth and Southwark, the proportion was more than eight per cent.
Pride in London, which will be held on 5 July this year, is an all-singing, all-dancing, all-inclusive celebration of London’s sexual diversity, which regularly draws more than a million people from across the capital and beyond. However, a trawl though recent polling suggests that Londoners’ attitudes to homosexuality are more complicated than the joyful throngs at Pride might indicate.
For example, a 2018 Ipsos poll asked interviewees how they would react if a teenage child told them they were gay or lesbian. The most common reactions, for Londoners and people living in other parts of the UK, were to be happy and proud, but Londoners were also more likely than people in other regions to say they would be surprised, sad or even disgusted.
The same poll also found that Londoners were less likely than others to intervene personally if they saw an LGBT person being verbally abused for their sexuality (but were more likely to call the police). This is worrying, not least because LGBT Londoners are more at risk of harassment than other UK residents. An open survey commissioned by the UK government in 2017 found that Londoners in same-sex relationships were more likely to avoid holding hands in public than people in other regions, and that LGBT Londoners were more likely to have experienced physical violence, harassment or threats related to their sexuality (though they were also most likely to say they were comfortable being LGBT in the UK).
Londoners are more worried (according to 2020 polling, again by Ipsos) about children learning about LGBT sex and relationships in schools, with 46 per cent supporting such content in relationship and sex education classes and 27 per cent opposing it (compared to 55 per cent supporting and 20 per cent opposing across Great Britain, and higher levels of support across England). However, this should be seen in the context of Londoners being generally more conservative about the age at which any sex education is appropriate.
London also seems surprisingly polarised. While the 2018 polling found that 22 per cent of Londoners had attended Pride (compared to 15 per cent of people across the UK), a 2022 poll found that 19 per cent of Londoners said they had never knowingly met gay or lesbian people (compared to nine per cent of Britons).
This all paints what might seem a rather gloomy picture – of London as a city of segregation, home to deeply conservative communities as well as sexually diverse and progressive ones, with limited interaction between them. But perhaps that’s part of London’s diversity: the capital contains multitudes, people with radically different moral values, both progressive and conservative.
For example, as well as being the UK’s gayest region, London is its godliest. It is more religious than other parts of the country, and some religious leaders and teachers remain hostile to same-sex relationships. It is interesting to note that London’s most religious boroughs are also those where more people declined to answer the 2021 Census questions on sexuality.
However, while it is sad to see the hostility of some London parents to the idea of their children being lesbian or gay, and sadder still to see the persistence of homophobic harassment and violence on the capital’s streets, Londoners’ views on LGBTQ rights overall are much more in line with the rest of the country’s. In 2022, only 19 per cent of Londoners said LGBT rights had “gone too far”, compared to 20 per cent of Britons (though London also had a high proportion of “don’t knows” which may suggest some reticence). The 2020 Ipsos poll asked a similar question with similar results.
A substantial majority of Londoners (like other UK citizens) sign up to equal treatment. Ipsos polling from 2019 found that four out of five Londoners said that homosexuals should be treated just like other people, in line with the UK average, and a 2023 YouGov poll found that Londoners’ support for same-sex marriage (76 per cent) and for the validity of same-sex relationships (77 per cent) was much the same as in other parts of England.
Even more positively (at least, if you are gay and/or liberal), the 2019 Ipsos polling also asked interviewees to consider whether a series of different issues or behaviours – from drug use to pornography to football hooliganism – were morally wrong. Londoners were generally liberal in their views, and only six per cent said homosexual relationships between consenting adults were wrong, less than half the proportion that said so across Great Britain.
This all presents a more nuanced picture – of a fundamentally liberal city where people can separate their personal opinions about their families and children, from their civic and political opinions about the rights granted to different groups.
We may be saddened by how some people feel personally – I certainly am – but there is little sign of them wanting to impose their views on other adults, or to roll back hard-won rights that now command a consensus of support. Not everybody in London may be waving the rainbow flag in Pride Month, but the capital is still a place where most people are happy to live and let live. That is something to celebrate too.
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