Black Americans are split on trans and nonbinary issues, report finds

By Nicole Chavez, CNN

There is no consensus among Black adults in America about how accepting society should be of transgender people, according to a new study released Thursday by the Pew Research Center.

Pew found that 36% of Black adults think society has not gone far enough in accepting transgender people. Thirty-one percent said the level of acceptance for transgender people has been about right and 29% said it has gone too far, the study published Thursday shows.

The study indicates there is also division along political ideology and religious service attendance when it comes to views on the nation’s acceptance of transgender people.

Forty-nine percent of Black adults who are liberals said society has not gone far enough in accepting transgender people. Meanwhile, 32% of moderates and 26% of conservatives said the same, the study shows. A larger share of conservatives said society has gone too far with 44%, compared to 28% of moderates and 23% of liberals.

Split views also emerged among Black adults who attend religious services. Those who attend monthly or weekly services are more likely than those who seldom or never attend to say society has gone too far in accepting transgender people, but there was not a consensus, the study shows.

Black Americans recognize that discrimination against LGBTQ people is problematic and expressed their concerned in the survey.

Nearly half of Black adults said they were extremely or very concerned about discrimination against LGBTQ people, while 22% said they were somewhat concerned and 28% said they were a little or not at all concerned, according to the study.

In the same survey, Black adults answered whether they believe a person’s gender is determined by the sex they were assigned at birth. Most Black adults, 68% said the sex is determined at birth and 31% said a person’s gender can be different.

Compared to the general public, Pew says, Black adults are slightly more likely to say that gender is determined by sex at birth. Black conservatives and liberals are more likely to express the same belief, 70% and 75% respectively. But for Black liberals, that drops to 51%.

A modest 37% plurality of Black adults say their views on whether someone’s gender can differ from the sex they were assigned at birth are influenced a great deal or fair amount by religion, but other reasons like what they’ve learned from science, social media, news stories or knowing someone who is transgender have also impacted their views.

These findings are based on a survey conducted online May 16 to May 22 among a randomly selected sample of 10,1888 adults drawn from panels originally recruited using probability-based methods, including a sample of 799 Black adults. The survey only included people who indicated they were Black and non-Hispanic.

The-CNN-Wire
™ & © 2023 Cable News Network, Inc., a Warner Bros. Discovery Company. All rights reserved.