A Gallup poll which aimed to assess the countries of the world and their attitude towards LGB people has ranked Ireland as number six and I have to admit I’m pretty impressed with that! 75 percent of people agree that Ireland is welcoming and friendly towards Gays and Lesbians. This survey collected answers from over 100,000 people from 123 different countries.
Here’s the top six…
First place – the Netherlands
Second place – Iceland
Third place – Canada
Fourth place – Spain
Fifth place – United Kingdom
Sixth place – Ireland
The biggest surprise for me was that the United States was voted into the 12th spot with 70 percent of those surveyed declaring the States to be gay friendly. Are you surprised by your country’s ranking? Do you think this accurately reflects the world as it is today? I’ve been thinking a lot about Ireland’s attitude recently and I have been giving this little country credit where it’s due because we are making progress here and our residents are opening their arms wider in welcome to increasing numbers of lgb people coming. We still have a long way to go before we reach complete acceptance but I’m grateful for how far we have already come.
alesbianspeaks 
Comments on: "Ireland Loves It’s Gays! Does Your Country?" (39)
I’m actually surprised Spain doesn’t make it to the top three! In Catalonia we’re known for being very gay-friendly, but probably the rest of Spain isn’t like that so much.
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I googled Catalonia – it looks so beautiful! I’m glad your area is so accepting. I wouldn’t take the survey as fact, I think it’s just an estimate based on the personal views of a small amount of people is all.
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Awesome!!! Interesting read
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Thank you 😀
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Wow I know we Dutchies welcome and enjoy our gays.
Once a year Pink Monday and our Gay parade, celebrating being gay. And mingle with everyone else having a big party.
Just on times it is maybe a bit over the top.
What surprises me more is the steep decline in percentages after lets say spot 15.
The numbers that does worry the most is thee negative numbers. They are usually also the dangerous ones.
Thumbs up on the post.
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I hadn’t heard of Pink Monday before so thank you for stopping by and telling me about gay life where you are.
I feel ill at the thoughts of how some people are treated in countries that aren’t accepting of gays and lesbians. It’s horrific that people can be so horrible just because of your sexuality.
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Pink Monday is the first Monday of a big Funfare in the city of Tilburg. Last one was on 21 Juli 2014. Next edition will be the 25th anniversary.
Great fun for everyone.
You are welcome.
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Ha! Australia didn’t even make the list. Far out what does that say?
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oops I put my reading glasses on and found us…yay we’re behind you 🙂
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It’s great that our countries ranked so highly! Yay for us! What’s it really like for you as a lesbian in Australia?
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It’s ok but I find at work their is lesbo-phobia (as opposed to homophobia). This I think is to do with being so close with people you rarely get to choose on a daily basis. People are ok with gay men and their fag hag supporters surround them but if you don’t conform to their idea of femininity and you sit somewhere on the butch side if the spectrum you tend to cop BS.
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Oh it’s so disappointing to hear that butches have to deal with such nonsense. It can feel so isolating when people treat you differently 😦
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I’m glad the UK has ranked so high. Yet again, it depends from city to city. I live out in the sticks where it is generally not accepted, but then I visit my friends in Brighton where it is almost unusual to be straight. Thanks for posting this. I hadn’t seen it before and have found it really interesting.
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I’ve heard that Brighton is sort of an unofficial gay capital of the UK? My wife went to Pride there a few years back and loved it!
In the town I live in which is a fairly small town it’s actually becoming widely accepted to be gay. We’re lucky that most people don’t seem to care about sexuality and treat everyone the same way.
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Doesn´t surprise me that where I´m from takes the last place. It´s just sad.
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That must be so horrible for you. I’m so sorry to hear that you must tolerate such ignorance and discrimination around you. Just remember that others are out there to support you even if we are in other countries.
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It is quite terrible to say the least, there’s 0 tolerance here for anything like that, every time I want to hold my girlfriend’s hand I’m scared for my life, so we (the homosexual part of this society) basically just have to sit at home and never come out or never show anything in public.
But thank you so much, I appreciate any support no matter where from. 🙂
x
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That sounds so difficult. It really is so upsetting to think of anyone having to live that way.
No problem, support is always here for you 🙂
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Hi! Got to say I’m surprised by Thailand’s low ranking! I spent two years there and it’s a massively gay country. There are so many ‘ladyboys’ aka gay boys and ‘toms’ aka butches and ‘dees’ aka femmes. They are literally everywhere! And so widely accepted. So I’m really surprised by the fact that they didn’t see it as a country that was good to be gay in. I was gay in Thailand for two years, and gotta say, it was an amazing two years 😉
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Hi fakingasia! 🙂 Thank you for sharing your experience with me. Yeah I actually watched a programme about ladyboys and no one seems to bat an eyelid when they see one and I’ve been told by another fellow blogger that toms are considered as perfectly normal so the whole thing was very surprising for me too. I’m not taking this survey to be factual anyway, I just found it interesting.
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39% Czech Republic assholes. Yep.
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It must be difficult living in a country like that?
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Surprised that South Africa ranks 49% – 51% – Probably depends on whom the poll surveyed and the demographics – Gauteng is far more gay friendly than for example the Eastern Cape.
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Is it gay friendly where you are? It must be so hard to know that the majority of people aren’t accepting of LGBT people in your country.
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Nope. Not surprised. We’re still a country arguing evolution vs. creationism. We still don’t discuss GLBT sexual habits in sex ed!!
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Really? Considering how many programmes I’ve seen that are made in the US that have LGBT characters or how many out celebrities America has I just presumed America was a country that had made great progress. Although I think I’m also right in saying that most States don’t have marriage equality yet?
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19 and our capital district recognize on the state level, and the feds recognize on the federal level (like for tax and benefits purposes) gay marriages performed in states where it is legal. The coasts are where we are most liberal and progressive, and where you hear all the good news. The middle and southeast (er, “the south” as we call it), parts of our country are still traditionalist, and because of how politics are rigged in our country, tend to dominate the federal and national levels of government. These “traditionalists”, usually backed by neo-conservative and fundamentalist (neo-Calvinist) religious groups, also fight very dirty, using tactics like saying each state and the populist demand should decide who can and can’t marry (if that were really true, we would still be having laws against miscegenation going on), because while section 3 of DOMA was knocked down, section two sich still says each state can determine for themselves who can and can’t marry, has yet to still be challenged.
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All of that sounds so complicated and unnecessarily messy. I can’t understand why a modern country such as the US can’t have marriage equality in every state. I also didn’t realise how much rigging occurs there. It’s so hard on your LGBT community to be constantly fighting for what you deserve. Thank you for taking the time to explain all of that to me. Sorry I took so long to reply to you, I’ve been busy because it’s pride weekend here so Happy Pride! 🙂
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Our country is too big, in my opinion! Yes, and it is overly bureaucratic, and then when something is unpopular people try to claim it’s a “state issue”, that each should determine the legality. (It’s being used by opponents of gay rights and marijuana; I can kind of see why for marijuana, but not on marriage. It even complicates business practices, especially for multi-state types, and many of these types claim to be “capitalist”!)
While Allentown, Pa (one a large and proud steel-producing town, and where I thought the baby Jesus was born when I was a kid) tends to hold their Pride in the Park in August, our nation usually tends to have Pride events during June, GLBT Pride Month, because that is when the Stonewall Riots, the largest of a series of riots happening in the late 60s and early 70s fought back against cops who would infiltrate gay bars and arrest people when “sodomy” was illegal, especially in NYC when it was illegal to cater to someone known to be gay or trans, happened. That’s why we have it in June.
The people who led the charge against the unfair treatment of the cops? Drag queens and trans women, two groups who sadly are increasingly at each others’ throats as the trans community is coming into its own. These younger kids don’t know our history, and are breaking up our family, rather than trying to remain united.
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I’ve heard many stories from the US about companies making themselves popular or unpopular by being openly pro gay rights. It seems to be a statement that carries a lot of weight and comes with a lot of implications.
I’m quite familiar with the Stonewall Riots. I actually find them very inspirational! When I think of how brave these people were to take a stand on behalf of everyone in our community I can’t help but feel so damn proud of them!
I don’t know much about the trans community here unfortunately but I can tell you that they appear to be very close allies of ours still luckily. We need each other to stick together and be strong together. Is the gay community accepting of you?
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Really depends on the group of friends. My old friends, no, but the younger generations very much are.
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Ugh I really wish you could find acceptance everywhere. We are all fighting the same fight for equality yet some of us aren’t even accepting our own.
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Exactly. We help gender variant GLB people, and there are trans (like me) who are GLB too (I’m gay because I am attracted to men, and I identify as a man). We need to help each other, because I know plenty of propel who still can’t tell the difference between a butch and trans man, or a drag queen and a trans women.
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Yeah I think we have the potential to be an amazing support system for each other. There’s so many misconceptions and poor stereotypes out there but I think we are each other’s greatest allies because we’ve both struggled and fought in similar ways and we are both more open to trying to understand each other. I feel like lesbians and gays are more capable of understanding a trans person than heterosexuals are but maybe I’m wrong.
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I have also met people who wonder why trans got thrown together with the GLB, because you it’s about who you are attracted to, but with us it’s about our sense of self, and our biggest detractors say the modern trans concept just came about to help really effeminate men and butch women transition just so the couple could look more heterosexist, and that it detracts, rather than helps, push forward the concept of gender variance.
I don’t think so. Cultures the world over have noted trans people (even the Qu’ran recognizes us, and some Islamic states like Iran has no problem covering trans-related operations). On the island of Sulawesi, in Indonesia, they have recognized male, female, and intersexed genders, but have no problem if their men have vaginas, or if their women have penises.
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Hi!
Though some of us still face horrible situations here in Brazil, things have improved a lot, I must say. Tomorrow (August 29th) is Lesbian Visibility Day here, there will be lots of activities for lesbian and bisexual women (more than there ever was, I think). We have a lot to fight for, of course, but seeing Brazil up the list makes me really proud. 😀
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Happy Lesbian Visibility Day! 🙂 This sounds like an amazing day of celebration. Congrats to you all for having such a day to celebrate. I can’t wait until the day comes when we no longer need to feel grateful for having our basic right to equality. I’m looking forward to it just being normal.
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I’m not surprised by the US. It depends from state to state, regional association, and type of city or town. I live on the Midwest in a state that doesn’t have gay marriage or civil union, doesn’t protect lgbt individuals in the workplace, etc (which is one of the worst place for lgbt rights on the us) and I’m also living in the more conservative area of the state.but 3 hours east (same state) their extremely liberal anf welcoming and apart of the lgbt community
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That honestly sounds terrible. It’s horrible to think that you are being denied such basic rights. The Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland have different laws but I’m based in the Republic where the majority of people seem to be fine with gays and lesbians and our laws are changing slowly for the better.
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