A third of Americans think society has gone too far in accepting transgender people
Anti-Trump protesters in New York (Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images)
New research has revealed that around a third of Americans believe that acceptance of transgender people has gone too far.
The study from the Pew Research Center has revealed significant differences between opinion on trans rights, especially between age groups and political parties.
Over half of all Americans (54%) believe that gender is determined by sex at birth, whilst only 44% of those surveyed believed that gender could be different from the sex assigned at birth.
32% of Americans believe that society has gone too far in accepting transgender people.
2017 has been the deadliest year on record for transgender people which contrasts with the idea that society has gone too far in accepting trans people.
This is in comparison to 27% of people who think that transgender acceptance is at an adequate level and 39% who said that the United States has not gone far enough.
These figures were affected by whether the respondent personally knew a transgender person.
Overall, 37% of Americans said they personally knew a transgender person.
Of these, 24% of people had a transgender acquaintance.
Only 9% of those surveyed had a transgender person as a close friend.
23% of people who knew a transgender person said that society had gone too far, compared to 52% who said that society had not gone far enough.
In the UK, the equalities chief of political party UKIP has claimed that transgender “political correctness” is going “way way too far”.
The Pew Research centre study also polled people based on political party and determined that there is a noticeable gap.
60% of Democratic party supporters say that society has not gone far enough to accept transgender people, compared to only 18% of Republican party supporters.
These differences were also seen based on age level, with 50% of 18-35’s believing that sex and gender can be different, compared with 37% of those over the age of 72.
Several transgender people made history in the recent state elections, with one woman beating an outspoken anti-LGBT+ incumbent to win in Virginia.
