From the Office of the President & CEO, Sarah Kate Ellis
GLAAD launched its first Studio Responsibility Index (SRI) in 2013 after seeing the progress driven by our studies and work to hold the TV industry accountable for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) storytelling.
In the past ten years, we have seen significant progress in mainstream film’s inclusivity, propelled forward by the data and insights of our SRI studies and ongoing partnerships with top studios and creatives. GLAAD has worked to ensure Hollywood is creating and promoting inclusive storytelling while eliminating harmful depictions. From GLAAD’s first SRI to this year’s milestone tenth edition,the percentage of LGBTQ-inclusive films has grown by 50 percent or 1.5 times as GLAAD has set industry priorities and best practices.
In the decade since this report’s founding, there have been a number of notable milestones for queer inclusion on the big screen. Audiences welcomed the first out gay hero to the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Phastos, and his husband in Eternals. The gay teen romcom Love, Simon was the first film of its kind to come from a major studio and was then supported by a robust national ad campaign. Queer people have been empowered to lead the jokes in raunchy comedies like Blockers and Booksmart, and LGBTQ characters are part of the world in all-ages film like Onward and The Mitchells vs. The Machines. After putting pressure on the industry in our earliest SRI’s, we’ve seen a necessary drop in films that include gay panic, anti-LGBTQ slurs, and LGBTQ people as punchlines. Hollywood history was made when Moonlight became the first LGBTQ film to win the Oscar for Best Picture, and recently our own GLAAD Media Awards have expanded categories to reflect the booming growth in outstanding LGBTQ-inclusive films.
All these storytelling wins are reflective of and tied to progress made in the real world.
While it is difficult to determine the exact population of the LGBTQ community, as we are still excluded from the U.S. Census, the majority of reputable researchers and polling organizations who have found methodologies for tracking community demographics agree that the LGBTQ community is growing – quickly. In 2022, Gallup reported a record high percentage of the population are LGBTQ, including 1 in 5 Gen Z Americans (20.8 percent). That number is roughly double the percentage of the same group from just five years ago (2017) and indicates that, as more of Gen Z reaches 18 and is included in these surveys, the percentage of LGBTQ Americans will continue to grow.
As Gen Z and Millennials now make up over half the population, and consumers have more programming options than ever, it is clear that studios, creators, and programmers need to evolve if they want to maintain their cultural relevance. They must reflect their audiences by including diverse LGBTQ stories in all genres and across all platforms.
A March 2022 poll conducted by Morning Consult on behalf of GLAAD found that a majority of American adults over 18 (64 percent) believe it is important for entertainment companies specifically to support LGBTQ equality. More than half of adults agree that their purchasing decisions (54 percent) and the entertainment they consume (56 percent) reflects their values and identity. A plurality of adults also agree that entertainment companies have a responsibility to affect positive change in acceptance of LGBTQ people through both the content they release (49 percent) and their advocacy efforts (48 percent) e.g. political donations, hiring practices, public statements, advertising and more.
The Edelman Trust Barometer found that business is the most trusted institution in public life at 61 percent, and it is clear from all social issues surveyed that people want more engagement from major companies across the board. As the LGBTQ community is currently under dangerous legislative attack, with more than 250 anti-LGBTQ bills proposed in 2022 and a number of those bills passing and being implemented in more than a dozen states across the country: it is more necessary than ever that our allies in Hollywood stand beside us, telling inclusive stories and furthering LGBTQ acceptance.
This real world damage and erosion of our rights in recent years is why GLAAD this year announced an expansion to our SRI. GLAAD now includes an evaluation of each studio and their parent company’s overall annual efforts on behalf of the community and factors these findings into the studio’s grades, alongside the inclusion in their film slates. These efforts can include political giving, public statements made by company leadership, actions taken to support LGBTQ-inclusive films, and more.
We know that inclusive storytelling drives culture forward. It is crucial that these major cultural institutions are not only creating inclusive content, but also standing behind those LGBTQ stories, characters, and creative teams. Consumers are looking to the companies they choose to support to make choices which align with their values and identities. The LGBTQ community has come to expect that companies will not court LGBTQ people’s attention and spending power (estimated at $1.4 Trillion annually in 2022) while staying silent and/or financially supporting those in positions of power who are actively proposing or furthering efforts to take away our rights and erase LGBTQ people from public spaces.
As we wrap the first decade of this report’s life and look to the next decade of LGBTQ representation in films, our reporting will continue to evolve as the larger entertainment industry shifts and introduces new avenues for storytelling. The GLAAD Media Institute works every day as a partner and resource to the studios, executives, creators and actors who are creating, distributing, and marketing the next generation of iconic queer films. Ultimately, these stories are the ones that will shape the narrative of our lives and community to reach every kind of person around the world.
We know that telling LGBTQ stories is crucial for our survival. A Trevor Project study found that 89 percent of young people said that seeing LGBTQ characters in film and TV made them feel good about being LGBTQ, the most popular sentiment of those listed. Polling from Variety, GLAAD, and others continues to show that seeing LGBTQ images in media is key in growing real-life acceptance for LGBTQ people, the largest factor outside of personally knowing an LGBTQ person.
As our report shows, there is still a huge opportunity for groundbreaking storytelling which highlights the full spectrum of our community and spotlights new voices. Together with our partners in Hollywood and through new pipeline initiatives, our GLAAD List, and more, GLAAD is committed to serving as a resource to help move the needle forward for LGBTQ representation on screen.
Thank you for your support.
In solidarity,
Sarah Kate Ellis
President & CEO, GLAAD
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