Gay In Augusta

Counting the gays

This week’s Columbia Free Times has a great cover story about the economic impact of anti-gay culture. It’s definitely worth a read and had me thinking about the size and purchasing power of the gay community in Augusta.

I, for one, have absolutely no clue how many of us there are in the area first of all, because we’re so closeted. The article, though, talks about census statistics and while I’m no statistician, I thought it might be interesting to check out the data from our area. I have some bad news for the bigots around here…

If you total up Augusta/Richmond County, Columbia County, and Aiken County, there were almost a thousand same gender households reported! That’s not including those in the community who are single, those who may not have answered honestly out of fear, or others who may not have been included. That was also in 2000; I for one didn’t live here then, so the number has since increased by at least one household. I also looked at Atlanta’s data just to get a sense of where the numbers stood. My rough math showed about half as many gay households when you compare it to total population. Considering we don’t have a gay mecca like Midtown and a gay-friendly city, I think that’s a pretty good showing!

I thought that was pretty exciting. 1,000 households in our area? Where are you people? Well, the numbers say Augusta/Richmond County first, then Aiken County, then Columbia County. I have to say I’m kind of excited to see the data from the next census, however geeky that might sound.

Posted in community, family