JACKSONVILLE– A study by the University of North Florida shows members of the LGBT community in Jacksonville feel that they are being discriminated against. According to the authors of the study, the results also show a need for an expanded Human Rights Ordinance in the city.
The most common negative experiences of participants were teasing or off-color jokes about LGBT people, verbal abuse or threats, and bullying or intimidation. In addition to the provided negative experiences options, participants added that they had also experienced medical discrimination, demotion, hateful attitudes, disparate pricing, pictures being taken of them and posted on social media with slurs, feeling unsafe or judged, and damage to their property including a brick thrown through their truck windshield, damage to housing, and loosened lug nuts on car rims.
When asked specifically about their discrimination experiences, the 54% of participants indicated that they had experienced discrimination based on their sexual orientation or gender identity in Jacksonville, Florida within the past five years.
Almost 12% of participants were unsure if they had experienced such discrimination, and 30.7% of participants indicated that they had not experienced such discrimination in Jacksonville within the past five years. The most common places where participants experienced discrimination were their job, a restaurant, club, or bar, and a job interview.
