Social tolerance makes for more supportive communities - WOW!

It's almost shocking sometimes, that in America, research has to be done to prove things that most progressive communities have known for a long time. Mind you, its nice to have some empirical evidence.

Mark Hatzenbuehler a psychology Phd at Colombia, recently concluded a study: 'The Social Environment and Suicide Attempts in Lesbian, Gay and Bisexual Youth'.

After surveying over 31,000 students, they looked at the influence of society on the rages of LGB teenage suicide. To simplify, they allocated counties a score on a conservative to progressive scale, and then found that the more socially progressive the community the less the likelyhood of LGB youth committing suicide. Suicide was 20% more likely in conservative communities.

To simplify even further, it looks like the better educated, and the more open-minded a society is, the less teens feel they  are unwanted by their communities.  To most this is self evident - but in the USA, this will be a red rag to conservatives.

Source: JoeMyGod