Youth Homelessness in the LGBTQ Community
Iquir’a Washington
Youth homelessness is a growing population in the United States. There are difficulties due to inconsistent definitions of what it means to be a youth and to be homeless. Young people experience pathways into becoming homeless because they are facing family conflict, child abuse, and neglect. Youth who identify as members of the LGBTQ community face additional problems in their home life due to lack of acceptance, homophobia, and using tactics aimed to change their sexual orientation. Many researchers indicate that abuse, family breakdown, disruptive family relationships and family opinion about their sexual orientation are the most common factors to youth homelessness. In this paper I aim to address the LGBTQ communities’ problems with youth homelessness due to rejection. Also, I am aiming to explore the youth homelessness among LGBTQ individuals and to identify their support system and family structure. Family structure has a huge impact on how comfortable youth would feel expressing their sexual identity to their family and others.
Iquir’a Washington will be graduating this spring. She is currently a senior at Lander University. Her major is sociology, and she has experience working with customers/clients.
