RW - foRWard Health & Wellbeing eMag - Apr26 - Flipbook - Page 16
cent who are trans and
gender diverse. Those
numbers help move the
conversation away from
vague assumptions and
toward something more
grounded. Pride is not a
tiny fringe. It is hundreds
of thousands of Australians
and the families, friends,
schools, workplaces and
communities around them.
Public attitudes also
re昀氀ect that mixed picture.
Ipsos found in 2025 that
support for protecting
LGBTQIA+ people from
discrimination remains
strong across surveyed
countries, and in Australia
80 per cent agreed
that LGBTQIA+ people
should be protected from
discrimination in areas
such as employment and
housing. Yet the same
Ipsos reporting found
softer support for some
other issues, including
explicit workplace
celebration programs and
corporate activism. Pride in
2026, then, is not arriving
in a world where the work
is done. It is arriving in a
world where support is
real, but still uneven.
The Australian picture
In Australia, Pride
Month matters because
LGBTQIA+ people are a
visible and signi昀椀cant part
of the national story. The
ABS estimates that 4.5 per
cent of Australians aged
16 and over are LGBTQIA+,
including around 0.9 per
Australian Census data
also shows how social
change is becoming more
visible in everyday life.
The 2021 Census counted
78,425 same sex couples
living together in Australia,
and one in three of those
couples were married.
The number of same sex
couples living together
rose 67.7 per cent between
2016 and 2021, showing a
rapid increase in visibility
and recognition. Pride
Month in Australia is not
symbolic. It re昀氀ects real
people, real households
and real lives that are
part of the broader
national fabric.
