11 Things We Learned From A New Study Of LGBT Characters On Television

GLAAD identifies the best and worst of the record-breaking 2012-2013 season.

1. Overall, the 2012-2013 season has the highest-ever percentage of LGBT characters.

At least when it comes to scripted television on the five broadcast networks: ABC, CBS, NBC, Fox and the CW.

These characters account for 4.4 percent of all regular — not recurring — characters, up from 2.9 percent in 2011. Two of them are on The New Normal.

2. Of the broadcast networks, ABC has the highest percentage of gay characters.

Ten of ABC’s regular 194 characters are LGBT. Two of them are Arizona and Callie on Grey’s Anatomy.

Meanwhile, CBS had the smallest percentage of regular gay characters, at 2.8 percent. (That’s four of 142 characters.)

3. Those four CBS characters appear on “The Good Wife,” “Two And A Half Men” and the new show “Partners.”

Kalinda on The Good Wife is bisexual.

4. Fox has the only transgender regular character on broadcast TV.

Unique on Glee.

5. On broadcast TV, 78 percent of all characters are white.

Ahem, How I Met Your Mother.

6. This year, Latino characters decreased from to 5.6 to 4.1 percent of all characters.

Modern Family’s Gloria and her son Manny.

7. And there are only four characters on broadcast TV with disabilities — that’s 0.6 percent.

Parenthood’s Max has Asperger’s syndrome.

8. Male characters also outnumber female characters, 55.5 to 44.5 percent.

The cast of Supernatural.

9. Of the cable networks, Showtime has the highest number of LGBT characters: 12.

Four of them are on Shameless, including Ian and Mickey.

10. TeenNick has the only transgender character on cable TV.

Adam on Degrassi.

11. And “True Blood” is the most inclusive show on cable, with six LGBT characters.

Including Tara and Lafayette.

But to be fair, True Blood probably has the most characters on cable too.

12.

LINK

See the study's full results here.

glaad.org