Originally Posted by irateplatypus

i'm sure they're reliable stats in themselves... but there is no context with which to frame the data.

how did they determine that the crimes were anti-gay instead of just crimes that happened to have gay victims?

how many people do they identify as gay/lesbian in the survey? surely that number can't remain constant from year-to-year... has the number of attacks against g/l peoples increased faster than the total number of gay/lesbians?

how do the anti-gay/lesbian violence rates compare against the average american? how do they compare against heterosexual persons of similar socioeconomic background? are the identified gay/lesbian populations subject to lifestyle factors that may be independent of their sexual preferences yet have statistical ties to crime victimization?

those are the type of questions i think need to be addressed before looking at the numbers you presented. it's very hard to look at those bare statistics in your post and conclude that there is an epidemic without more information. my apologies if those are discussed in the link you provided in your post... i'm on a very slow connection and am reluctant to try to d/l a pdf document.