Journalist-blogger in Cuba seeks to count all LGBT people, couples living on island

According to Havana Times, Cuban journalist-blogger Francisco Rodríguez is seeking to identify all the LGBT people and couples on the island.

From Havana Times:

How many homosexuals are there in Cuba? How many same-sex couples are living together? How many transsexuals does the island have? And how many bisexual and lesbian households exist in Cuba?

Rodríguez will conduct the survey from Sept. 15-24, according to Havana Times.

Click here to read more.

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The Census confirms it: Wilton Manors in No. 2 nationally for most gay couples per 1,000

BY STEVE ROTHAUS, srothaus@MiamiHerald.com

For more than a decade, Wilton Manors has been known anecdotally as South Florida’s gayest city. Day and night, same-sex couples promenade hand-in-hand along the main drag, Wilton Drive, which is lined with rainbow flags, gay and lesbian bars and shops with names like Gaysha sushi and Gay Mart.

Now, the 2010 U.S. Census has provided numbers to back up that reputation: With about 140 per 1,000, Wilton Manors is the No. 2 city nationally in percentage of same-sex couples, second to Provincetown, Mass.

The demographics of Wilton Manors developed over 15 years, after the first major gay bar, Georgie’s Alibi, opened in the boarded-up shell of a shuttered bank in the heart of Wilton Drive and sparked the revival.

Since then:

• Real-estate prices skyrocketed, peaking in 2007 at nearly $400,000 for the average single-family home.
• Wilton Manors has become a comfortable place for gay people to live and work, providing an alternative to traditional gay-friendly places, such as Fort Lauderdale and South Beach.
• The gay community has evolved and matured as people settled down in relationships and sought a quieter, family-friendly place to put down roots.

Vincent Frato, Alibi’s general manager, said Wilton Manors is “a very convenient neighborhood to live in.”

“It’s one of the few neighborhoods in South Florida that you can park your car when you come home and walk to the grocery store, walk through the neighborhood, walk to a bar,” he said.

Until about 15 years ago, “nobody wanted to put Wilton Manors as their [postal] address, they used Fort Lauderdale,” said Coldwell Banker Realtor Andy Weiser, who has sold homes in the area since 1998.

“It was very down market, very déclassé at the time. But not any more,” Weiser said. “During the boom, prices in Wilton Manors were rivaling many parts of Fort Lauderdale. Now that prices have readjusted, prices are lower, but they’re much higher than they ever were before gentrification.”

In 1996, the year before Alibi opened, the average single-family home in Wilton Manors was worth $85,612. In 2007, the average price was $396,150. In 2011, it is $215,548, according to Ron Gunzburger, general counsel for the Broward Property Appraiser’s Office.

By contrast, the average single-family home in similar-size Dania Beach sold for $76,476 in 1996, $328,426 in 2008 and $150,087 in 2011.

Before the Wilton Manors renaissance, many Broward gays and lesbians lived in Fort Lauderdale’s Victoria Park neighborhood, Weiser said.

“When Victoria Park was gentrified, everybody moved on to Wilton Manors,” Weiser said. “The prices were incredibly, incredibly low. ... When the properties began to be renovated, people began to take notice of it. All of a sudden it wasn’t this rundown neighborhood.”

Wilton Manors Commissioner Scott Newton has lived there since 1960, when he was 3.

“This city was a middle-class to low-class redneck community,” Newton said. “As the years progressed, the community got transformed to a more elegant neighborhood.”

Jennifer Morales, whose partner Laurie Whittaker owns Sidelines Sports Bar on Wilton Drive, says “it’s a delight” to live and work there.

“You feel a sense of — I don’t want to say freedom — relaxation, and being able to be who you are without any kind of fear of retribution. The people are wonderful.”

Gays and lesbians began moving to Wilton Manors from faraway places like New York and Washington, and nearby Northeast Miami-Dade and South Beach.

South Beach was the region’s internationally known gay destination through the ‘90s and into the new century, but when it got increasingly expensive, crowded and to some, chaotic, gays began to leave.

Jason Tamanini moved from Philadelphia to South Florida 10 years ago and managed Halo bar (now Mova) on Lincoln Road from 2007-09.

“When it was a gay mecca” in the 1980s and ‘90s, South Beach was very affordable, Tamanini said.

“You could have a one-bedroom apartment on Meridian [Avenue ] for next to nothing, but when I was living there, I was paying $1,600,” he said. “Sometimes South Beach can be intimidating. It became too fabulous. The average person wants to go out to a restaurant, go to a bar without dressing to the nines and paying a $30 cover.”

Two years ago, he helped open The Manor restaurant and nightclub complex on Wilton Drive.

“It’s filling a void in Wilton Manors ... making a more affordable product that appeals to the masses,” said Tamanini, The Manor’s general manager.

Carol Moran moved from the Beach to Wilton Manors in 1993, after growing weary “of riding around for a half-hour trying to find a parking space.”

Also, Moran got tired of living “in a 500-square-foot apartment” and wanted more for her money. “[Wilton Manors] was so cheap and as close to the beach as you could get,” she said.

Most importantly, Moran liked that “I can walk hand in hand with [partner Nancy Goldwin] and no one is going to say anything.”

Moran gave up her corporate job at Red Lobster and opened Kicks, a lesbian bar on Wilton Drive, in 1998. She sold Kicks in 2003 and opened another lesbian bar, New Moon, in ’05.

“I wanted to be on Wilton Drive because I want people to know we have just as much money, just as much power,” Moran said. “We’re just as wealthy, just as poor. We are the same.”

Many in Wilton Manors attribute the city’s revival to George Kessinger and his namesake bar, Georgie’s Alibi.

“I hate to say a bar is what changed a town, but it really had a lot to do with it,” said Weiser, the Realtor.

Alibi is in a strip-shopping center at 2266 Wilton Dr. When Kessinger first saw the property, it was a boarded-up former bank without electricity. The main reason he liked the site: plenty of parking.

“The first thing we did was take down the boards and expose the storefront windows,” Kessinger said. “We proceeded to open a bar. A video bar. The concept was a place that everyone wanted to hang out in. When we first opened, we figured it would be a mom-and-pop organization and we’d work it.”

Kessinger said the day Alibi opened, at 4 o’clock in the afternoon, a line of men waited to get in.

Eventually, Kessinger opened Alibis in St. Petersburg and Palm Springs, Calif. Five years ago, he sold the Wilton Manors location to life partners Jackson Padgett and Mark Negrete, who also own a gay bar across the street, Bill’s Filling Station.

Wilton Manors’ gay community first gained national attention after the 2000 Census, when it was determined that between 11 percent and 17 percent of couples sharing homes were "unmarried partners" of the same sex.

Same-sex couples in Florida and most of the United States can’t legally marry. But last year for the first time, the Census actively encouraged gay and lesbian couples to identify themselves as married or domestic partners, said Gary Gates, a demographer at The Williams Institute, a think tank at the University of California, Los Angeles, law school.

In the 2010 Census, 65,601 same-sex couples in Florida identified themselves. Just more than half (53 percent) are female couples, and 18 percent of the couples are raising children, according to The Williams Institute.

Nationally, 901,997 same-sex couples identified themselves, 7.7 couples per 1,000. The actual number of gay people throughout the United States is unknown. The Census did not count gays and lesbians who are single, and it is likely that many gay couples did not identify themselves as such, Gates said.

In 2010, 871 same-sex couples reported living in Wilton Manors, about 14 percent of all households in the city.

The high number of same-sex couples is the reason Wilton Manors Elementary School must be filled with students from outside the city, Commissioner Newton said.

The school has 596 pupils this year; only 270 are Wilton Manors residents. “It’s a magnet school, so a lot of them come from the outside,” Newton said.

Gays and lesbians have fully integrated within Wilton Manors business, civic and political circles. Many community leaders, including Mayor Gary Resnick, are gay.

The city’s first gay mayor, John Fiore, was elected in 2000. He was succeeded two years later by another gay man, Jim Stork. At the time, Wilton Manors had the only gay-majority commission in the eastern United States.

Sometimes, there is political conflict. Days after he spoke against gays openly serving in the military, conservative U.S. Rep. Allen West, R-Plantation, canceled a speaking appearance at the private Wilton Manors Business Association after local gay activists threatened a kiss-in protest.

Still, most everyone, gay and straight, gets along in Wilton Manors, according to Newton, who says he often parties at Alibi, The Manor — “even Full Moon,” the lesbian bar.

Years ago, he took his son Patrick, then age 6 or 7, to a gay restaurant in town. “Some of the men were dressed up in drag, short sleeves with hairy arms,” Newton said.

Patrick said, “Daddy, that’s a man in a dress.”

“We had a good laugh,” Newton recalled. “I said, ‘Yeah, some men wear dresses around here,’ and we moved on.”

Other top South Florida rankings for same-sex couples: Oakland Park (981 couples or 5.6 percent); Miami Shores (177 couples, or 4.9 percent); Fort Lauderdale (2,677 couples, or 3.6 percent); Key West (375 couples or 3.4 percent); Monroe County (710 couples or 2.2 percent); Broward County (9,660 couples or 1.4 percent); and Hollywood (710 couples or 1.2 percent).

U.S. Census show number of Florida same-sex households on the rise

Census numbers show same-sex couples now willing to be counted, indicating a trend of greater social acceptance.

BY ANDRES VIGLUCCI, aviglucci@MiamiHerald.com

The 2010 Census counted some 65,000 same-sex households across Florida, many of them raising children, data released Thursday shows.

The number of people reporting on their Census forms that they are in same-sex relationships represents a tiny percentage of the state’s 7.4 million households, the data shows. About 46 percent of state households are made up of husband-wife couples, according to the data, part of a massive release of statistical tables compiled by the U.S. Census Bureau based on last year’s decennial count.

The Census Bureau and some experts released statements warning that the same-sex numbers may be erroneous, however. The bureau said it will issue a revised table at a later date.

The same-sex household numbers have been among the most eagerly awaited of the 2010 Census, in part because for the first time they reflect how many gay couples are raising children. Later this year, the Census Bureau will report another first -- how many same-sex couples report being married. This is the third Census in which the bureau has enumerated same-sex couples, but the first since a few states - not including Florida - began allowing gay couples to legally wed.

Some same-sex couples in Florida got married in other states.

The uncertainly over the numbers’ significance underscores the pitfalls involved in the government’s efforts to count a social minority that until relatively recently was widely stigmatized and largely unacknowledged.

Despite the statistical issues, however, experts who have followed the state-by-state releases over the past several weeks say they have seen a clear trend: increases of around 50 percent since the 2000 Census in reported same-sex households virtually everywhere. On a broad scale, they say, that doesn’t represent an increase in the number of same-sex households so much as a greater willingness by gay couples to report accurately to the government.

That willingness, in turn, reflects a greater social acceptance of same-sex couples across the country, said Gary Gates, distinguished scholar at the UCLA law school’s Williams Institute, which focuses on legal issues related to sexual orientation. Some of the biggest jumps in reported same-sex households since 2000 came in conservative areas and states like Montana, he said.

Florida saw a jump from some 40,000 reported same-sex households in 2000, an increase of more than 50 percent. Though Gates cautioned that the precise numbers may be inaccurate, he said statistical errors alone cannot account for the significant rise. In fact, he says annual Census Bureau estimates already suggest the greatest increases in reported same-sex couples in the state to be in areas of largely conservative Northern Florida where social stigma previously kept many gays in the closet.

“These data are showing that throughout the country there is greater, broad social acceptance of same-sex couples,’’ said Gates, who is analyzing state-by-state numbers as they are released. “The data undermine the stereotype of same-sex couples as largely white and urban, and emphasize that same-sex couples do in fact live every where in the country, including rural areas and in racial and ethnic minority communities.’’

Some of the increase in same-sex couples in Florida may also simply reflect the state’s continuing population growth, Gates said. Cities in some other states that are draws for retirees, including New Hope, Pa., Gates said, have seen increases in same-sex couples that likely reflect real growth as gay couples move to them after retiring.

Not unexpectedly, many of the state’s same-sex couples reside in South Florida, with slightly more than 9,000 in Broward County and around 7,400 in Miami-Dade, with an additional 600 or so living in Monroe. Male couples outnumber female couples across the board, in a few places like Fort Lauderdale by huge numbers.

About a fifth of the state’s same-sex couples are raising children.

Gates and the Census Bureau believe the overall numbers may be at least somewhat inflated, however, in part because an analysis of the data suggested some members of heterosexual households appear to have erroneously checked a box indicating they were a same-sex couple.

Gates, however, says that at the same time independent surveys taken after the 2010 Census suggest that as many as 15 percent of same-sex couples did not report their status accurately to the government. That would have led to a likely undercount of same-sex households that would largely cancel out the errors by heterosexual couples, he said.

“What it says to me is how big this phenomenon of people hiding they are in a same-sex couple still is,’’ Gates said. “But it’s hard to quantify people who don’t want to be counted. That’s the whole point of being in the closet.’’

Read the top stories: Steve Rothaus' Gay South Florida now available by email in free newsletter

Steve Rothaus' Gay South Florida is now conveniently available in a free Miami Herald newsletter emailed at least twice weekly.

Just enter your email address in the sign-up field on the left rail with my photo, just below the Facebook icon. Thanks and enjoy!

Read the top stories: Steve Rothaus' Gay South Florida now available by email in free newsletter

Steve Rothaus' Gay South Florida is now conveniently available in a free Miami Herald newsletter emailed at least twice weekly.

Just enter your email address in the sign-up field on the left rail with my photo, just below the Facebook icon. Thanks and enjoy!

Census: 581,000 (.5 percent) of U.S. households are composed of same-sex unmarried couples

From the latest Associated Press article about the 2010 Census:

Roughly 581,000, or a half percent, of U.S. households are composed of same-sex unmarried couples, representing nearly 1 in 10 households with unmarried partners. Unmarried gay couples made up the biggest shares in states in the Northeast and West, led by the District of Columbia, Oregon, Delaware, Massachusetts, Maine and Vermont. The largest numbers were in California and New York, which is now considering a gay marriage law.

Here's the complete article:

By HOPE YEN, Associated Press

WASHINGTON -- For the first time, minorities make up a majority of babies in the U.S., part of a sweeping race change and growing age divide between mostly white, older Americans and predominantly minority youths that could reshape government policies.

Preliminary census estimates also show the share of African-American households headed by women - made up of mostly single mothers - now exceeds African-American households with married couples, a sign of declining U.S. marriages overall but also continuing challenges for black youths without involved fathers.

The findings, based on the latest government data, offer a preview of final 2010 census results being released this summer that provide detailed breakdowns by age, race and householder relationships such as same-sex couples.

Demographers say the numbers provide the clearest confirmation yet of a changing social order, one in which racial and ethnic minorities will become the U.S. majority by midcentury.

"We're moving toward an acknowledgment that we're living in a different world than the 1950s, where married or two-parent heterosexual couples are now no longer the norm for a lot of kids, especially kids of color," said Laura Speer, coordinator of the Kids Count project for the Baltimore-based Annie E. Casey Foundation.

"It's clear the younger generation is very demographically different from the elderly, something to keep in mind as politics plays out on how programs for the elderly get supported," she said. "It's critical that children are able to grow to compete internationally and keep state economies rolling."

Currently, non-Hispanic whites make up just under half of all children 3 years old, which is the youngest age group shown in the Census Bureau's October 2009 annual survey, its most recent. In 1990, more than 60 percent of children in that age group were white.

William H. Frey, a demographer at the Brookings Institution who analyzed the data, said figures in the 2009 survey can sometimes be inexact compared with the 2010 census, which queries the entire nation. But he said when factoring in the 2010 data released so far, minorities outnumber whites among babies under age 2.

The preliminary figures are based on an analysis of the Current Population Survey as well as the 2009 American Community Survey, which sampled 3 million U.S. households to determine that whites made up 51 percent of babies younger than 2. After taking into account a larger-than-expected jump in the minority child population in the 2010 census, the share of white babies falls below 50 percent.

Twelve states and the District of Columbia now have white populations below 50 percent among children under age 5 - Hawaii, California, New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, Nevada, Florida, Maryland, Georgia, New Jersey, New York and Mississippi. That's up from six states and the District of Columbia in 2000.

At current growth rates, seven more states could flip to "minority-majority" status among small children in the next decade: Illinois, North Carolina, Virginia, Colorado, Connecticut, South Carolina and Delaware.

By contrast, whites make up the vast majority of older Americans - 80 percent of seniors 65 and older and roughly 73 percent of people ages 45-64. Many states with high percentages of white seniors also have particularly large shares of minority children, including Arizona, Nevada, California, Texas and Florida.

"The recent emergence of this cultural generation gap in states with fast growth of young Hispanics has spurred heated discussions of immigration and the use of government services," Frey said. "But the new census, which will show a minority majority of our youngest Americans, makes plain that our future labor force is absolutely dependent on our ability to integrate and educate a new diverse child population."

Kenneth Johnson, a sociology professor and senior demographer at the University of New Hampshire, noted that much of the race change is being driven by increases in younger Hispanic women having more children than do white women, who have lower birth rates and as a group are moving beyond their prime childbearing years.

Because minority births are driving the rapid changes in the population, "any institution that touches or is impacted by children will be the first to feel the impact," Johnson said, citing as an example child and maternal health care that will have to be attentive to minorities' needs.

The numbers come amid public debate over hotly contested federal and state issues, from immigration and gay marriage to the rising cost of government benefits such as Medicare and Medicaid, that are resonating in different ways by region and demographics.

Alabama became the latest state this month to pass a wide-ranging anti-immigration law, which in part requires schools to report students' immigration status to state authorities. That follows tough immigration measures passed in similarly Republican-leaning states such as Georgia, Arizona and South Carolina.

But governors in Massachusetts, New York and Illinois, which long have been home to numerous immigrants, have opted out of the federal Secure Communities program that aims to deport dangerous criminals, saying it has made illegal immigrants afraid of reporting crimes to police. California may soon opt out as well.

States also are divided by region over old-age benefits and gay marriage, which is legal in five states and the District of Columbia.

Among African-Americans, U.S. households headed by women - mostly single mothers but also adult women living with siblings or elderly parents - represented roughly 30 percent of all African-American households, compared with the 28 percent share of married-couple African-American households. It was the first time the number of female-headed households surpassed those of married couples among any race group, according to census records reviewed by Frey dating back to 1950.

While the number of black single mothers has been gradually declining, overall marriages among blacks are decreasing faster. That reflects a broader U.S. trend of declining marriage rates as well as increases in non-family households made up of people living alone, or with unmarried partners or other non-relatives.

Female-headed households make up a 19 percent share among Hispanics and 9 percent each for whites and Asians.

Other findings:

-Multigenerational households composed of families with grandparents, parents and children were most common among Hispanics, particularly in California, Maryland, Illinois, Nevada and Texas, all states where they represented nearly 1 in 10 Latino households.

-Roughly 581,000, or a half percent, of U.S. households are composed of same-sex unmarried couples, representing nearly 1 in 10 households with unmarried partners. Unmarried gay couples made up the biggest shares in states in the Northeast and West, led by the District of Columbia, Oregon, Delaware, Massachusetts, Maine and Vermont. The largest numbers were in California and New York, which is now considering a gay marriage law.

-Minorities comprise a majority of renters in 10 states, plus the District of Columbia - Hawaii, Texas, California, Georgia, Maryland, New Mexico, Mississippi, New Jersey, Louisiana and New York.

Tony Perkins, president of the Washington, D.C.-based Family Research Council, a conservative interest group, emphasized the economic impact of the decline of traditional families, noting that single-parent families are often the most dependent on government assistance.

"The decline of the traditional family will have to correct itself if we are to continue as a society," Perkins said, citing a responsibility of individuals and churches. "We don't need another dose of big government, but a new Hippocratic oath of 'do no harm' that doesn't interfere with family formation or seek to redefine family."

Aqua Girl presents comic Suzanne Westenhoefer 8 p.m. Friday at Unity on the Bay in Miami

Suzanne Westenhoefer, the first openly gay comedian to perform on television, appears 8 tonight at Unity on the Bay, 411 NE 21st St. Miami.

From Aqua Girl, which runs through Sunday:

Join us for an evening of laughs with the first openly gay comedian to appear on television.  You’ve seen her on Letterman, HBO, Bravo, Logo and GSN as well as performances across the US.  Now come see her newest show – SEMI-SWEET – LIVE at Aqua Girl®! The Miami Gay Men’s Chorus and Katie Wirsing open the show.

$30 in advance / $35 at the door
Members: $25 in advance / $30 at the door

VIP Seating:
$45 in advance / $55 at the door
Members: $40 in advance / $45 at the door

Advance tickets are available throughout the afternoon at the Aqua Girl welcome center, Surfcomber Resort, Atlantic Room, 1717 Collins Avenue, Miami Beach.

Here's a 2002 profile I wrote of Westenhoefer, that ran during the fourth annual Aqua Girl festival:

Comic looks at the in's and out's of success

BY STEVE ROTHAUS, srothaus@MiamiHerald.com

Lesbian comedian Suzanne Westenhoefer has a serious message for gay performers just starting out:

Stay in the closet, at least until you've made it big. Then come out and the gay community will really appreciate you.

Westenhoefer, who performs May 17 at the fourth annual Aqua Girl festival in Miami Beach did it the hard way: She has been out since her first stand-up date 12 years ago - and never got the attention of her more famous peers.

"Ellen comes out. Rosie comes out. They're all over The Advocate and every move they make is covered: They came out!!!

"And for some reason we value it more."

Westenhoefer said that she and other out-from-the-start performers are "no big deal" in the gay community.

"We're the utility players, " she said. "If you ever see the 100 Most Influential People, you never see us."

But, adds Westenhoefer: "I go to sleep knowing that I never had to compromise, to look at tapes of me talking about 'my boyfriend.' "

Westenhoefer grew up in Pennsylvania's Lancaster County, where "people judged you on whether you took care of your home, not your background."

Her managers prefer that she not reveal her age.

"I can tell you I'm queer, but not 41, " Westenhoefer said.

She moved to New York City in 1983 after graduating Clarion University in Pennsylvania.

"I thought I was going to be a great actress. I was so intimidated by the process. I became a bartender.

"People would come into the bar and say, 'Oh, you're so funny. You should do stand-up.' I had never thought about it."

She made her first stage appearance on July 31, 1990.

"I was, like, the only openly gay person [doing stand-up] in New York, so it was a very big deal, " she said.

Her early audiences, mostly straight, had never seen an openly gay comic before.

"It was so hard because the first three or five minutes I couldn't do any jokes. I just had to be really happy or peppy about being gay, " she said. "I don't know what they expected. Me to burst into flames?"

Westenhoefer came out on national television in 1991, on an episode of Sally Jesse Raphael titled "Lesbians Who Don't Look Like Lesbians."

Since then, Westenhoefer has appeared on Comedy Central, Evening at the Improv, Caroline's Comedy Hour, and Politically Incorrect. Her HBO special was nominated for a 1995 cable ACE award.

Westenhoefer also has recorded two live comedy albums: Nothing In My Closet But My Clothes and I'm Not Cindy Brady.

Some straight audiences still don't feel comfortable hearing her joke about her partner of 10 years. ("My girlfriend and I are old-fashioned queers. We don't want to get married.")

But because of network TV shows like Ellen and Will and Grace, straight audiences today are more hip than they were 10 years ago, she said.

"It's way easier, " Westenhoefer said. "It just rips open everything. It's eliminated a tremendous amount of explanation. To a straight audience, I can now make references to butch and femme."

Then, the joking stops and Westenhoefer reflects on the realities of show business.

"It's about how you look, " she said. "If you look normal - what they decide is normal - it's easier than if you are a screaming queen or a big dyke. It's just that ugly sometimes.

"And I'll tell you what: Gay people say it - 'We love you because you come out and you're not a big, ugly dyke.' "

Westenhoefer believes that being openly gay has hindered her career.

"If I hadn't been so gay, as I was told early on, I could have had a shot on Letterman, " she said. "I would be naive to say 'No, I don't care.' Sometimes I care for a minute, but I have to live with me for the rest of my life."

Instead of doing lots of big TV spots, Westenhoefer perfors at gay-oriented events like Aqua Girl. Event coordinator Lily Majjul-Pardo said Aqua Girl is a "great way to meet new people."

"Not everyone wants to go to a bar. . . . We have pool parties, a basketball game, dance parties, " Majjul-Pardo said. "One hundred percent of the money goes to Dade Human Rights Foundation Women's Fund. Their whole goal is to promote equality, health and the visibility of South Florida lesbians."

Westenhoefer describes her Aqua Girl gig (part of the Miami Light Project's annual Come Out Laughing series) as "a little bit about pride."

"It's just pure entertainment and a lot about networking, " she adds. "If 800 women show up, 10 will meet someone they hadn't met before. That's how we create our society.

"Everybody brings something different to the table. Miami has a lot of glamour. You go to Fayetteville, Ark., and they remind you why you are there, why you are out. They talk to you after [the show] and they cry."

2010 Census: More than a half-million same-sex unmarried households in United States

From an Associated Press article by Hope Yen about the 2010 Census:

On the topic of families, the number of married couples with children dropped about 5.7 percent to 23.4 million, or roughly 20 percent of U.S. households. That's down from a share of 23.5 percent in 2000 and 43 percent in 1960.

The decreases in traditional families were seen in 42 states plus the District of Columbia, while the remaining eight - Nevada, Utah, Idaho, Arizona, Colorado, Texas, North Carolina and Georgia - saw increases. Those eight states generally have a higher number of either immigrants or Mormon residents.

In contrast, non-family households made up of single people such as seniors living alone, or opposite-sex or same-sex partners without children, jumped 13 percent to roughly 38 million. Married couples with no kids, which include younger couples and older empty-nesters, rose 9 percent to more than 32 million.

"In American politics, there's a nostalgia element when invoking terms such as 'family values.' But that term is out of touch with the way many Americans live, given demographic changes such as gay marriage" and cohabitation, said Julian E. Zelizer, a professor of history and public affairs at Princeton University.

Preliminary census numbers show that unmarried partners made up 6.5 million, or nearly 6 percent of U.S. households. Those figures include roughly 581,300, or a half-percent of households, composed of same-sex unmarried couples. Measured by shares, the District of Columbia ranked highest for same-sex unmarried households at 2 percent.

Official 2010 data on unmarried partner households will be released beginning in June, followed by figures on same-sex spouses in November.