A Preliminary Analysis of Twitter’s LGBTQ+ Discussions

Social media platforms play a significant role in the lives of LGBTQ+ (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer, and others) individuals, where they have to tackle the challenge of managing their sexual and gender identities. In addition, social media have been leveraged as the go-to platform for a significant proportion of LGBTQ+ communities to come out and participate in discussions related to their rights and the discrimination faced. Twitter, in particular, has been analyzed to understand online behaviors towards LGBTQ+ communities, an example being how online Twitter discussions can reveal discriminatory behavior towards them. However, a macro-level analysis of LGBTQ+ tweets since the early days of Twitter has been understudied. In this research, we present a preliminary macro-analysis of users and tweets since 2006 to gather insights into queries such as: What emotions and toxicity levels are more prevalent in LGBTQ+ discussions? Do the emotions and toxicity levels in tweets change over time? What do we know about the users who have frequently been tweeting about LGBTQ+-related topics since 2006? Upon our analyses, we find that emotions such as joy and anger and toxicity such as identity attacks and threats are more prevalent in the negative user-bios and tweets. We also see a significant increase in activity on Twitter over the years for both overall and positive emotions.