Well yes, some people are more free to live different kinds of lifestyles these days. But to be clear, an LGBTQ identity is not a lifestyle. People who are bisexual, gay, transgender, etc lead amazingly diverse lifestyles. Lifestyle is not a characteristic that binds queer people together, because our lifestyles are so diverse.

For example, I'm gay, and I live in a rural, isolated part of Michigan. My lifestyle is necessarily quite similar to that of my neighbors. Like them, I own a small home, I have to worry about maintaining it through difficult weather. I have to be self-sufficient. I have to know how to repair things and take care of myself. I have to deal with wintry driving conditions that can leave me snowed in for significant amounts of time. All of these sorts of things set up a lifestyle.

But I used to be very urban and lead a very different sort of lifestyle, living in apartments, with public transportation readily available.

I would regularly visit art galleries and museums, and my social life revolved around dense city populations — and my cisgender, straight, urban neighbors shared a lot in common with me in terms of lifestyle.

Very little about being queer impacts my lifestyle. Nor are lifestyles, I think, particularly fluid among queer people. Sure, some of us are like me and move around and change lifestyles. But that's more of an exception, I think, than a rule.

One caveat. Coming out as queer has traditionally involved moving to an urban area, at least for a lot of us. We needed to in order to find accepting community. And while that remains the case for many queer people, the phenomenon is less ubiquitous than it used to be. People are much more likely these days than when I was young to stay where they are when they come out.