Submission Guidelines/Disclaimers
First, things to keep in mind when you submit:
there is a limit of 12 answers for polls, and on this blog one of those answers will always be 'show results,' to allow for people that the poll doesn't apply to to see without skewing data. so in reality you have a maximum of 11.
there's also an 80-character limit on the options
SO, if you go over those limits, know that I will take it into my own hands to decide which answers to omit and/or how to re-word it to fit the limit.
even otherwise, expect that the wording of your submission may be slightly altered in order to be more inclusive (when it doesn't affect the data), or because i think you missed an option that you probably meant to include, or just to make it sound less clunky. if you have an issue with any changes upon posting, i'm happy to hear you out.
currently there is no wait time, but if things go as expected, soon enough it'll likely be about a 4-5 day wait between the time you submit and the time it gets posted
if your poll is addressing a very small group, don't be surprised or angry when the 'see results' poll is the biggest. that needs to be there to keep data from being skewed by anyone's curiosity.
Base Guidelines For Submitting:
poll must be related to gayness in some way. it doesn't have to be directed exclusively at gay people, but it should center same-gender attraction. if you have a poll in mind to direct specifically at bisexuals, there's @mspecpolls
it CAN be a general LGBT poll, but if it's specific to something that has nothing to do with gay attraction, you're better off submitting to another blog. there's @transgenderpolls for trans stuff and @aspecpolls for ace/aro stuff.
it CAN be directed at a specific type of gay person, such as gay men, lesbians, specifically trans lesbians, nonbinary mlm, gay poc, disabled wlw, etc - literally you can address any specific gay group you want, just make sure to say so.
...this DOES include 'cis gay men/women/people' but tbqh you're gonna have to provide a good reason to be excluding trans people from the poll
in general if you want to explicitly exclude people who have a nonconforming relationship with gender, you better explicitly say so AND have a good reason. otherwise it'll be assumed that all sorts are included and if your options don't reflect that, i will change them or reject the poll.
it CAN relate to sex (i expect many polls here will be), just try to be tasteful about it. like, as long as it sounds like you're trying to collect data rather than arouse people lol
What would make me NOT post a submission:
as mentioned previously, if it's excluding subgroups without a good reason
if it's an opinion poll about the validity of any particular type of gay person. "validity" is a moot topic and i'm not going to encourage it, and in any case i'd like the focus of this blog to be about recording experiences (real, undeniable, forever in stone) rather than opinions (always changing, meaningless)
pride discourse polls, lol
anything that tries to pit issues against each other. no "which intercommunity issue is more important to you? ableism? racism?" like cmon
if it's just way too niche and would make a pointless poll. if a poll is "who's your favorite lgbt character" and then you've got 11 options from different TV shows, you gotta know that most of the ppl who see that poll will NOT have seen ALL those shows, so they'll really just be voting for the show that they know. it's just dumb.
if it's something like "gay people: do you like pineapple on pizza?" or some other question that doesn't actually have anything to do with being gay. if you wanna send something like this, make your case for why it's relevant that the poll is directed at gay people.
if it's some other obviously offensive shit, obviously. no racism or whatnot here.
FAQ:
Who counts as gay?
Like most of these guidelines I'll continue the same sentiment from the trans polls blog: We self-define here. But I will stress answering in good faith and understanding what any given poll is asking and what definitions they're using. If you're, say, nonbinary and bisexual in a way that makes all your attraction gay, or you're gay in a very specific way (like nb4nb), or you call yourself gay bc you're mostly gay but you're technically bisexual, or you're definitely homosexual but don't actually like to call yourself gay, etc, it'll likely just depend on the poll. It's totally up to you to decide if it includes you or not, or you can always ask if you want to be sure.
Though if it's not explicitly stated that the poll excludes transmasc lesbians or transfem gays, or other trans/nonbinary gay people, you should still for sure assume it includes you.
Why isn't there an option for X?/You missed an option.
Sometimes I may genuinely miss an option, but 9 times out of 10 the lack of the option is either due to the poll limits on tumblr, or because it goes against the point of the poll. For example, if the question begins with "If you're in a relationship," then "i'm not in a relationship" isn't going to be an option. If the prerequisite of the poll doesn't apply to you, then what you click is "see results." If it's something a little less concrete, polls will usually include some kind of "other" option anyway.
Can you make more polls for X type of gay person?
*I* make polls based off what I'm personally curious about. If you're curious about something, submit it!
Do you know that some people are gay in very unconventional ways that your polls aren't accounting for?
Yes, I know. When there's room on the poll, I try to be inclusive, but often there's not, and that's really the main thing there. However, I will admit that a secondary reason is that when a poll is addressing exclusively gay people, the fact that they're only attracted to one gender is relevant, regardless of whether or not it would still be gay of them to be attracted to more.
Can you get rid of the 'see results' button? Or can you not include it on this particular poll? I only want X people to respond. This poll is ONLY for X people.
If a poll is on this blog, it's for everyone, questioning and simply curious people included. It's also not going to stop curious people from clicking if there's no 'see results' button. It ensures that the data doesn't get skewed, and gathering data is what polls are for. It doesn't hurt you to see a big see results bar. The data is still there. If the bar does wind up obscuring more significant data, that means the poll was addressing too small of a group to begin with. And that's NOT the end of the world. This blog is far from the only place where you can get information about other gay people's experiences.