Our research indicates that First Globals are more likely than older generations to hold liberal positions on issues involving same-sex relationships. According to our survey, 31% of Americans support amending the Constitution to ban same-sex marriage, but only 15% of First Globals share this view. First Globals support gay marriage at a rate of 58%, compared to 24% of those over 65 and 42% of adults overall. Similarly, 64% of First Globals thought homosexual couples should be allowed to adopt children, compared to 52% of all adults.
However, recent elections saw the ban on gay marriage being passed relatively easily in California, Florida and Arizona and the same happened in Arkansas to the ban on gay couples adopting children. Did we just witness the gay version of the “Bradley effect”?
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6 comments:
Time for First Globals to move to Arkansas!
Just kidding. I'm not sure I would describe this as a gay version of the bradley effect but rather (as this post shows) an issue where young people and older people are quite divided but young voters are still only a small segment of the electorate. Even if all First Global voters voted in favor of gay marriage it wouldn't be enough to make up for the votes of older generations.
However, I bet the newest groups of voters will be more like First Globals, so that's reason to be optimistic if you're a liberal.
"Even if all First Global voters voted in favor of gay marriage it wouldn't be enough to make up for the votes of older generations."
But according to the data above even older adults supported adoption (let alone marriage).
What?
The youth were against Prop 8 by 60%. Where would the Bradley effect be? 58% support gay marriage and 60% opposed Prop 8. Seems pretty cut and dry.
"According to our survey, 31% of Americans support amending the Constitution to ban same-sex marriage".
Yet, 50%+ of Californians supported something similar. If Bradley is there (I am not saying it is) maybe it's not among the youth.
From everything I've heard, it was minorities "non-whites" in California that pushed Proposition 8 over. African-Americans, Latinos, and Asian-Americans. While these groups might usually vote Democratic and especially for Obama, on this issue, they went full-Limbaugh. I don't know if there was a Bradley effect, or if this one issue was undersurveyed in terms of ethnic minorities.
Why do you include Asian-Americans in your comments? The exit poll on cnn.com says Asians voted 49% Yes, 51% No ... the exact same result for Whites.
Somebody made the same mistake on the Rachel Maddow show, talking about "people of color" instead of addressing the fact that it was specifically African-Americans who were the only racial group that was not almost evenly divided on the issue.
But your point on undersurveying is well-taken ... for example, even though the gay vote in the presidential race was not specifically broken out, the straight vote in California was barely more pro-Obama than the state as a whole. There is no way in hell that such a small difference could be statistically significant, but somebody could push back and say "See, gays were LESS likely to vote for Obama even though they usually vote largely Democratic ... looks racist to me."
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