Cross-posted at The Huffington Post.
Last month Jet — a magazine marketed to African-American population — featured their first gay male couple in their wedding announcements. The announcement may be a sign that African-American attitudes towards gay marriage may be turning around. While the group has typically endorsed gay marriage at lower rates than White Americans, the gap between Blacks and Whites has been narrowing.
The Pew Research Center reports that the percent of Whites opposed to gay marriage dropped from 51% in 2008 to 41% in 2012. Among Blacks, the percent in opposition dropped from 63% to 49%. African-Americans and Whites are now separated by eight percentage points instead of twelve.
The data above was collected in April of 2012. In May, Obama announced that he supported gay marriage. It remains to be seen whether Obama’s modeling of a pro-gay stance will influence the opinions of the African-American community further.
Lisa Wade, PhD is an Associate Professor at Tulane University. She is the author of American Hookup, a book about college sexual culture; a textbook about gender; and a forthcoming introductory text: Terrible Magnificent Sociology. You can follow her on Twitter and Instagram.
Comments 12
Dan — January 14, 2013
What's with the odd exaggerated scale on the "among blacks" chart? 66 there is slightly below 65 on the whites side, and 26 is way below 27. Seems there's an implied message there too.
Today’s Links | Nubian Stylez — January 15, 2013
[...] Are African-Americans Changing Their Mind About Gay Marriage … Last month Jet — a magazine marketed to African-American population — featured their first gay male couple in their wedding announcements. The announcement may be a sign that African-American attitudes towards gay … [...]
ARE AFRICAN-AMERICANS CHANGING THEIR MIND ABOUT GAY MARRIAGE? | Welcome to the Doctor's Office — January 15, 2013
[...] from SocImages [...]
Guest — January 15, 2013
The singular "mind" in the title is telling. I am pretty sure African-Americans have more than one mind.
Successful sociological entrepreneurialism: on Sociological Images | price of data — January 16, 2013
[...] while making theoretical points or, like today, asking what we can anticipate from future data (link to today’s post, “Are African-Americans Changing Their Mind About Gay [...]
Bri — January 16, 2013
African American seem to be finding Gay marriage more favorable at a similar rate of White Americans. It's only a few points difference. With the way everyone talks about how African American dislike homosexuality, you'd think it would be a huge difference but it's not.
Elmored — January 17, 2013
This article is complete trash. Just because people are the same color doesn't mean the have the same mindset.