A Gallup poll of a random sample of Americans conducted in May finds that, for the first time, a majority of Republicans report that they believe that gay and lesbian relations are “morally acceptable.” This is your image of the week:
And this, showing that a plurality of Republicans — meaning more than not — think sexual orientation is inborn, not chosen or learned:
Now, to be fair, Gallup specifies a sampling error of ±4 percentage points. So, they’re 95% confident that at least 47% of Republicans now approve of gayness, but also as many as 55%. Also, I don’t know what “gay and lesbian relations” means — sexual relations? relationships? — and neither do the pollsters or the respondents, as far as I know, which is some interesting slippery question asking. Still, that’s the data. Here’s some skepticism, just in case you’ve got an eyebrow raised.
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 1
Bill R — June 6, 2015
This is an example of oversimplification by grouping individuals with heterogeneous opinions into a single classification (pun intended).
Today's Republicans are the remnants of Reagan's "big tent" approach to building a coalition. He assembled anti-intellectuals, wall-streeters, fiscal conservatives, social conservatives, hawks et al into one big party. Many of them tolerate social conservatives for the sake of the voting bloc, not because they think like them.
When studying social phenomena avoid lumping Republicans together and you'll learn more.