It was midday today, Wednesday, before The New York Times, via the AP, was able to analyze the demographics behind the success of the most expensive ballot issue in American history that didn't deal with the oil and gas industry:
Exit polls for The Associated Press found that Proposition 8 received critical support from black voters who flocked to the polls to support Barack Obama for president. About seven in 10 blacks voted in favor of the ban, while Latinos also supported it and whites were split.
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3 comments:
Luis,
Is it true that many Americans of color are also in the Evangelical movement (Southern Baptist or American Moslem?) Is it also true that many Latinos were raised in the Catholic faith? I suggest Religious beliefs may have played a bigger role in the outcome of proposition 8 than freedom, race or equal rights did, particularly since the Mormon church was a major contributor and proponent of proposition 8. I suggest the racial numbers of the exit polls may showing a false correlation. In my opinion proposition lost because of irrational religious beliefs not because of race.
--Clyde
Hello, Clyde. Nice to hear from you. It is true that religious beliefs played a huge role in how people voted on Proposition 8. But it is also true that whites voted against passage of Prop. 8, while Hispanics and African-Americans voted in favor of it (Hispanics by only a small margin, blacks by 70-30%).
It's no secret that homophobia is rampant among African-Americans, just as it is in Africa. So, it's partly cultural. This is the primary reason why almost half of new AIDS cases in the U.S. are among that population--gay sex is done on the "down low", which means, I think, below the radar (or from a state of denial).
There is a good post on this at the "reason and reverence" Blog
http://reasonandreverence.blogspot.com/2008/11/what-supporters-of-marriage-equality.html
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