Wow, North Carolina.

[XYlophonetreeZ]

So everyone's probably seen by now that there is a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage in my home state. No surprise that it passed, but still...

I feel like making a thread about gay marriage in a politics forum is almost like "What's your opinion on abortions," or like "What's your favorite Offspring song ? " would be in GOD, but it's topical so what the hell. I actually came back from my crazy road trip a day early just to vote against this bitch.

Basically everyone I know opposed the amendment, except for a few of the Christian Bible-thumpers from my incredibly small, incredibly Christian high school (about half of whom went to college and denounced everything and became rampant liberals, LOL). My facebook is absolutely blowing up right now, but I hate getting into debates on facebook so I've stayed silent. It does frustrate me to see overreactions to it, though. Stuff like "My state is so full of uninformed bigoted rednecks, bla bla bla I'm moving to San Francisco/Canada/Mars." I can't think of anything lamer than moving just to be around other people who already think exactly like you. You can find a community that suits you in any city so long as you're not lazy. Subcultures and counter-cultures exist everywhere, and they get more shit done than people who preach to the choir all the time.

If this had just been a vote on a bill to legalize gay marriage, and the "No" votes won, I wouldn't be upset at all right now. People turned out in pretty good numbers and a large number of people spoke strongly in favor of equality. But the thing is, this is an amendment. This was devised by a state senator (and widely known bigot) solely to make it more difficult for the next generation to legislate gay marriage. And he did it just in time, not mincing words, for the bill's supporters to still be alive.

Just earlier today I was in Asheville, NC. I didn't like it much- it's got some nice scenery around it, but the city itself is the perfect example of one of those places where people move to be around others who are exactly like them. But even though it's full of annoying hippie freaks, I appreciate that a place like that can exist in a southern state. NC also has a lot of universities and a few other liberal hubs, so I guess I'm semi-hopeful that the climate will improve enough to do something about this in the not-so-distant future, but I was kind of hopeful that that would have already happened. Harumph.

I probably wouldn't have even made this thread because it's not a very original debate topic, except I wanted to continue Sidewinder's thumbs-down-to-southern-states theme.

[WebDudette]

Didn't see this thread before creating mine, oops.

Saw this with the tagline 'Ignorance versus the future' on Facebook:



Checking again, Alec shared it! Anyway, you can see a really strong trend nationwide of younger generations being very pro-equality. It's only a matter of time before it's legalized nationwide, and when everything is said and done the opposition is going to look like fucking fools, and history is going to show them as a fucking embarrassment in the same way it shows people who were anti-interracial marriage and pro-segregation.

[Llamas]

Pilz, it's true in every state, every country - city/university towns are ALWAYS way more liberal than the surrounding areas. Older people, and people who just aren't very exposed are always more conservative. It was the same thing a few years ago when Wisconsin voted on gay marriage - it passed, and the only county that massively voted against it was Dane County, where the capital (and thus, UW) is.

What confused me about that map you posted, though, was that they mostly used sports logos. I was like, "College sports makes you ignorant?" lol. I get it now, but they should've used the general logos for the universities :P

Treez, I understand the sentiment toward people running away from shitty areas... an extreme example is when Africans become well-educated and successful, they leave Africa, rather than sticking around to try to help things there. Maybe if all the influential people didn't leave their troubled region, things would improve. However, I was ultra depressed in my home region (southeastern Wisconsin). Full of obese bible thumpers, racists, and homophobes. I just couldn't take it, and I did feel powerless to change it. Maybe I could've made a difference, but I booked it to Minnesota instead and became a much happier, better person. It's a tough decision, and I totally see your side of it.

[bighead384]

I visited Rush Limbaugh's site today, and I came across this:

I look around, I listen, and I see everywhere I look in the media that gay marriage, we had some guy call yesterday, try to advance this theory, "Hey, Rush, we're gaining on you. Yeah, 60-40. But pretty soon it's gonna be 50-50 and we're gonna overtake you." Okay, fine. I look around, I look at the news media, and no matter where I go, gay marriage, universally, overwhelmingly popular, in every poll I look at. The vast majority of the American people fully, unconditionally, eagerly, anticipatorily support gay marriage, and yet every damn time it's been on the ballot it loses in landslide numbers.

So I, El Rushbo, my finger to the grindstone, my ear to the pulse, and my nose, whatever smells best, am trying to figure this out. How can we have polling data touted by all the media which shows overwhelming national support, except in the black community, wherever you go, of gay marriage, and yet every time it's come up on the ballot, loses. It hasn't even come close to winning when it's put to a vote. It's just like Obama's likability numbers. The people that give him a job approval (unintelligible) support health care, 30%, 35% still support Obamacare. Sixty-five percent likability. Nothing gels here.

I guess he does kind of have a good point, or at least raises a question that I don't have the answer for. Why does gay marriage apparently do so much better in national polls, but often lose in states when it's put on the ballot?

[Llamas]

I guess he does kind of have a good point, or at least raises a question that I don't have the answer for. Why does gay marriage apparently do so much better in national polls, but often lose in states when it's put on the ballot?

Simple answer, actually. People vote in the polls. The polls show overwhelming support for gays. Supporters think it's in the bag, so they stay home. Those against gay marriage see that they're behind in the polls, so they go out in droves to vote. And they win. Happens a lot.

[bighead384]

Simple answer, actually. People vote in the polls. The polls show overwhelming support for gays. Supporters think it's in the bag, so they stay home. Those against gay marriage see that they're behind in the polls, so they go out in droves to vote. And they win. Happens a lot.

This may be true to some extent, but what is different about this scenario than with anything else? It's not like it's a general rule that when a view or candidate takes a lead in the polls, they lose on election day. There's got to be something about this issue in particular that is causing this effect. Or, perhaps it's possible that the national polls aren't giving an accurate picture, as Limbaugh seems to suggest.

[Llamas]

This may be true to some extent, but what is different about this scenario than with anything else? It's not like it's a general rule that when a view or candidate takes a lead in the polls, they lose on election day. There's got to be something about this issue in particular that is causing this effect. Or, perhaps it's possible that the national polls aren't giving an accurate picture, as Limbaugh seems to suggest.

Because bigots against gay marriage feel EXTRA strong about this. Presidents don't usually bring out this kind of hatred and intense emotion. There aren't nearly as many people out there who HATE Obama with a fiery burning passion where they'd like to see him die, as there are people who feel that way about gays.

[Sidewinder]

My university is actually incredibly conservative, relatively speaking. I wouldn't be surprised if the bill would have passed had just my university voted, hypothetically speaking.

[mario_spaghettio]

Did anybody hear about the guy who got fucked to death by a horse? Crazy.

[XYlophonetreeZ]

Simple answer, actually. People vote in the polls. The polls show overwhelming support for gays. Supporters think it's in the bag, so they stay home. Those against gay marriage see that they're behind in the polls, so they go out in droves to vote. And they win. Happens a lot.

It's funny because the reverse scenario of that is exactly what failed to happen in NC. All of the polls in NC were in favor of the amendment passing, and the margin was pretty close to the actual one. I was actually hoping, since even the local media is pretty liberal for the most part, that they'd really make those poll numbers known and that supporters would get complacent while opponents would get serious and vote, but that didn't seem to happen. Hell, churches around here bussed people out to the precincts.

I've seen that map a bazillion times by now and it kind of pisses me off, mainly for the elitist claim beneath it. An opponent would just spin that as indoctrination. Which is amusing and ridiculous because of course, no matter which way people vote, it largely depends on who's the loudest voices in your ears, and in most of the other counties that would be the pastor at church. Really though, it's much more of a generational thing, and it's not necessary to make a big deal about being more educated. I personally agree with it, but emphasizing that aspect is only going to divide people further. Universities equal higher concentrations of young people, and furthermore, young people who are around diverse groups of other young people. Even if you look at the comments on your average trashy, white-bread American web-based news story related to gay rights (think Yahoo, Fox, or basically anything on Youtube), and the visitors (who are presumably younger) tend to be pretty pro-gay-rights. Yet if you look at other stories on the same sites, of course the same people spout out a bunch of racist, zealously anti-Obama, and libertarian shit. It's a pretty interesting ideological shift we're seeing in this generation.

Now, there are a few college towns that didn't vote against, and one county (Chatham, which contains a lot of suburban spillover from the Durham area which is NC's most liberal) that did despite no major universities. You'll note the glaring absences of ECU and Wake Forest, which are both notoriously conservative (the latter is also a small university in a fairly large city that has thrived on tobacco money forever, which is a pretty damn conservative industry. Hell, "Winston" and "Salem" are both the names of cigarette companies!) But the map does paint a pretty telling overall picture. You can't quite ascribe it to being more of a big city thing either. Winston-Salem and Fayetteville didn't vote for it (both super conservative areas), and, most interestingly to me, Watauga County (home of Appalachian State) did. That's a very small county with no big cities, and App State doesn't even have a reputation for being particularly liberal.

Asheville's also a smaller city, but I could have told you in advance that it probably would have voted for a pro-horse-fucking amendment. Seriously thought, everyone these days grows up knowing someone who's gay, and thankfully a lot of people are realizing that they're not destroying society. I think it's just a matter of time, hopefully less than 10 years, before enough people die that we can win votes like these.