---

Comments, possibly informed.

Tim Wilson
Daytona Beach, Florida, USA
timatollah@mackandtim.net
Personal Homepage
Professional Homepage

 
New Gallup Poll

The Gallup Organization has a new poll out about USAns attitudes towards homosexuality. Overall, it supports the idea that the trend is towards acceptance, non-discrimination, and recognition of our relationships, even to the point of social-security benefits for the surviving partner of a same-sex couple.

The summary, following some Blogger introduced white space:

Homosex legal?	Yes: 60%	No: 35%	Don't know: 5%
Equal job rights	Yes: 88%	No: 9%	Don't know: 1%
Acceptable lifestyle	Yes: 54%	No: 43%
Why homo?	Born: 38%	Made: 44%	Both: 11%
Civil unions?	For: 49%	Against: 49%	No opinion: 2%
Equivalent benefits to marriage?	For: 62%	Against: 35%	No opinion: 3%

Note that on the questions of legality, equal employment rights, and equivalent benefits to marriage, the numbers indicate strong, if not overwhelming, support for those ideas.

Even though I know nothing should surprise me, the one about why homo gives me some pause. I guess what's really bothersome is that people would think they know why other people are the way they are, when there's so much evidence that we're only beginning to understand the reasons, long-term evolutionary and short-term over the events of our lives, that we are who we are.

Gallup's press release include graphs showing the evolution of opinion on these subjects. For instance, the data regarding legality of homosex is presented as follows:


There's similar presentation for some of the other questions that have a history of being asked.

(Link to Gallup from Andrew Sullivan.)
posted by Tim Wilson at 8:25 AM