
The PEW Reseach Center published 13 May 2011 shows an increasing
majority of the population favours the acceptance of GLBT. The will
of the people should be respected by the various states who would in
the next decade be increasingly under pressure to repeal of the laws passed
previously against gay marriage. It seems that all the effort of
Christian Right against gays in the legislature will come sliding
down soon.
On the question on whether gays should be accepted, a large majority
of 58% was in the affirmative, with 33% against, and 8% undecided.
In the next few years, it is unlikely that the steadfast opposition
would change but the undecided would like follow the trend of
accepting gays pushing acceptance over the 60% mark.
Perhaps crucial to the future trends is the 18 to 29 years old with
69% accepting gays. The 30 to 39 years old is just above the average
with 59% acceptance. In the next decade, based on this trend,the 30
to 39 years will jump to at least 69% or higher pushing the overall
acceptance well above 60% (from current 58%).
The last bastion of opposition is the Protestant white evangelicals
with only 29% accepting. Coincidentally in a 2008 pew survey
question "Which religions lead to eternal life?", a total of 35% of
the same white evangelicals say "yes" with regards to people with no
religious faith. ie being anti-gay is now so much a core of the
evangelicals beyond the Gospel message.
Another surprising stats is that college grads are 67%
accepting versus 26% un-accepting which means that the focus should
be education, educating Christians what the bible actually says
versus what was preached to them. The increasing insight and
reflection on how badly the bible has been mis-translated and
mis-interpreted to be ant-gay may play a major role to persuade the
undecided 10%.
The younger generations are however educated not by biblical
reflection, but by more gay friends coming out at a younger age,
their rock stars coming out of the closets as gays, and the
increasingly positive message about gays at schools. It is however
hard to change beyond 50 years. The anti-gay position of white
evangelicals of 29% accepting was effectively balanced by 65% of the
White mainline Protestant and 66% of White Catholic being affirming.
The strong anti-gay sentiment in the Singaporean Christian church is
due to a large majority of evangelicals especially in the mainline
Anglican and Methodist church. There are very few moderate/liberal
mainline Protestants as compared to America.
The rejection of gays by the white evangelicals has a strong impact
on the Republicans poor overall acceptance of Gays at 40% versus the
Democrates at 67%. However, any move to the right will
alienate the younger and moderate/liberal voters. There are now two
gay affirmative groups in the Republican party - the Log Cabin
Republicans and GOProud. The recent attempt to repeal Pop 8 in
California for example was spear headed in part by Ted Olson, a
Replublican who was the former solicitor general for President Bush.
The grass roots action by the Republicans supporting gays is a game
changer to tip the balance.
We are on a verge of a "slippery" slope of public opinion sliding
towards acceptance of gays. With the news of one country after
another in South America allowing gay marriage, the tide and call
for change gets stronger each day, It gets louder each time gay
singers such as Adam Lambert, and Clay Aiken performs on stage. It
gets better each time Lady Gaga voices her support for basic gay
rights. Getting married is not a special right reserved for the
straight people only but a fundamental right for all to fall in love
to whom we chose.
It really gets better all the time.
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