Prop 8 and Minority Voter Turnout

[tbredbeck]

I'm highly suspicious when news outlets start claiming that the increased minority (read 'black') turnout for Barack Obama somehow caused Prop 8 to pass in California. It sounds like a diversion and, I'm guessing, isn't nearly as simple as it's being portrayed.

Here's a post from the 538 website about the voting there: http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/2008/11/prop-8-myths.html

Key excerpts:

... the notion that Prop 8 passed because of the Obama turnout surge is silly. Exit polls suggest that first-time voters -- the vast majority of whom were driven to turn out by Obama (he won 83 percent of their votes) -- voted against Prop 8 by a 62-38 margin. More experienced voters voted for the measure 56-44, however, providing for its passage.

And from farther down in the post:

At the end of the day, Prop 8's passage was more a generational matter than a racial one. If nobody over the age of 65 had voted, Prop 8 would have failed by a point or two. It appears that the generational splits may be larger within minority communities than among whites, although the data on this is sketchy.

:grouphug:

[Phredicles]

1. So you can say about your Yes on 8 voter, as was once said of Mr. Burns,

"He's bad, but he'll die. So I like it.":P

[tbredbeck]

2. Sad but true

Sure looks that way. Too bad that's what it takes...

[David__77]

3. It's what I've always said: attrition will solve this problem.

Older people tend to be anti-gay, relatively speaking. Not all, but certainly more than younger people. In ten years even, the audience for the fearmongering will drop off precipitously. It simply won't work because it will seem ludicrous.