A surprisingly good number
Who among us doesn’t forensically comb opinion poll data in search of evidence to support our pre-existing world-view? I know I do. And here’s a cracker from CNN Opinion Research, released on Sunday. First, the question:
22. Some people think the government should promote traditional values in our society. Others think the government should not favor any particular set of values. Which comes closer to your own view?
This is a very starkly framed proposition that seems to me heavily loaded in favour of the first option. ”Promote traditional values” is so warm and fuzzy — not to mention perfectly aligned to our perceptions of redneck America — when contrasted with the misanthropic-seeming alternative. “Not favoring any particular set of values” comes across as something a French intellectual might say while drinking a coffee, smoking a cigarette and bonking someone to whom he is not married but someone else is.
Now the results (June 2010):
Promote traditional values 46%
No particular set of values 50%
No opinion 4%
Contrast this with the same question posed in 2008:
Promote traditional values 57%
No particular set of values 41%
No opinion 2%
This earns a major wow from me.
The traditional values crowd has gone from a +16 advantage in 2008, the year America elected someone President who pretty much disagrees with them to a -4 deficit today. A 20 point turn-around in favor of — let’s not beat around the (non-George) bush — homosexuals and atheists like me.
P.S. The picture above is not me. My hand-painting skills are not nearly as advanced.
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[...] “values” crowd went from a 16 point advantage in 2008 to a 4 point deficit now. Twenty points. Three short years. Who would have thought even a decade ago that we would [...]