How is same-sex marriage able to pass?

[Clarko95 📚💰📈]

The 2012 exit polling proved that Hispanics and even African-Americans were more supportive of SSM than Whites.

Last year, Pew had 50% of whites supporting SSM vs. 38% of blacks.

Yes, but of the poll of African-Americans who actually voted in 2012, the majority of them support SSM.

Then, maybe it's between 38% and a majority.  It's very dynamic as it is with the general population.  Maybe last year it was 45% of blacks, and this year it's 49%, who knows.  But, it is less support than among white Democrats which is what I said originally.  And, that makes sense because black culture is more hostile to homosexuality than white culture.

Well it's also that the same people who were polled and said "no" may not have been the exact same people who voted for legalization. Polling, while generally accurate, can't always predict turnout, enthusiasm/intensity, or how people will always vote once in the voting booth.

[Badger]

The "minorities are opposed to gay marriage" myth is getting tiresome.





(Black protestants, for obvious reasons, are less supportive of same-sex marriage than the Black community as a whole)

Can someone please tell me who these "unaffiliateds" (who I assume to be agnostic/atheist) are that oppose gay marriage?  WTF? 

My father is an agnostic and a conservative Republican. He's more apathetic than moderate on most social issues (economics is the driving force of his conservatism), but he opposes (nominally rather than with any passion) gay marriage on the sheer principle of "tradition" for thousands of years of Western Civilization, etc. My mother is very active in the Pittsburgh arts community, and they (including my father) have a number of gay friends and acquaintances. My father also doesn't oppose civil unions for some reason. I'll also add that it's been at least a year or two since we last had that discussion, and I suspect he might've shifted along with the recent groundswell (or at least isn't as opposed as he surely can see the writing on the wall).

That's really the best explanation I can give. Chalk it up to conservatives having an instinctual reaction against liberalism/change. Not all agnostics/atheists are social liberals, or even moderates.

[Non Swing Voter]

Something that was on my mind. I am certainly in support of it, but demographically it doesn't seem to add up.

The votes on this are usually a partisan breakdown. Even in states with liberal GOPs you don't get overwhelming GOP votes, and even if you do, those states are liberal enough to be able to do it with just the Democrats.

Furthermore, minorities tend to be in opposition to same-sex marriage. Evem minority Democrats are overwhelmingly opposed to it. That is a huge portion of Democratic politicians.

Basically, my point is that the group of voting politicians that the base of the support comes from is primarily white liberals. How many states outside of New England have enough white liberals to pass bills with just that?

It sounds really dumb because the issue has progressed so much and I probably am overthinking and overgeneralizing, but I still think it is a legitimate question.

Why do you think minorities are in opposition?  Currently it seems like this is only the case for African Americans, while hispanics are about evenly split and Asians tend to favor gay marriage like white liberals.

If you look at Maryland, which has a huge minority population and voted in favor of gay marriage, it's clear that gay marriage had majority support from white liberals + moderates + urban minorities.  Gay marriage won strongly in the Montgomery DC burbs that have high minority populations (mixed among blacks, hispanics, and asians). 

While gay marriage lost in black precincts in and around baltimore, it seems it did not lose by huge margins.

Also, it seems like the Maryland results indicate that highly educated (i.e., liberal) areas voted in larger numbers on the issue whereas other precincts that would tend to oppose gay marriage didn't vote at the same rate on the issue.