Are people under 35 who oppose gay marriage typically unintelligent generally?

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I honestly have never met a well-spoken and well-accomplished person who is 18-34 and who opposes gay marriage.  Maybe the smart ones are just good at hiding their bigotry, but it seems like every Doctor/Lawyer/Engineer is fully on board with gay marriage.  I've definitely met a few people who bag groceries who do not support it though.

Maybe living in NOVA influences this.  Thank God Virginia is now a blue state.

Nothing like some good old fashioned classism from our red avatar'd friends.

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No, and this absurd obsession about SSM support being the great litmus test of "modern" or "enlightened" political views has passed the annoying level and is now starting to look increasingly sinister.

The real problem I have with shaming anti-SSM advocates is not really the shaming itself, but the fact that the same people who speak so passionately about the rightfulness of SSM support and the evil of SSM opponents would never even think about doing the same for other issues (such as economic redistribution), which, let's face it, are infinitely more important.

Completely agree (especially with the bolded part), I have never really gotten the opposition to SSM, mostly because I don't give a f**k about how other people choose to live their lives as long as it don't effect me, but I think the obsession  among some librals to make SSM support the "the great litmus" are disgusting, especially as they mix it (as the person starting this thread) with classism.

Liberalism is classist by nature, so I don't think we should be surprised in that regard.

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No, and this absurd obsession about SSM support being the great litmus test of "modern" or "enlightened" political views has passed the annoying level and is now starting to look increasingly sinister.

The real problem I have with shaming anti-SSM advocates is not really the shaming itself, but the fact that the same people who speak so passionately about the rightfulness of SSM support and the evil of SSM opponents would never even think about doing the same for other issues (such as economic redistribution), which, let's face it, are infinitely more important.

Completely agree (especially with the bolded part), I have never really gotten the opposition to SSM, mostly because I don't give a f**k about how other people choose to live their lives as long as it don't effect me, but I think the obsession  among some librals to make SSM support the "the great litmus" are disgusting, especially as they mix it (as the person starting this thread) with classism.

If someone tells me, you don't deserve equal rights because of your sexual orientation, that's far more personal than having differing beliefs about a political issue like taxation.  I know it may be hard to understand for straight folks, but it's not easy having people tell you that you're a second class citizen.  I don't think I should have to accept that as legitimate viewpoint.

How can you separate having different beliefs about taxation and not deserving equal rights because of your sexual orientation? What's the dividing line? Taxation and the distribution of income in a society (as well as who owns the way that income is generated) are just as much equal rights issues as those pertaining to sexual orientation, and effect far, far, more people. This isn't to say we should minimize the struggles of LGBTQ people. It is to say, however, that where these homophobic beliefs lie should be analyzed and inspected deeper. Why do people hold homophobic views? For the vast majority of people posting in this thread, that doesn't matter, because people holding views contrary to their own are self-evidently evil. Liberals treat this as an individual failing, rather than what homophobia is and what it actually represents, which is a societal failing to fully educate its population.

Homophobia won't be stopped by forcing homophobes out of prominent positions. Like racism, it'll simply go underground and the words used to express homophobic ideas will change. Homophobia will only end if the system of exploitation which creates inequities in education (so as to provide a cheap and docile labor force for said system) and other public facilities, are totally ended. We hear a lot about same-sex marriage, and there's been definite progress on that front, but we should not kid ourselves into thinking that homophobia will wither away once LGBTQ Americans can marry.

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"Reasonable people" can disagree over whether or not 9/10ths of mankind should live a miserable, dreadful, and decrepit existence, but they cannot disagree on sexual orientation? Perhaps you should go one step further and make the (much more logical) argument that "reasonable people" can instead disagree only over the course of how that 9/10ths of mankind be freed from the drudgery of daily life. I don't think it's a stretch to say that if someone is a capitalist or supports capitalism, that that belief or their actions as such are an attack upon almost all mankind in the same manner that you're describing homophobic or racist belief as an attack upon you personally.

But I understand that we live in a complicated world that is, with few exceptions, the result of forces set in motion by the relationship all of us have with one another. And so I have friends that are capitalists, friends that are socialists, and friends that hold bigoted views or make bigoted remarks from time to time (including a good deal of my family). The fact that such bigotry and such misplaced or misdirected anger at certain groups of society by other groups within that society exists is unfortunate and should be remedied with education and dialogue between said groups, not by shutting people out entirely and denigrating them as social outcasts because of supposed individual failings. Homophobia, racism, sexism, etc, etc. should not and cannot be boiled down to the failings of individuals, because the individuals who display these behaviors, with few exceptions, got those as a result of some kind of social failure. Maybe their schools weren't very good. Maybe they were purposefully taught wrong so as to keep them from collaborating with others (this is especially true in the South, where white and black were kept separate for fear of their unity undermining the established way of things). Maybe they haven't been exposed to the realities of homophobia, what it does to people, how it affects people, etc, etc. It is very naive and very shortsighted to regard these as the problems of individuals, rather than as the problems of society at-large.

I don't disagree about the need to create safe spaces. I think that it's very important that we eliminate official bigotry and official homophobia insofar as possible. We need workplace protections for LGBTQ Americans. We need homeless shelters for LGBTQ youth cast out by their homophobic parents. We need to allow same-sex couples to marry and adopt children. But we don't need to lose sight of the fact that even with all these things, homophobia will not vanish overnight. The only way you're going to truly eliminate homophobia is to eliminate the overarching system of exploitation that employs homophobia to its own ends (as it also employs racism, sexism, and other bigotries).

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Classism is not equivalent to racism/sexism/homophobia for one simple reason: you can change your class, you can't change your race, gender, or sexuality.

Of course, it's getting harder and harder to move upward in class. But it's still possible. And of course it will always be possible to move downward, just blow all your money on drugs and prostitutes.

Sure, if you win the lottery. The vast majority of people do not change their class position throughout their lifetime, and such is true throughout the history of human civilization.

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I have met few people who have moved from the working class into the capitalist class, because nearly everyone I know falls into the former category, rather than the latter. My social circle is largely confined to working class people; I can only off the top of my head name a few people that I know that are petit bourgeois business owners, and no persons that are actual members of the bourgeoisie, that is, folks who live primarily off of investments. This shouldn't be surprising, given the area that I live in and the fact that most Americans are working class.

'Winning the lottery' is an expression, but it is not without merit, given that success in capitalist society is almost wholly based upon luck, rather than actual merit.