College-educated whites- social issues

[Fwillb21]

This is a question about the suburban, college-educated whites who have been trending Democratic since Trump took office.

From personal experience, do you find the majority of this demographic to be liberal, moderate, or conservative on issues such as immigration, LGBT rights, etc?

[100% pro-life no matter what]

Where I live, it's much more conservative than other places because of religiosity, but I would say that the bigger issue nationally for the GOP is that they are not culturally conservative, not that they are not socially conservative.  That's especially evident in that many suburbs had no problem with social conservatism from the GOP for decades, but flipped en masse when the GOP started to focus on cultural conservatism.

[Del Tachi]

Certainly the suburban areas swinging away from Trump are not Evangelical strongholds, but they aren't necessarily socially liberal either.  There's nothing socially liberal about having all the "cool" positions on gender or reproductive rights and then sending your kids to a private or heavily segregated public school.

My upbringing in a small, "Evangelical" Southern town was way more diverse than other people my age I knew who grew up in suburban Nashville or Atlanta. 

 

[Skill and Chance]

Where I live, it's much more conservative than other places because of religiosity, but I would say that the bigger issue nationally for the GOP is that they are not culturally conservative, not that they are not socially conservative.  That's especially evident in that many suburbs had no problem with social conservatism from the GOP for decades, but flipped en masse when the GOP started to focus on cultural conservatism.

What do you mean by culturally vs. socially conservative?  Attitudes on e.g. gay rights have shifted seismically in the college+ demographic over the past 15 years and college+ as a whole appears to lean pro-choice vs. non-college.  Some of this is Millennials growing up and moving to the suburbs, but it also looks like a lot of people really changed their minds.   

The one major issue on which college+ suburbs still strike me as socially conservative is monogamy/waiting until marriage to have kids, and Democrats are probably better positioned to appeal to suburban voters on those issues post-Trump and MeToo.

[Tekken_Guy]

I don’t really see a difference between social and cultural conservatism. I do believe the suburbs are quickly moving left on those issues and Trump has accelerated that trend.

[darklordoftech]

This is a question about the suburban, college-educated whites who have been trending Democratic since Trump took office.

From personal experience, do you find the majority of this demographic to be liberal, moderate, or conservative on issues such as immigration, LGBT rights, etc?

A willingness to switch suggests that they’re moderates.

[darklordoftech]

Where I live, it's much more conservative than other places because of religiosity, but I would say that the bigger issue nationally for the GOP is that they are not culturally conservative, not that they are not socially conservative.  That's especially evident in that many suburbs had no problem with social conservatism from the GOP for decades, but flipped en masse when the GOP started to focus on cultural conservatism.

What do you mean by culturally vs. socially conservative?

Socially conservative = religious, anti-abortion, homophobic, anti-single-parenthood, etc.

Culturally conservative = anti-immigration, dislikes hearing languages other than the historical language of their country being spoken, thinks Obama is a Muslim born in Kenya, etc.

[Stranger in a strange land]

Where I live, it's much more conservative than other places because of religiosity, but I would say that the bigger issue nationally for the GOP is that they are not culturally conservative, not that they are not socially conservative.  That's especially evident in that many suburbs had no problem with social conservatism from the GOP for decades, but flipped en masse when the GOP started to focus on cultural conservatism.

What do you mean by culturally vs. socially conservative?  Attitudes on e.g. gay rights have shifted seismically in the college+ demographic over the past 15 years and college+ as a whole appears to lean pro-choice vs. non-college.  Some of this is Millennials growing up and moving to the suburbs, but it also looks like a lot of people really changed their minds.   

The one major issue on which college+ suburbs still strike me as socially conservative is monogamy/waiting until marriage to have kids, and Democrats are probably better positioned to appeal to suburban voters on those issues post-Trump and MeToo.

Nearly everyone over 35 who supports gay marriage has changed their mind on the issue at some point, so there's that to consider.

[tallguy23]

They're pretty liberal on social issues. If they vote Republican it's because of taxes.

Having said that, we are getting to a place where LGBT rights won't be considered liberal or conservative. It'l be status quo.

[Wazza [INACTIVE]]

“College educated whites” is a very broad group and isn’t really a proper source of identity in the same way that being an African American, an LGBT or an Evangelical Christian is. The politics of UMC evangelicals in Williamson County, TN are generally going to be vastly different from the politics of yuppies in Manhattan. How college educated whites vote is shaped by core sources of identity like religion, specific ethnicity, regional economic factors, age distribution, etc.

[Person Man]

Where I live, it's much more conservative than other places because of religiosity, but I would say that the bigger issue nationally for the GOP is that they are not culturally conservative, not that they are not socially conservative.  That's especially evident in that many suburbs had no problem with social conservatism from the GOP for decades, but flipped en masse when the GOP started to focus on cultural conservatism.

What do you mean by culturally vs. socially conservative?

Socially conservative = religious, anti-abortion, homophobic, anti-single-parenthood, etc.

Culturally conservative = anti-immigration, dislikes hearing languages other than the historical language of their country being spoken, thinks Obama is a Muslim born in Kenya, etc.

So the Religious Right vs Alt-Right. If I had to guess, there isn't much beyond their intersect.