The Deciding Factors

The less educated and the most religious voted for the same-sex marriage ban.

Evangelicals and people who did not attend college were the main population segments who voted against gay marriage in California this past November, says a poll conducted by the Public Policy Institute of California, a private, nonprofit, nonpartisan organization dedicated to informing and improving state public policy. The poll was based on a survey of 2,003 California voters in the November 4 election.

While early reports stated that the large number of African American voters this election might have been responsible for the ban, the new findings state that race was not a major factor in the passing of Proposition 8, banning same-sex marriage. In fact, just over half of non-white voters (57 percent) favored the ban, meaning that 43 percent voted against it.

Age, also a variable which some considered a possible influence, was also not a particularly strong factor, with 56 percent of those age 55 voting to ban gay marriage, and 42 percent voting to allow it.

Religion, specifically, degree of devotion, influenced voter attitudes more than race or age. The vast majority of self-identified evangelical Christians voted to ban same-sex marriage (85 percent), as did two-thirds of Protestants (66 percent) and 60 percent of Catholics. 

“There are at least two elements to religion—the type: Methodist, Baptist, Jewish, Catholic, Muslim, and so on— and the degree of religiosity. [This is] measured, for instance, by reported strength and extent of religious belief, how frequently one prays, attends church, how much one donates to a church or religious causes, [and so forth],”  explains Paul Lachelier, political sociologist and assistant professor at Stetson University in DeLand, Florida.

“Degree of religiosity shapes perception and behavior more than does type of religion,” he adds.  “Thus, a Christian who believes the Bible should be read literally, prays every day and attends church on Saturdays and Sundays, is more likely to vote against gay marriage than a Christian who rarely prays or attends church, and who believes the Bible should not be read literally.”

John H. Evans, associate professor of sociology at the University of California at San Diego specializes in the sociology of religion, and the sociology of culture, among other areas. While Lachelier says that degree of religiosity, not the type of religion, shapes the attitudes toward same-sex marriage, Evans maintains that some religions have ingrained anti-gay rhetoric into their cultures.

“In the US there are certain religious traditions which have officially been opposed to homosexuality while others have not,” he says. “The official positions within Catholicism and evangelicalism are against it.”

Evans notes that religions such as Judaism and other world religions have not taken an official stance against same-sex marriage.

“Why do evangelicals interpret the Bible to say that homosexuality is wrong?” Evans says. “Because for Christians the Bible is fairly silent about homosexuality, so this remains a cultural belief that they have turned to a religious belief.”

Evans cites Bob Jones University, the South Carolina-based fundamentalist Christian college that until only nine years ago, had banned interracial dating and had not admitted black students until 1971. In November, the university issued an apology for these practices, citing “culture,” not religion, as the force that shaped these racist policies.

Bob Jones University, Evans contends, used bigoted cultural mores and integrated them into their religious traditions, which is what many who voted against same-sex marriage, citing their religious beliefs, did on November 4. Banning same-sex marriage, Evans argues, would be like banning interracial marriage.

Educational level also played a factor in the Prop 8 vote, the study found. The majority of those who did not attend college (69 percent) voted against same-sex marriage rights.

“The general pattern with education is that the more one has, the more tolerant one becomes of social differences, and conversely, the less education one has, the less tolerant one tends to be,” Lachelier tells demo dirt. 

In fact, Evans notes, even among evangelicals, the most educated members of that group would be the most tolerant. “Say I went to a southern Baptist church, classically evangelical. In terms of degree of education, the most educated are the most liberal about things like homosexuality,” he says.

Doctors and lawyers in the group would be more accepting of homosexuality because they are more educated, Evans says, although they would most likely still hold conservative values overall.

Why are the highly educated more tolerant than the less educated? The nature of education, Lachelier says, involves progression, expressing skepticism, and generally questioning the status quo.

“Conservatism is to believe in what you have, believe in what you have, and to reject the new. The idea is to conserve what you have,” he explains. “Academic enterprise questions our values and traditions; while it does support values, it nurtures the pursuit of questions, to seek answers. Education is fundamentally liberal in the sense that it increases tolerance.”

“The academic enterprise generally, particularly in the social sciences, encourages us to ask questions,” Lachelier adds. “With more fundamental to conservative political viewpoints there is a conviction in truth, the truth, and other points of view are wrong. This way of thinking is antithetical to the academic enterprise, which tends to be more skeptical, so there is a fundamental difference in philosophies.”

Another factor which accounts for the tolerance gap between those of different educational levels is that in many cases, students go away to university, and are placed in living situations and classrooms with a diverse group of peers, in many cases a group far more diverse than what they were exposed to in their hometowns, both experts agree.

“Most colleges teach people to view human relationships and human beings as equal,” Evans adds. “In actuality the entire nature of education presumes that we are individuals of equal worth, something that students learn almost subconsciously. We may not talk about homosexuality specifically, but essentially, in sociology we teach people that individuals in society should be treated equally.”