Trends

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

An interesting finding in recent polling on social issues. I'll let this piece give the details:

Americans are now evenly split on same-sex marriage: 47 percent support marriage rights for gays and lesbians, and 47 percent oppose them. That stalemate won't last long—critics of gay unions are dying off. According to a new report from the Public Religion Research Institute, only 31 percent of Americans over age 65 support gays getting hitched, compared to 62 percent of Americans under 30.

But strong millennial support for gay marriage has not translated into an uptick in acceptance of other sexual freedoms, like the right to an abortion. The Public Religion Research Institute notes that popular support for keeping abortion legal has dipped a percentage point since 1999, and young Americans are not swelling the ranks of abortion rights supporters. Today, while 57 percent of people under 30 see gay sex as "morally acceptable," only 46 percent of them would say the same thing about having an abortion.

The institute calls this a "decoupling of attitudes." Support for same-sex marriage and abortion rights have traditionally gone hand-in-hand, and that's changing. Though young people today are "more educated, more liberal, and more likely to be religiously unaffiliated" than their parents—all factors traditionally correlated with support of abortion rights—they are not actually more likely to support abortion.

The article goes on to give some reasons as to why this decoupling is occurring, but I believe the issue is much more simple than that - gay marriage, as it is, has been a reality for millennials (folks ages 19-29) for most of their politically/socially aware lives now, and they see quite clearly how the issue really doesn't matter - gay people getting married doesn't impact their straight marriages, or their lives at all, really. There's no harm involved. The difference with abortion is that the harm involved remains self-evident - at the end of the day, we know how many abortions occur, and such "decoupling," as it were, likely reflects that difference. I also speculate that many do not see the abortion issue as one of "rights," but rather one of life. That those who self-identify as pro-life remains competitive ideologically with those who self-identify as pro-choice for the first time in a while may be a sign of that.

Why do you think these issues are separating? Should they truly be falling under the same social umbrella? What am I missing here?

Comments

[prog-expat.livejournal.com]

Our Supreme Court also took a stance on it: if it can't survive outside the mother's body then it's part of her body and her right to privacy makes it none of the government's business if she aborts or not. The only reason there's a question mark is that some can't leave well enough alone and keep trying to spray-paint a question mark on the issue.

[blue-mangos.livejournal.com]

But did they actually define fetal personhoood? See, this is the reason Canada has no abortion laws to tamper with as there is no possible criminal act that can be involved when there is only one person involved.

Several individuals and a couple of governmnents, in 99 and I believe 08 tried to topple this ruling but our Court shuts them down every time.

[prog-expat.livejournal.com]

Is there a difference between "it's part of her body" and "it's not a person"?

[blue-mangos.livejournal.com]

Yes. Here, even though they also recognize that the rights of the women involved weigh more heavily they also took the stance on when a fetus becomes a person. Two totally separate issues yet only the latter keeps abortion laws off the books.