Americans are becoming increasingly more liberal across several moral issues. According to a new Gallup study, a record high percentage of Americans are now accepting of same-sex relationships, having a baby outside of marriage and premarital sex between men and women.
Sixty-three percent of Americans now say they are accepting of same-sex couples. Only 40 percent felt that way in 2001. The 23-point jump in just 14 years marks the greatest shift in opinion to the left out of any issue Gallup measured in the survey.
Substantial progression to the left has also occurred on having a child out of wedlock. Today, 61 percent report that they are comfortable with the idea, a 16-point increase from when Gallup last asked the question in 2001. When it comes to premarital sex between men and women, 68 percent of Americans now see it as morally acceptable, compared to 53 percent in 2001.
Moral acceptance of divorce and stem cell research has also jumped by 12 points, reaching 71 percent and 64 percent respectively. By slightly lesser margins, Americans have also grown more accepting of issues such as polygamy and cloning humans. Still, these issues are seen as morally acceptable by less than one-sixth of the population.
Americans aren’t just growing liberal on specific issues, they are becoming more liberal in general. For the first time since Gallup began asking the question 16 years ago, an equal number of Americans now identify as socially liberal and socially conservative. This reflects a trend since 1999 of a growing number of Americans self-identifying as liberal, according to Gallup.
Gallup surveyed 1,024 adults between May 6-10 via live interviews on landlines and cell phones.
There are lots of surprises here. The biggest surprise is that 29% of the respondents didn’t approve of pre-maritial sex. Seriously. Do 29% of the people in America disapprove of sex before marriage? I know parents don’t want their 14 year old kids involved in sexual encounters but with consenting adults? How bizarre. I find that not only strange but also unbelievable.
Why are Americans becoming more socially liberal? Have the times just desensitized us? Has divorce become so common-place that we just assume that marriage doesn’t protect children? Your thoughts please!
I ponder, at least with regards to same-sex relationships, divorce and child out of wedlock, it is not so much “becoming liberial” as more a shift to becoming social norms. And they have become a norm as time has shown the negative stigmas of the past have not played out.
The sucess of single parents raising children who became successful in their own right fits into both the children of divorce and the out of wedlock. Lots of examples out there, to include childern of divorce who had one or the other parent end the marriage because of an abusive situation.
And as for same-sex marriage, the examples of succesful couples – to include those parenting and raising children, are providing evidence in the social norm aspect that the view that only heterosexual marriage is the standard for childrearing.
As for marriage protecting children: No, it doesn’t and there are examples upon examples. Look at Bill Clinton’s history as an example. His Father ran off leaving his Mother; his Step-Father was abusive toward the Mother and two Brothers. And he is the first example of many that came to my head.
I also ponder the change in defining the words “liberal” and “conservative”…both have become lost over time in what their original definitions meant because of the politcal bandwagons. I hand it to Gallup who at least clearly defines what they mean by each word when they do their survey.
I agree about using the words liberal and conservative. They have lost their meaning. Both terms are now dog whistles.
Clarifiying: My paragraph on same-sex marriage should read that the
“evidence in the social norm aspect that the view that only heterosexual marriage is the standard for childbearing may not be the standard as the years progress”.
Typing faster than proofreading does not always work well in expressing a thought 🙂
Pendulum is swinging. When the aging baby boomers became set in their ways the social conservatives tried to use that political power to enforce an overly strict morality. People pushed back on several fronts in the name of personal and religious freedom. The Social conservatives upped the ante by claiming religious freedom allows them to discriminate against others who didn’t hold the correct moral or religious views. The bombastic rhetoric against gays, Muslims, immigrants and the poor is harsh and uncaring and many people simply don’t want to be associated with a brand that could just as soon turn on them with such anger.
Liberal is the new anti-conservative rather than conservative the anti-liberal. Eventually we will reach decadence–excessive liberalism– and conservatisms will rise again. Meanwhile we can enjoy fighting against or promoting progressive instead of regressive changes in society.
In some respects I think we have become overly permissive. There are very few social standards that to me, are a part of good manners rather than any political movement.
I am tired of seeing commericials for erectile disfunction, painful post-menapausal intercourse, feminine products and bears using toilet paper while I am eating my lunch. Back in the day, all those things were personal discussions, not something you blared out in the middle of social gatherings.
People talk like they are in a locker room regardless of where they are.
I wouldn’t read a whole lot into this poll. At the beginning of this year, there were several studies that showed the electorate becoming MORE “conservative” on almost every issue, except for a couple: Gay Marriage, Legalization of Marijuana & Prostitution. The studies indicated that there is a “conservative” shift on the issues of abortion restrictions, and 2nd Amendment issues, property rights, and the proper role of government.
The studies also noted that those that identified as “conservative” were less likely to identify with a party, than those who self-identified as liberals were.
If anything, I’d say that the electorate (and society) is becoming more “Libertarian”, and I think this trend will continue. Both parties will lose the ability to claim some ideological turf that have been associated with each, respectively.
Here’s an example of what I am talking about: http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2014/01/more_states_are_quietly_becoming_republican.html
A poll is a “point-in-time” snapshot, and can be affected by any number of variables, both external and structural. One of the longitudinal measures political scientists use is the “Policy Mood Index” overseen by James A Stimson from UNC. According to this study, the electorate is swinging back to the “right” on most issues, except same-sex marriage, and marijuana legalization. On almost every major issue (my core issue included) the electorate is moving to the right. But I still think that as the millennial generation becomes more influential, “conservatives” will become “Libertarians” and the “liberals” will become “progressive/populists”.
But I have to agree with Moon: I think we’ve become too permissive. I’ve also concluded that I have an “old soul”.
Its not as if we have much choice, is it?
The media floods our culture with liberal social memes.
The courts forbid free speech and free association.
We will be made to care.
Statistics and polls are scary things, especially if you understand them. A sample of 1,000 is not statistically significant for a nationwide survey, but then this poll feeds the liberal need to be right about everything even in face of all the evidence or the unintended consequences of their policies and attitudes.
Conservatives, in fact, continue to outnumber moderates and liberals in the U.S. population in 2014. However, their 14-percentage-point edge over liberals last year, 38% vs. 24%, is the smallest in Gallup’s trends since 1992. Who woulda thought given the reinforcement of the mainstream media’s a-moral and anti-constitutional crusade.
When Gallup initiated this measure of self-identified political ideology in 1992, the largest group of Americans called themselves moderate, while slightly more than one-third identified as conservative and fewer than one in five as liberal. The conservative-liberal gap at that time was 19 points, and by 1996 it had widened to 22 points, its highest across the trend. Since then, the liberal percentage has increased and the percentage of moderates has correspondingly shrunk from 40% to 34%.
These results are based on combined data from Gallup’s standalone surveys of U.S. adults, totaling between 16,000 and 45,000 interviews for each year.
And I agree with Steve, as the young start to pay taxes and carry the burden of Obamacare, they will turn on the old entitlement hippies. I don’t see their support for the Liberal social agenda as liberal as much as I see their support as libertarian.
@Cargosquid
Cargo, Ithink you have made a good point, especially regarding te media. Each fall I listen to the “new” vocabulary on network TV. Each year it gets more explicit.
eI do think there should be standards of public speech. It is just part of having good manners.
A sample of 1000 is statistically significant so long as it was randomly distributed
@blue
It is good that Americans are becoming more socially liberal.
I thought liberal and conservative had been redefined by the media and other non thinkers as Democrat and Republican. Requires less thinking and leaves more time for yellin’.
One issue remains unchanged, about 50/50 pro and con give and take any given survey, abortion.
It really depends on how the question is framed as well as what the question is.
Let’s take the 20 week ban that is now headed towards the Senate–Do people understand that it could very easily ban any kind of theraputic abortion because of fetal anomaly. If people were educated about that issue, I doubt you would find people jumping on the bandwagon so fast.
The Devil must have a big smile on his face.
Why ? Has he some burning desire to be a flower boy in a gay wedding?