Married or not?
According to a news article at CNN’s website, the campaign to overturn Maine’s new gay-marriage law is heating up within the Catholic Church. The Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland is now asking parishioners for donations to fight against the state’s same-sex marriage law passed last spring. Voters in Maine will decide on November 3rd whether to repeal the marriage equality law or not.
In a recent Zogby Interactive survey of adults nationwide, respondents were asked to choose a statement that comes closest to their beliefs on gay marriage. A slight majority of the sample (57%) strongly or somewhat agrees that marriage should only be between one man and one woman, while more than one-third (39%) of the sample strongly or somewhat agrees that the institution of marriage should adapt to a changing society.
Subgroup analyses show that 66% of Christians (including both Catholics and Protestants) are against same-sex marriage, compared to 23% of the respondents with no religious affiliations. Among Christians who attend religious services more than once a week, 88% are against same-sex marriage, compared to 55% of Christians who rarely or never attend religious services.
What is your opinion on same-sex marriage? Do you think that same-sex relationships should be recognized legally as equal to heterosexual relationships? Do you think that a different name other than marriage, such as civil union, can be divisive and counterproductive, as some gay marriage activists suggest?
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I think same-sex marriage is wrong, but I think it should be recognized legally. Today, what society writ large calls “marriage” actually is a civil union based on the laws of man so the term civil union is not divisive. What is divisive is the term “gay marriage” because it is offends those who believe that a true marriage must contain the religious sacrament.
The concept of a civil union is a comparatively recent development, established for a secular government to mimic the religious rite. If homosexuals want all the trappings of “marriage”, so be it.
Actually, it doesn’t make a bit of difference to me if it is legal or not. It won’t affect me in the slighest bit.
However, what I do find interesting is how biased the language is in this short blurb. It is clear that the writer (I presume it is Zogby) has a strong preference in this discussion. It is subtle, but it is not negligible. Case in point: when he talks about the results (57% against vs 39% in favor), he uses a word with a diminuitive connotation (SLIGHT majority) to describe the 57% who oppose, and he uses aggrandizing words (MORE THAN one-third) when describing the 39% in favor. I’m not sure how he justifies describing 57% as a SLIGHT majority, when in the Senate that would be 3 points away from a super-majority.
So, the content of this article doesn’t really bother me at all, as I really have very little opinion on this matter, but the poor writing and the clear bias is a bit annoying.
@Jesse Excellent observation.
@Kevin Thanks, Kevin. I am by no means criticizing the data, but I have found a number of articles on this website to be highly biased, which is fine if the website is an EDITORIAL website, but to be a pollster, and have a clear bias is a bit of a contradiction to me.
I would love to hear from the writer of this article how this is justified…
I don’t get it. With all the divorce, misery, cheating, adultery, fighting, promiscuity, abuse, single moms and baby daddies in the world…with a lousy economy, homeless people, lost insurance, war in Iraq and Afghanistan, drug cartels, the dumbing-down in education, a stale-mated Congress…why do people need to judge other people’s personal decisions? I’m happily hetero myself, but if two consenting same-sex adults are happy and want to be married to each other, more power to them.