Originally Posted By DDMAN26 <a target="blank" rel="nofollow" href="http://onpolitics.usatoday.com/2014/03/11/gay-marriage-republicans-pew-research-poll/">http://onpolitics.usatoday.com...ch-poll/</a> Just an idea of how things are changing
Originally Posted By Dabob2 It says 61%. And people who support equality don't change their minds to support inequality, though millions move the other way. I've said this a zillion times, but it's much like segregation 50 years ago. Millions of Americans who either actively favored segregation - or were indifferent and okay with the status quo -changed their minds and came to favor integration... but virtually no one who ever favored integration changed their minds to start favoring segregation. Likewise, millions of Americans who either actively favored marriage inequality (or job discrimination, etc.) or who were indifferent and okay with the status quo have changed their minds and now favor equality - and virtually no one has moved the other way. So this 61% of Republicans under 30 who favor marriage equality? In 20 years that's going to be 61% of Republicans under 50 - even if not a single additional person in that age group changes his mind to start supporting it (which will inevitably happen too). We've seen this with the country as a whole and now we're even seeing it with young Republicans. And the powers that be in the GOP are finally noticing what some of us noticed quite a while ago. Did you notice that gay issues were almost absent from CPAC this year? After years and years of gleefully using gay people as a punching bag as part of the "throw the red meat to the base" spectacle that is CPAC's reason for being... pretty much NOTHING this year. That's not an accident. Sure, individual Republicans in deeply red districts can still safely be anti-gay. But nationally? The power brokers have finally gotten the message: that's a loser politically. They're realizing they can't afford to be seen as the anti-gay party any more. Which is freaking some of them out because it was not that long ago that they were HAPPY to be seen as the anti-gay party. It was an electoral winner for them. But no more. It's not quite like a light switch and there will be exceptions. And in private, no doubt many are still anti-gay. But as a national strategy? It's gone from "God, guns and gays" to "God, guns, and don't mention gays." They don't want to be "pro-gay" and alienate their base; but they don't want to alienate what is now a majority of Americans and a huge majority of young Americans either. So they just don't mention it at all. CPAC was all the proof you need.
Originally Posted By RoadTrip Many of the young Republicans today have a somewhat Libertarian point of view and I think that is a HUGE improvement over the Tea Party. Although they favor a conservative fiscal policy, they don't think the government should be messing with people's private lives.
Originally Posted By ecdc >>It's gone from "God, guns and gays" to "God, guns, and don't mention gays."<< Or "God, guns, and Obamacare."
Originally Posted By Yookeroo "It says 61%." 61% of young Republicans is how many actual people? Gotta be less than 20, right?
Originally Posted By Dabob2 Yuk yuk. If they keep alienating young people, it could get close to that.
Originally Posted By SuperDry Surely the "true conservatives" that we keep hearing about don't feel this way.
Originally Posted By DDMAN26 <<Many of the young Republicans today have a somewhat Libertarian point of view and I think that is a HUGE improvement over the Tea Party. Although they favor a conservative fiscal policy, they don't think the government should be messing with people's private lives>> I think that would probably extend to people in their 30's and even early 40's.
