When former President Barack Obama campaigned against gay marriage in 2008, the majority of his party agreed with him. Traditional marriages between one man and one woman were still considered the backbone of a healthy society; the nuclear family was still his ideals.
Five years later, Obama’s publicly expressed opinion on the matter changed dramatically, as did that of most Democrats’. The reason was obvious: Public opinion was also shifting. By 2011, the number of people who supported legalizing gay marriage finally overtook the number of people who opposed it. And just two years later, the Supreme Court issued its Obergefell v. Hodges ruling, cementing into law a new definition of marriage, one that included same-sex couples.
Since the court’s ruling, public acceptance of gay marriage has continued to grow in America, even among Republicans, many of whom vehemently opposed Obergefell. A new poll released this week found that 70% of the public believes that marriages between same-sex couples ought to be recognized as “valid” with “the same rights as traditional marriages.” Among Republicans, support for gay marriage reached 55%, marking the first time in the poll’s history that a majority of the GOP was in favor of it.
Why has the public’s opinion on this matter changed so dramatically in such a short time? Perhaps because the younger generation, which is much more likely to accept liberal viewpoints, is now entering the public square. But that doesn’t explain why people of all ages have become more accepting of same-sex marriage over the past decade.
Obergefell, however, does. As soon as the court issued its ruling, legal and legislative challenges to same-sex marriage began to drop like flies. Legally, they no longer had much of a case, and culturally, pressure from liberals made it extremely difficult for conservatives to keep trying. No one wants to be the reason marriage equality fails; no one wants to be smeared as a bigot.
Perhaps the legalization of gay marriage was inevitable. Maybe it was long overdue. Regardless, it is obvious that our views, more than we realize, are shaped by cultural tides, which in turn can be shaped by the law.
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Tags: LGBT, Gay Marriage, Polls, Supreme Court, Democratic Party, Republican Party, Barack Obama
Original Author: Kaylee McGhee White
Original Location: How our opinions on gay marriage have changed
