Opinion:   “North Carolinians and Americans still overwhelmingly believe marriage should be defined as the union of one man and one woman. When asked if they agree with the statement: “I believe MARRIAGE should be defined ONLY as a union between one man and one woman," 62% of Americans agree. (3)



Fact:  Those who watch the sometimes deceptive listing of references for the appearance of credibility won’t be surprised at this instance. The footnoted story link here leads to an article describing the anti-gay Alliance Defence Fund's (ADF) skewed polling, and which outlines the actual contrary poll results found by most respected pollsters. The title of the linked article, which appeared in the Washington Independent, is “Gay marriage poll released by religious right group was intentionally skewed.” The article reveals ADF documents outlining specifically how the poll sample was to be skewed.

The respected polling, from Gallup, CNN, ABC News/Washington Post, all show at least 51 percent support for full, legal same-sex marriage. This means, if polling and data are important, that most Americans think same-sex marriage should be legal. The trend here, according to respected polling, is that national support for these rights is growing steadily. In a 2010 poll by CBS, only 25% thought there should be no kind of legal recognition for same-sex couples - so, nationally, only a quarter of the people would support this North Carolina amendment.

The footnoted link error here could well be an unintentional mistake. It could also be an attempt, in the absence of supportive data, to create the illusion that there are data worth footnoting - on the hope that many amendment supporters won’t actually click the links. This would be a terrible hope to have. Civil rights measures should lead all of us to demand good research, to the extent that facts can inform our votes.

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http://washingtonindependent.com/110140/gay-marriage-poll-released-by-religious-right-group-was-intentionally-skewed

(*) These are the misleading sources linked from the NC Values Coalition web page ‘opinions’ above:

Note: the link below incorrectly leads to a "Washington Independent story which shows Americans actually favor legalized same-sex marriage.

(3)

 Stephanie Samuel, "Most Americans Still Believe in Traditional Marriage, Poll Shows," June 17, 2011 at http://washingtonindependent.com/111398/gay-marriage-poll-released-by-religious-right-group-was-intentionally-skewed.