Box Turtle Bulletin
News and commentary about the anti-gay lobby“Now you must raise your children up in a world where that union of man and box turtle is on the same legal footing as man and wife…”
News and commentary about the anti-gay lobbyJune 17th, 2011
A survey with +/- 0% margin of error has found that the best ice-cream is rocky-road. Yeah, probably Haagen-Dazs.
That’s all fine and good, but its useless unless you know that the survey consisted of asking myself what ice-cream I would like at the moment.
Although… maybe strawberry… hmmmm
Well back to my point.
The Alliance Defense Fund has released a new Surprising and Shocking Survey that pretends to report that Americans really-o truly-o don’t want Teh Gheys to marry:
Contrary to recently released studies that suggest increasing support for homosexual “marriage,” an extensive national survey reveals just the opposite.
Alliance Defense Fund (ADF) commissioned the study through Public Opinion Strategies. It reveals that 62 percent of Americans believe “marriage should be defined only as a union between one man and one woman.” Fifty-three percent of Americans participating in the study “strongly” agreed.
Well, gosh, that should shake things up. Right?
Except, of course, that the reputation of Alliance Defense Fund is so abysmal that everyone assumes that they are just lying. That’s what liars do, after all.
So no media has even blinked. None.
Well, the Christian Post, Charisma News, and the ever-wacky Dakota Voice all trotted it out as though it were legit (when will Christian media tire of being patsies of political operatives pretending to be religious?). And several alternative media sources have reported the story about ADF’s bogus polling and how it is nothing more than propaganda. And the Sacramento Bee ran the press release in their “unedited press release” section.
But no mainstream press, not even very conservative mainstream press, ran with this story. It simply isn’t credible. As the Colorado Independent noted:
The group says 53 percent of Americans strongly agreed with the statement and only 35 percent disagreed.
But CitizenLink provides little other data on methodology. There is no list of questions asked, no tabs breaking down how various constituencies were chosen or how they answered and in what percentages.
The poll was reportedly commissioned last month by the conservative Alliance Defense Fund. The firm that conducted the survey, Polling firm Public Opinion Strategies, is tied to Republican Party causes and has been linked to unethical election campaign strategies in the past. According to Raw Story, the firm was charged with violating Virginia polling disclosure laws and was accused of using push polls to influence elections in favor of Republican candidates.
You know, it must be embarrassing to realize that everyone knows that you are lying. Everyone.
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Rob
June 17th, 2011
I absolutely love the acronym for Public Opinion Strategies. POS is pretty accurate. (And I’m not referring to “Point Of Sale.”)
Ben In Oakland
June 17th, 2011
They are beyond embarassment.
Or irony.
Tom O\'Connor
June 17th, 2011
Gays themselves aren’t interested in marriage. In the places where they can do it, very few do.
PJB863
June 17th, 2011
When you’re dealing with mainstream publications, Tim, you’re absolutely right. However, when you take that detour off into lunatic-fringeland, these things do get noticed. This was on the website of our local hate group (as certified by the SPLC), the Illinois Family Institute as of today: http://illinoisfamily.org/news/contentview.asp?c=35314. Groups like IFI and others tend to exist in an alternative reality, where hard facts and metholodigies are a very minor consideration. It’s the conclusion that counts, no matter how convoluted the logic used to arrive at it.
Now that IFI has published this on its website, LaBarbera will likely pick up on this, because he’s a buddy of theirs. Also, the new group, the Illinois Defense of Marriage Initiative will also pick up and parrot this “survey,” as they try to place an advisory marriage referendum on a statewide ballot.
Sooner or later, a reporter working at one of the mainstream publications will neglect to do his/her homework, and publish the results of this survey without checking the facts as you have done. It may not happen for weeks or even months, but it will happen and suddenly, the ADF survey will gain some measure of credibility by being cited by the Chicago Tribune or the Sun-Times or some other publication.
enough already
June 17th, 2011
Good point, PJB863.
Everytime I look at that absurd literature review out of California which is now cited everywhere to show that we are only 3.5% of the population (or was it 2% or was it 4% or was it???) I am reminded of just how few people actually understand anything about statistical analysis.
When I read about such bald-faced lies, I am reminded of the following:
Prov 14:5
5 A faithful witness will not lie, But a false witness speaks lies.
Guess that doesn’t apply when you are fighting for “Christian” values.
Timothy Kincaid
June 17th, 2011
Tom,
Not all gay people are interested in marriage. Some are, some aren’t.
But we don’t base civil rights on the number of people who will utilize them.
We don’t look at the buses to see whether black folk are riding in the front or the back. We don’t quiz Jews on just how many are wearing yarmelkes. We don’t ask how many women really want to be corporate executives. Rather we remove barriers to freedom and allow people to live how they see fit.
Or, rather, that’s what lovers of freedom and equality do. Folks who hate freedom and equality look for excuses to deny it to people.
Regan DuCasse
June 17th, 2011
I remember how Lou Sheldon and his daughter would grumble at what they thought were tax payer funded research and studies on gay people.
Then they challenged the veracity of privately funded research of the same.
Then they asserted that THEIR studies were the most accurate and truthful ones. Which actually weren’t contemporary, comparative studies or research of a broad or lengthy sampling, but in fact selective cut and paste jobs on research that had been done decades ago on a sampling that consisted of gay men who’d been institutionalized.
Because they, in no way, would want to fund any comprehensive studies at all.
The TVC AND FoTF however, took these suspect findings and reported them very differently and out of context to the subject.
Similar to how this poll is reported by ADF, there is no breakdown of subjects they asked by gender or age or ethnicity. Nor a list of the questions they asked.
I think considering that the ADF AND TVC have been resentful of whatever expense has been utilized for research into how discrimination impacts gay lives, or how gay people live DESPITE discrimination.
The ADF likes to think of themselves as impacted and victimized negatively by gay people.
It would be pretty difficult to manufacture evidence of that, where there is none. Hence, lying would have to substitute.
But they wouldn’t want to spend the money, and invest the time in the sorts of effective research or polling that would come closer to more accurate results.
Priya Lynn
June 18th, 2011
Tom said “Gays themselves aren’t interested in marriage. In the places where they can do it, very few do.”.
Not true. In the few months gays were allowed to marry over 18000 couples did so.
As is typical of anti-gays you make up whatever story supports your viewpoint and pretend its the truth.
Kate
June 19th, 2011
PJB863, thanks for the link to those lovely folks at the IFI…what a red white and blue bunch of bullshit that was!
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