Analysis: Gay marriage - signs of backlash

Just as the highest court of Massachusetts ruled same-gender marriages constitutional, a public backlash against homosexuals seems to be in the making, according to a new Pew survey of American religious and moral attitudes.

The opposition against such unions has risen from 53 percent in July to 59 percent in October. A slight majority of 51 percent even opposes the idea of granting some legal rights to couples of the same gender.

"As public attention has turned to the question of gay marriage -- and as homosexuals have become more visible in society and the entertainment media -- there have been some signs of a backlash," report the Pew Research Center and the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life, which conducted this study.

"Roughly three-in-ten Americans say greater acceptance of gays would be a bad thing for the country, up from 23 percent in a 2000 survey conducted by the Kaiser Foundation. And half the public thinks the entertainment media present too many gay themes and characters, compared with 37 percent in the same survey."

Americans are drawing a clear distinction between accepting and approving of homosexuality. In a recent Gallup poll, 88 percent stated that homosexuals should have equal rights; that's up from 56 percent in 1977. In a similar vain, the Pew survey found that more than three-quarters of the U.S. public do not mind being around homosexuals.

At the same time, however, half of the respondents -- and 60 percent of blacks -- told the Pew pollsters they hold unfavorable views of homosexual men. Their disregard for lesbians is slightly less (48 percent).

Religion has a significant part in shaping these attitudes, as the reasons given for opposing same-sex marriages prove: 28 percent find such unions morally wrong, sinful and against the Bible; 17 percent said they violated the respondents' religious beliefs; 16 percent insisted that the "definition of marriage is a man and a woman"; 12 percent answered, "It's just wrong," and nine percent declared homosexuality as unnatural.

Not surprisingly, denominational loyalties have had a heavy bearing on these attitudes. While 80 percent of evangelical Protestants disapprove of homosexual marriages, this is true for only 54 percent of mainline Protestants and 55 percent of Catholics, showing once again the synchronization of the latter two groups, a phenomenon polltakers have been observing on several other issues in recent years.

On the other hand, while in no major religious group a majority expresses favorable views on homosexuals, the opposite is true for self-declared secularists (those without religious affiliation) of whom 60 percent were well-disposed toward homosexuals.

The opposition against same-sex union transcends all ethnic and regional distinctions. However, it is strongest in the South (67 percent), weakest in the East (50 percent) and more pronounced in rural areas (69 percent) than in the cities (52 percent). Hispanics are the ethnic group least adverse to the idea of men marrying men and women marrying women (51 percent).

Pew's pollsters also noted significant differences in the attitudes of age groups -- the younger and more educated they are, the greater their acceptance of the idea of homosexual marriages. Still, the survey cautions, even Americans in their late teens and twenties "do not, on balance, favor this idea."

On the other hand, even though faith plays a major role in shaping people's attitudes toward homosexuality, this is not the most significant moral issue discussed from America's pulpits. When asked what they topics they heard about in church, 72 percent of evangelicals and 85 percent of Catholics first mentioned abortion.