Posted on 10/29/2004 8:39:53 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
Is the gender gap gone? Well, no. While I've never bought into that whole Mars/Venus thing, it's pretty clear that there are still some striking differences between most men and most women. Like our salaries. And our representation in corporate boardrooms.
But there is one area where the difference between men and women is rapidly disappearing. It's in how we vote.
In the last several presidential elections, it's been reliably true that women have favored Democrats and men have tended to support Republicans. (This gender gap was the reason, by the way, that Bush-the-elder selected Dan Quayle as a running mate. He thought chicks would dig the handsome, but utterly vacuous, Indiana senator.)
This year, though, that gap has dramatically narrowed. In a number of polls, the difference in support for Bush and Kerry among men and women is within the statistical margin of error.
There is, however, an enormous "marriage gap."
Married people -- of either sex -- favor Bush by significant margins (ranging from 6 to 19 points, depending on which poll you see), while singles overwhelmingly prefer Kerry (by a margin of 17 to 35 points).
It's not entirely clear why this would be true. Maybe single people tend to be less afraid of being attacked by wolves than married people. Or maybe married people have decided that it's better to be steadfast than right.
Falling into the gap
Part of the marriage gap is explained away by simple demographics. Married people are more likely, for example, to fall into the highest income bracket, the one that stands to lose its big tax cut if Kerry wins the election. They're also more likely to be socially conservative in a way that remains deeply incomprehensible to singletons like me. (Explain to me again how two other people -- who love and are deeply committed to each other, but who happen to be of the same sex -- getting married somehow ruins marriage for the rest of you.)
But there's more to it than that. Even among people who have most other characteristics in common -- including similar incomes and backgrounds -- there is a stark split. Married people go for Bush; singles for Kerry.
I've been wondering why this should be true ever since it first started showing up in the polls this summer. But I couldn't quite figure it out. Is there some sort of secret married-person code that Bush has been using? Do people think that John Kerry, who likes being married so much he's done it twice, is actually secretly opposed to the institution?
I thought about conducting my own survey: calling up married friends around the country and asking them whom they planned to vote for and why. Then it occurred to me that I hadn't spoken to many of my married friends since, well, they've been married. And, when I did start phoning them -- after months of not being in close contact -- they all assumed I was calling to tell them I'd gotten engaged. That made the whole survey thing kind of awkward.
So it remained a mystery to me, this question of what married people were seeing in the president that I was so obviously missing. And then, bizarrely, Bill Clinton helped me out with my marital issues.
Hope vs. fear
Speaking out for John Kerry in Philadelphia this week, Clinton told the crowd it's "one of Clinton's rules of politics" that "if one candidate is trying to scare you, and the other's trying to get you to think; if one is appealing to your fears, and the other is appealing to your hopes -- it seems to me you ought to vote for the person who wants you to think and hope."
The hope/fear divide Clinton described felt right to me -- and familiar. It seemed to embody the way my thinking differs from that of my married friends.
The single person's life is all about hope. It's about taking leap after leap and believing, despite tons of evidence to the contrary, that the next thing -- the next date, the next job, the next city -- will be better than the last. Single life is a constant high-wire walk without a net: a dangerous, but inherently optimistic, act.
Being married must be quite different. It's about deciding to hold on to what you have, about putting a stake in the ground and declaring, "This is it. It doesn't get any better than this." There would almost have to be fear attached to that, fear of losing the fortress of sanity and safety you worked so hard to build, fear of failing to live up to the biggest commitment you'll ever make. It must be a profoundly frightening thing to form a family in this world, to make yourself responsible for lives other than your own. That's a kind of fear I've never known, simply because I've never had that much to lose.
So maybe singles are suckers for hope. And maybe that visceral message of fear really grabs at the hearts of our married counterparts.
After Tuesday -- sometime after Tuesday -- the election will be over. And then we'll have to find a way to talk to each other again.
SCREEEEEECHHH!!!
Maybe liberals just don't believe in marriage.
It's a lot easier to be irresponsible when you are single than when you are not.
I have NEVER understood where they get the "women" vote Democratic...oh yeah Clinton, those brainless women "loved" him....N.O.W. became LATER under clinton......
but smart, funny, beautiful women, ALWAYS vote Republican.. 'enuff said :)
Well, it could, but narcissism comes in degrees. ;)
-- For a man and a woman planning on raising a family.
This guy is so far off the mark that he's not even close to the target.
I think you hit the nail. I also got a kick out of the "single person's life is all about hope". Yeah, hoping they will get married!
Whatsa matter Debra, always a bridesmaid?
Kerry attracts angry people.
Bush attracts hopeful people.
BUMP
Maybe too many leap after leaps.
She should stop and smell the roses and choose wisely.
A "lets go slap this insipid twit silly" ping.
Yes - it is about responsibility and character.
LOL! I was just thinkin' he hadn't even made it to the range.
Good point.
Well, generally younger people tend to be more Democratic. They are simply more idealistic. Younger people,as a group, are less likely to be married than older people so this might explain the difference.
Yep, it could, but the fact the author spent any time at all on this, a topic I have found the MSM particular good at ignoring, is a good sign.
This author, who likely will lurk to see this article posted here at FR, would do well to read this to answer the 'mystery' behind why marrieds go for Bush:
How the Birth Control Pill Hurts Boys
and this:
The next generation of Main Stream Media.
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