TRANSCRIPT
Could it be the case that all the social sexual woke weirdness over the past two years, especially the past few months, is changing some people’s minds and making them more conservative? According to a recent survey, that looks like a distinct possibility.
But before diving into that headline, a word of caution. First, the term “conservative” has proven itself to be pretty darn elastic and somewhat difficult to nail down. It doesn’t seem to correspond to an objective set of criteria but, rather, a description of where a person stands politically compared to someone else. So yeah, it’s not all that helpful. But that said, it doesn’t mean nothing.
Second caution: Polls and surveys nearly all need to be delved deeply into because the takeaway headline is almost always a giant overstatement of what the poll finds. So with those cautions, let’s look, because there does seem to be some merit to this.
Here are the two major takeaways from the Gallup poll released a few days back. First, 38% say they are conservative on social issues and that’s a 5-point uptick from just last year. Second, that 38% percent number is now the highest percentage saying they are socially conservative since 2012 — more than a decade. But as we said, you got to go deeper than the headlines. Where and why are these shifts occurring?
When polls are conducted, rarely is the question “Why do you think that?” asked. It’s just too expensive and, in real-world terms, impractical. However, where or what different social groups is something that is tracked, and this poll does just that. As it turns out, it’s not so much the case that the woke idiots are changing their minds — and we use the term “minds” very loosely. It’s rather that people who identified as mild conservatives or even moderates are firming up their preexisting beliefs.
Why that is happening was not measured. But since the somewhat sizable shift has happened in such a short period, it does seem to suggest that something in the culture is prompting the shift. What might that be? Well, there is, of course, no definitive way to know that, but there does seem to be a correlation.
It looks like a “fed up” mindset is beginning to develop because a close examination of the deep data reveals Republicans account for the largest increase in saying they are socially conservative, from 60% in 2021 to 74% today, which is a 14-point jump in only two years.
Of course, Democrats remain unyielding in their ideology, with just 10% saying they are socially conservative today, which is unchanged over the past two years. But it is, once again, that mushy middle of the independents where the tale is told. Among them, an increase from 24% to 29% has occurred over the past couple of years. Though modest, it’s still a 5-point shift.
Since our focus here at Church Militant is the Faith, we are concentrating on the social numbers, not a series of questions about economic opinions. There, unsurprisingly, was even more of a shift toward “conservatism” but, of course, not with the implacable Marxist Democrats. Seems the Devil always overplays his hand.
Nothing moves them, nothing. But then again, they kill children by the millions, so what’s a jacked-up economy between friends? What appears to be happening is that Biden and his woke mob running the government and their cooperation with corporate America to force their agenda down our throats seems to be backfiring, at least among more even-keeled people.
And when it comes to polling and reading the tea leaves, you always want to look at as many as you can and find any trends and common themes. That Biden is unpopular is inescapable as a conclusion — lowest approval ratings since before the American Revolution. Likewise, he continues to trail both DeSantis and Trump (even with his indictments) in poll after poll.
It could be the case that the Biden years could pivot from a controlling new world order to normalcy again — not the much-needed Catholic normalcy, but it’s at least a move in the right direction. In a war, cultural or otherwise, you advance in various stages. You need real estate in order to expand.
In an ideological war, that translates into people waking up and realizing that the position they held, or were indifferent to, has real-world consequences, and they change their minds. Marxism is bad. It’s evil. It’s destructive. It’s a killer. That some people may now grasp that better is a good thing. And the “conservative,” which is philosophically in shambles, can use all the help it gets, even from Uncle Joe in the White House.