Some interesting poll results from Gallup: today, practically no one believes that a Presidential candidate’s gender or skin color automatically disqualifies him or her from office, and the same is true for a candidate’s religion, at least as long as we talk about Jewish or Catholic candidates.
This wasn’t always the case: in the 1950s, only 54% of Americans would vote for a female Presidential candidate, 38% for a Black one, 63% for a Jewish one, and 67% for a Catholic one. Large minorities and in the case of race even a large majority were heavily biased in the 1950s. The fact that this is no longer true today is evidence of moral progress – or of political correctness if you are a cynic.
However, this doesn’t mean that all forms of prejudice are gone. Even in our day and age, large minorities of Americans are still unwilling to vote for a homosexual, atheist or Muslim Presidential candidate, even if the candidate in question is well-qualified:
(source)
Republican voters are slightly more prejudiced than other voters, but not towards Mormons:
(source)
More posts in this series are here.
Interesting!