Comments on What If Everything You've Been Told About the Cultural Elite is Wrong?

Give it a rest. The mythical cultural elite are a bunch of uptight slobs - always have been.

More evidence that the "culture war" is largely a myth. Both the latte-subaru-sushi liberal-urban-secularists and the religious-nascar-suburban-conservatives get tricked into thinking this supposed cultural divide is the fundamental political conflict in this country.

Thomas Frank's "What's The Matter With Kansas" is essential reading for figuring out the bogus history of cultural elites.

Wow - the only piece of the puzzle I lack is the high income. I'm elite! Woot!

If Michelle, John Robert, and Jim Fitzhenry are what "assortative mating" looks like, I'd rather be a pauper living in sin.

perhaps Newt, Ann and the like are thinking of gays at the cultural elite (they do like fashion, food, and theater!), so you are assualtuing marriage and family. and most of the gays i know are pretty well off (and in stable relationships). they have everything but the legal title and benefits.

surpisingly the article didn't attach the usual stigma of "living in sin" to those who cohabitate and have kids outside of marraige. I know cohabitation is illegal in ND, but i dont think bastards are...

I dunno nothin' 'bout those smart-ass surveys, but take my word, I pay my taxes, go t' church, and beat my wife every day to keep her straight. Mark my word for it!

(joke, of course)

Dan, an observation:
Marriage has always struck me as a financial institution, first and foremost. It provides the legal framework for managing wealth and property, and passing it on to the next generation. That's why it's prized by middle and upper classes; and perhaps more prized by women in that socioeconomic group.

Likewise the lower economic classes with fewer assets see less advantage in the institution.

I guess that denying full marriage rights to the gay community is not only cultural discrimination, it is also economic discrimination. Some of the lost benefits can be overcome with civil partner contracts, but not all of it.

This is just further evidence that all the state marriage amendments, the move for a federal constitutional amendment, the exploitation of the issue in candidate politics is nothing more than a desperate response to being on the losing end of a cultural/historical paradigm shift. Couples with high levels of income and education are not threatened by the paradigm shift, have embraced it, and know how to operate within it.

Whenever such a shift occurs (see the entire history of the struggle for civil rights by blacks and other minorities) the diminishing number of hangers on to the previously dominant cultural ideal respond with violence and the politics of hate. In fact, Dan, your posting the other day about a resurgence in gay bashing is another response. While narrower historic ideals of marriage and family are breaking down, some members of the old guard respond with constitutional amendments while others respond with violence. As blacks were freed from slavery, cultural conservatives responded with segregation laws and the emergence of the KKK. As blacks started to gain some economic power, even in the face of segregation, the reaction came in the form of lynching and more segregation laws. And, with the Civil Rights Movement, we saw the killings of civil rights workers, the beatings of freedom riders and the resistance of southern governors to forced integration.

Just as legal segregation against blacks was overcome- after a long, bitter, deadly struggle, so will discrimination against gays. So, take that Ann Coulter and James Dobson!!! You and your ilk are on the losing side of history.

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