I wrote recently about the big jump in support by black voters after Obama supported marriage equality. The day before Obama's famous interview North Carolina voted to approve a marriage protection amendment. The day after the vote Pam Spaulding, who is black and lesbian, lives in North Carolina, and is lead writer for Pam's House Blend, was asked by many in the media to comment on the "black vote" that supported the amendment. She wants to bury that hoary idea to stop people from talking about it.
There was no exit polling. Therefore there is no data that can be broken down along racial lines. That didn't stop people from claiming blacks voted against gays -- until Spaulding demanded hard numbers.
Barry Yeoman of The American Prospect looks at precinct tallies for the amendment and discovered that the real divide wasn't racial, it was urban/rural. And even there, black majority urban precincts rejected the amendment and black majority rural precincts did the same.
The National Organization for Marriage has as one of its tactics is to split black from gay and stir up tension between the two groups. That was brought out in the 2008 repeal of marriage equality in Calif. But the idea is no longer true (if it ever was), yet media people (I'm not sure they deserve to be called journalists) keep trying to push the idea. Is it because of their personal racism? Perhaps they want to highlight conflict? Are they lazy? Or maybe they're stooges for NOM and conservatives?
Just keep in mind it was the black president who first supported marriage equality.
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