There's been a lot of back-and-forth on the diary list today about who to "blame" for California's Proposition 8 passing. Specifically, whether California's black population bears particular responsibility for the bill's passage.
I think some, if not most, of the diarists here are missing the forest for the trees. But I've got a pretty good idea as to what happened here. Follow me over the jump, and I'll get to the bottom of this - my conclusions may surprise you.
Here we go: the sole reason Proposition 8 passed on Tuesday:
More people voted for it than against it.
Those people were from all races, all socioeconomic classes, all parts of California. I could say that a minority ethnicity was to blame because they had a higher-than-average percentage of "Yes" votes. I could say that white voters were to blame because more "Yes" votes came from whites than anywhere else.
But both of those arguments miss the point. The point is, more people in California voted "Yes" than "No". More people were swayed by the Yes on 8's arguments than the No on 8's responses.
There. That was simple, wasn't it? Now can we stop pointing fingers and get back to work on repealing or striking down this piece-of-shit bill, please?