IN the most recent Gallup poll on abortion, as many Americans described themselves as pro-life as called themselves pro-choice. A combined 58 percent of Americans stated that abortion should either be “illegal in all circumstances” or “legal in only a few circumstances.” These results do not vary appreciably by gender: in the first Gallup poll to show a slight pro-life majority, conducted in May 2009, half of American women described themselves as pro-life.
I see that 20% say abortion should always be illegal. I see that 26% say it should always be legal. And I see that 51% say that is should be legal only under certain cirumstances.
What I don’t see is any possible way to find a combination of those three numbers and come up with 58%. Nor do I understand why you would combine those who think it should be illegal all the time with those who think it should only be legal some of the time. If you think it should be legal some of the time, you’re pro-choice. But that’s another point.
Am I just missing something? How does he get to 58%?
*** Update ***
Found it- the graph combined Legal under most circumstances (38%) and Legal in only a few circumstances (13%) to get the legal under certain circumstances (51%). Later on it breaks the responses down, and that is how he got the magic 58%. I just didn’t scroll down the poll far enough.
Regardless, I look at that polling data and don’t come up with what Ross sees, which is that 58% of people are pro-life. What I see is that 77% of the people think it should be legal. Here’s a good piece:
“But Brian,” you say, “all this shows is that the country is pretty equally divided on abortion.” It doesn’t, actually. Even though people identify fairly equally as pro-life (how I hate that construction) and pro-choice, the numbers strongly favor choice. See, there’s really only one group up there who wants abortion to be illegal all the time, and they make up about 20% of the population. Those are hard numbers, too—look at the poll and scroll down. Gallup provides numbers going back to 1975 on this question, and there’s not a lot of variation. Low is 12% and high is 23%.
Everyone else, even if they don’t want to admit it, is pro-choice. Some are more pro-choice than others, but unless you want abortion completely outlawed, you’re pro-choice, at least a little, because you’re admitting that you can imagine a situation where a woman would feel she needs to have an abortion.
The real difference between the group in the middle and the group who supports “legal under any circumstances” is that the latter group isn’t trying to impose its morality on the public at large. The mushy middle wants to be able to pass judgment on the straw women they see as slutty while making exceptions for the people they approve of, but in the end, they still support choice. People like Ross Douthat can’t stand to think of this as a country which largely accepts abortion as a necessary part of the health care system, but it is.
Right.
YellowJournalism
More new math?
What I see here is that there is a large number of people wanting abortion to remain legal in some form or another.
dr. bloor
Uteritis broke his calculator.
schrodinger's cat
That’s because he can’t add and he does not understand what a percentage is. Being innumerate is practically a requirement for being an MSM punditubbie, see Sullivan Andrew. At least we should be happy that he is not the Business and Economics Editor of the NYT.
maus
The difference is that believing someone should choose life doesn’t necessarily mean that you want abortion to be illegal under every possible circumstance.
That’s where the asshole right-wing conflates everything.
Comrade Mary
@dr. bloor: Here’s your Internet. Treat her with respect.
AA+ Bonds
Easy; he fucking lies about everything
schrodinger's cat
Mr Douthat we will talk when you have the ability to get pregnant, until then keep your moralistic preening to yourself.
Kthxbai.
The Dangerman
Pulled from a dark place (perhaps with some Santorum that confused him).
Rick
I’ve seen this question on the General Social Survey, and there are usually four response options. (Legal in all, legal with restriction, illegal with exception, always illegal). Or some variation thereof.
Its possible the gallup chart collapsed some responses, and Douthat added the two more conservative ones to get his number.
None of this should be construed to mean that I don’t think Douthat is an asshole.
AA+ Bonds
Think about it – this is a guy who turned a shame story about how he couldn’t perform in bed into a smear of all women who use birth control
He is primed to swallow information and immediately take a shit on the rug – as Deleuze put it, “shit = money”
Douthat literally fears the truth, fears that it will reveal his weakness in front of his father figures, in a complex unconscious way that would take years of psychotherapy for him to realize
The Ancient Randonneur
Douthat, Gingrich and Santorum are living proof that abortion should have been legal long before Roe v. Wade. Maybe, just maybe, we wouldn’t have to suffer these insufferable pricks.
And for your listening pleasure. (Which has nothing to do with this thread but it made me have a happy.)
Baud
Also, is it just me, or am I seeing remarkable stability in the numbers over a 25+ year period?–And certainly far more stability that the politics over that period would have you believe.
JasonF
If you scroll further down the Gallup poll link, they break “Legal under some circumstances” into “Legal under most circumstances” and “Legal only in a few circumstances.” In the latest poll, “Legal only in a few circumstances” and “Not legal” do, in fact, add up to 58%.
Of course, any given respondent’s “few circumstances” may not be the same as another respondent’s “few circumstances,” so the poll is somewhat meaningless.
Kanamit
Scroll down, they break it up into four responses (where Douthat gets his number) farther down the page.
DougJarvus Green-Ellis
Scroll down a bit, you’ll see a 20+38 for the questions Douthat describes. It’s just not in that chart.
JasonF
@schrodinger’s cat:
I disagree. I’m not interested in anybody’s moralistic preening on this subject, male or female.
Brian S
Hes using numbers from a sub-question, i.e. he’s being dishonest. I wrote about it here: http://newindesmoines.tumblr.com/post/17098573908/the-majority-are-pro-choice
trollhattan
Recalling the considerable speculation McMegan would get the Idiot Republican Typist Chair at NYT before it was awarded to Chunky Reese Witherspoon botherer, I struggle to see any meaningful difference between the two.
Brian S
Hes using numbers from a sub-question, i.e. he’s being dishonest. I wrote about it here: http://newindesmoines.tumblr.com/post/17098573908/the-majority-are-pro-choice
pete
Douhat got the numbers wrong, but also failed to cherrypick to his own advantage. You have to go to the pdf linked here to find them. The 2011 figure for what he cites would actually be 61, made up of 39% saying “legal under only a few circumstances” and 22% saying never legal. This doesn’t make much sense because there is no definition of “a few circumstances.”
He may have been trying to use the 2010 numbers (37 + 19 = 56) and mistyped. But the real number is 76 think legal (maybe with restrictions, maybe not) 22 say illegal and a stunnningly low 3 say dont know. Pro-choice wins big. Shut up Douhat.
TFinSF
Go down to the [COMBINED RESPONSES] mark in the crosstabs. 2011 July 15-17: Legal only in a few circumstances = 38%, Illegal in all circumstances = 20% for 58% total.
It’s hard to support a general view that Americans are anti-abortion from this, though. Depends on the specifics of “a few circumstances”.
blogenfreude
@AA+ Bonds: beat me to it … you must be a fellow member of that Reality Based Community.
Hungry Joe
Yes, you’re missing not being a gibbering asshat tool.
Baud
This poll from the link was interesting given recent events:
(Would you vote for) A law prohibiting health clinics that provide abortion services from receiving any federal funds?
Favor: 40%
Oppose: 57%
No opinion: 3%
bystander
I think Douthat went down to the section labeled [COMBINED RESPONSES] and added the 38% who selected Legal only in a few circumstances to the 20% who selected Illegal in all circumstances.
Or, that’s my guess.
pete
@TFinSF: Ah. I was on the May 23rd numbers. That explains it. General point remains, however.
schrodinger's cat
@JasonF: Actually agree with you. I somehow find men preaching about abortion much more offensive than women doing it. Like the Catholic Bishops and moral scolds like Douthat.
Villago Delenda Est
@The Ancient Randonneur:
They are, in fact, living proof that retroactive abortion should not only be legal, it should be required in their cases.
Darius
And according to the polling data, you’re both right!
Isn’t polling fun?
burnspbesq
So 58 percent? BFD. The genius of our Constitution is that it prevents transitory majorities from getting their way.
So suck it, Ross. Ah blow mah nose on your silly polling data, you useless unable-to-get-it-up type.
jonas
I’m surprised to see that 26% believe it should be legal in all circumstances. I wouldn’t have thought that position would out-poll the “under no circumstances” one, which falls well below the Crazification Constant (27%). If your position falls below the CC, it’s a really marginal one. Sorry, Ross. 76% of Americans want abortion available to women if not in all, then at least some, circumstances. Few issues in modern political life have that level of consensus.
I think Dems should really make more hay over growing conservative attacks not just on abortion, but on contraception as well. I don’t think most American women realize that opposing contraception is on its way to becoming a major plank in the Republican Party platform.
jonas
@jonas: Whoops! Make that 77% who are pro-choice.
Amir Khalid
Under the sub-heading [COMBINED RESPONSES], in the poll results for 15-17 July 2011 (the most recent listed), “Legal only in a few circumstances” is at 38% and “Illegal in all circumstances” at 20%. That might be your mystery 58%.* But it’s a hell of a way to read poll data, and I’m wondering whether Chunky really knows his way around statistics.
Anyhoo, the error in relying on public polling rather than reasoned argument in a matter like this should be self-evident. Public opinion is too often driven by popular prejudice/sentiment rather than an informed assessment of the issues, which in this matter are medical, and ethical.
(*ETA:
@bystander:
In other words, I agree with you.)
CarolDuhart2
The numbers bear themselves out anecdotally as well. The anti-abortion movement has never had a lot of growth beyond a small percentage of the population. The same group of white, lower-middle class antichoicers have been running the movement and populating it for years. Even more conservative groups immigrating haven’t joined, and the growing minority groups, more conservative and religious aren’t populating the movement either.
The reason is the people for the most part have made their peace with abortion being legal. Those who disapprove of the practice beyond the movement are content to persuade people to not have one and not have one themselves. And abortion makes no demands on anyone else: no tax money, no need to go out of one’s way to accommodate the practice, nothing that pushes people one way or another.
maus
@Hungry Joe: Pretty much. They confuse the issue on Evolution and Gay Marriage by using the same conflation, to tell people that there are no Christians who understand evolution because it’s antithetical to belief in a “creator”, and that gay marriage somehow destroys straight marriage.
pseudonymous in nc
“Legal in only a few circumstances” = “r@pe, inc3st and me.”
schrodinger's cat
When did the abortion issue become such a political football. Was it immediately after Roe or was it Reagan’s election campaign?
Southern Beale
I think you need to be careful throwing around qualifiers like “thinks it should be legal some of the time,” or “think there should be some restrictions,” without defining exactly what you mean by that.
One “some of the time” qualifier is, if the life of the mother is at risk. I think most people would say if the mother’s life is at risk, abortion is acceptable. Only a tiny percentage of people would say no.
But what about if a couple wants a boy and tests determine the fetus to be female? Is abortion OK in that scenario? I think most people would say no.
This is why I think public debate on the issue is always warped and annoying as hell. These are personal decisions. Trust women to know what is right for them and their families. Leave the rest of the public — and the government — out of it.
Suffern ACE
Now, I wonder how many of those who said, “Only in a few circumstances” believe that the woman who is pregnant is capable of determining those choices privately, consulting who she feels fit without the need to hire lawyers to testify before strangers and other professional busybodies, who would like to make that determination for her.
CarolDuhart2
@pseudonymous in nc: Or the first trimester and second trimester. Or only if the kid’s deformed or dying. Whatever. But in any event, they don’t want the law involved as long as abortion is voluntary, and the fetus has no chance of survival outside the womb. And there’s no real public sentiment to tighten the rules or even clarify them. And certainly no sentiment for reversing Roe vs Wade, which I think also makes the movement more violent as they see the public’s growing indifference.
Southern Beale
@schrodinger’s cat:
It’s always been like this, even before Roe. Because we’ve always had this issue.
Abortions have always happened, whether they were legal or not. Cripes, cave women knew which herbs and teas had abortive properties. This has always been about women needing to control their bodies and men needing to control women.
MattF
Like it or not, the Clintonian “legal and rare” is pretty much the majority view. FWIW, I’ve known lots of politically liberal women who support a right to abortion, but who will say flatly that they would never have one themselves.
Added: Other than for medical reasons.
pete
@Southern Beale: Yes. Some years ago I documented two simultaneous polls on embryonic stem cell research that came to precisely opposite conclusions (2-1 pro, 2-1 against) simply because of the way they were worded. Catholic Bishops commissioned one, CAMRA (I think) the other; truth is, both were biased. There are many other examples.
That said, the 37-year trend in abortion attitudes is totally consistent, and trends by the same pollster do count. The public mind is set, and it’s in favor of choice, with some limitations. I do wish the Douhat’s of this world would quit, but there is no sign of it. He just cherry picks data, which is seriously annoying.
JPL
@pete:
In fairness he meant to be factually misleading.
Sasha
Whatever people say in polls, whatever the percentages are, in the two elections where people VOTED on the question, they both had strikingly similar results. In South Dakota and Mississippi, two of the most conservative states, both measures (one that would have outlawed abortion and one that would have led to the outlawing of abortion) were defeated 55% to 45%.
Talk is cheap and a lot of people probably feel pressured to take the anti-abortion position in polls but when the moment of truth comes and in the privacy of the ballot box, people want abortion to be legal.
CarolDuhart2
@MattF: That’s fine. If they don’t want to have one themselves, but aren’t interested in forcing others to go one way or another, that’s good enough.
LongHairedWeirdo
To be fair, I do have to mention that those who think abortion-is-murder (not just “wrong”) have a reason for trying to impose their views on others.
To be equally fair, I should mention that a lot of people say that abortion is murder, and say that it’s okay to kill a murderer, and say that violence is justified to prevent murder, and say “OMG I’M SO TOTALLY OPPOSED TO CLINIC BOMBINGS AND VIOLENCE AGAINST ABORTION PROVIDERS!!!!!!!1!!11!” And, nearly none of them would approve of “good Germans” who obeyed the laws while millions of murders occurred during the Nazi regime. So, a lot of them are bullshitters, or liars (or both), or, possibly, cowards.
Me, I was forced to acknowledge that, if you handed me a thimble, and said “I don’t think there’s an actual person in here, and you need to convince me it would be murder if I were to kill the occupant of this thimble[1],” I could not make up a compelling legal argument. I could make an argument that *I* agreed with, one that convinced *me* – but not one based upon broadly accepted legal principles. So, up to about 12 weeks, I can’t see anyone making a legal issue based upon morality.
[1] Technically, now that it’s in a thimble, it’s probably too late to argue against killing it.
MikeJ
@MattF:
Even Sarah Palin talked about how her daughter who got knocked up *chose* to keep her kid. Which is all anybody wants. The right to coose for oneself.
Trentrunner
If men could get pregnant, abortion kiosks would be in front of every Walmart and Costco.
Villago Delenda Est
@Trentrunner:
Abortion would also under that circumstance be a sacrament of the Catholic Church.
MattF
@Trentrunner: An old friend of mine (ex-Catholic) used to say that if men got pregnant, abortion would be a sacrament.
Added: As the immediate previous poster notes…
MacKenna
Now that Catholic Pillsbury Dough Boy is pulling stats straight out of his ass, he should leave the NYTs and work for Fox News.
Brian S
@LongHairedWeirdo: Even those people aren’t always logically consistent. If you honestly believe abortion is murder, after all, then you have to call for the mother and anyone who assists her in getting an abortion to receive, at the minimum, life without parole in prison. After all, if abortion is murder, then it’s the very definition of pre-meditated murder, and that carries the death penalty in pretty much every state which has one. But I guarantee you that you won’t get 20% of the population calling for that. You might not get 20% of the people who say abortion should be illegal in all circumstances saying that.
JR in WVa
Ross can’t do higher math (that is, with numbers above 10) unless he takes his shoes off, which you can’t do at the NY Times office.
Simple as that!
JR in WVa
Also too, he will lie without hesitation to support his poorly considered position, which is what he is doing when he adds a group that believes abortion is sometimes justified and a group who believes it is never justified.
That’s like trying to get polka dot paint by stirring black and white together!
SiubhanDuinne
Oh dear doG. The ad at the bottom of this page is for Christian Maternity Clothing, complete with a biblical verse and the URL http://www.HIS-child.com.
Okay, so Google thinks I’m a Christian woman of child bearing age. That makes a nice little change from their thinking I’m a 55-year-old man who enjoys fishing and golfing and needs to find the right investments to support those leisure activities.
Pongo
I think the right is going to push the abortion angle on this to distract from the really big issue this week’s nightmare revealed: Komen’s stewardship is appallingly inadequate and their corporate structure appears to be just another example of wingnut welfare, allowing them to distribute money to a lot of cronies while getting no actual useful skills in return. How many highly paid execs does this outfit have, anyway? VPs, presidents, CEO’s, founder/spokespeople, directors, corporate officers? All that brain power and not one person had the sense to predict that pulling funding from a program in line with their mission (breast cancer screening) in order to support a policy that was not (anti-abortion political agenda) would cause some problems? Even if they knew they had hopelessly inept execs, they spent more than $140,000,000 on ‘consultants and advisers,’ who should have been able to provide the expertise their staff and board apparently lack. What are they paying all these people to do?
And the welfare continues, as they have just hired Ari Fleischer to ‘guide them through this crisis’ http://tinyurl.com/6tbkh7z.’ How much donated money intended for breast cancer initiatives will now be funneled to Ari Fleischer, et al for ‘crisis management?’ People will never agree on the abortion issue, but everyone should be able to see the problem with mismanagement of donated funds.
Southern Beale
On a related note, the FCC ruled that Chicago TV stations don’t have to show Randall Terry’s creepy fetus-part ad, since he’s not a real presidential candidate. He was trying to get a gross-out abortion ad aired during the Super Bowl by running for president, which would force affiliates to air his campaign ads because they have to run candidates’ ads within a certain number of days before a primary.
He’s going to be crying into his coffee now.
Cacti
“Legal in only a few circumstances” = rape, incest, my teenage daughter
TooManyJens
I think that’s weaselly as hell. By that standard, George W. Bush was pro-choice. Somehow I don’t think NARAL et al. would claim him.
Brian S
@TooManyJens: It’s not weasely–it’s an indication of where the actual debate over abortion is in this country. Pro-choice has won the war–the battles now are over how accessible abortions will be. And yes, pro-choicers have lost a lot of those battles of late, but when you look at the poll numbers, they’re clear–no one outside that hard-core 20% wants to go back to a time where they’re illegal.
The real problem is that enough politicians know that they can pretty much get that 20% of the population’s vote if they adopt that position, which means they only have to get 30% of the rest to win. That’s a huge advantage in a lot of districts. And there are a lot of people who think they’re anti-choice when they really aren’t, who are willing to vote for a person who adopts that extremist position because it’s not a deal breaker for them. We need to make it a deal breaker for them. And I don’t have a magic bullet argument to make that happen. I try pointing out that rape and incest exceptions don’t make a lot of sense if you actually think abortion is murder, and that more than just doctors should go to jail if we make it a crime, but that only gets you so far.
Brutusettu
Even under the “combined responses” numbers, Douthat has no clue what most people mean by “Legal only in a few circumstances.” Does Douthat have a Karnak clue how many people were ok with 1st trimester abortions and that qualified as “few circumstances”?
Brutusettu
And if the poll question changed to whether the government should arrest, by physical force if necessary, women seeking an abortion, with the government making sure those pregnancies are carried to term through any means necessary.
Any guesses on how much those numbers would change?
honus
@JasonF: Also, don’t “legal in most circumstances (38%) snd always legal (26%) add up to 64% which kind of kicks Douthat’s contention in the head?