Liberal science denialism at the ballot box

The two major issues where liberals in the United States get tagged as “denialist” or “anti-science” is on vaccination and GMO. A major problem with this thesis though is that in aggregate the social science doesn’t support this. I’ve used the GSS to check on GMO attitudes, and education/intelligence (or lack of) are the strongest predictors of skepticism, not ideology. And the best social science doesn’t seem to indicate strong political valence to anti-vaccination sentiment at the grassroots.

But sometimes looking at aggregates misses the important dynamics. I’d argue that the reason people keep thinking that there is a correlation between anti-vaccination opinions and anti-GMO opinions and the Left is that the the most vocal elite expositors of these positions hail from the cultural Left. Policy positions that start out non-ideological can quickly become polarized when elites lead in a particular direction.

The state of Oregon had a ballot measure on genetically modified organisms and labeling. Oregon also legalized marijuana. We have county-by-county results for both, as well as results for the governor’s race. I brought them together and generated some scatter plots. As you can see below:

1) There is a strong correlation on the county level for support for legalization of marijuana and GMO labeling (R² is just the square of the correlation, and explains proportion of variation in Y explainable by variation in X).

2) There is a strong correlation on the county level for support for Democratic candidates and GMO labeling.

I am aware that not all of those who support GMO labeling are denalists. Some of them are scientists. But my personal experience with those who support GMO labeling (there was a measure in California a few years back) is that their rationales are inchoate, and often not “reality based” (i.e., they are more about fear than anything else). Though there is no strong political valence on the grassroots at this point, I predict that if GMO labeling keeps coming up over and over, and it becomes a social movement, you’ll see it become Left-tinged as people like Michael Pollan start polarizing opinions. Of course in some places, such as Europe, the anti-GMO position has swept society to become the dominant one.

Raw data:

County	Yes, Marijuana	Yes, GMO label	Democrat for governor
Baker	41	32	27
Benton	60	52	59
Clackamas	51	47	46
Clatsop	57	50	46
Columbia	53	45	43
Coos	53	50	42
Crook	41	31	29
Curry	56	52	41
Deschutes	51	46	46
Douglas	45	41	34
Gilliam	41	23	32
Grant	35	32	25
Harney	34	26	24
Hood River	57	54	59
Jackson	53	55	43
Jefferson	44	32	34
Josephine	50	49	35
Klamath	44	36	28
Lake	38	29	23
Lane	60	57	57
Lincoln	62	53	54
Linn	47	38	35
Malheur	31	32	25
Marion	48	42	41
Morrow	34	27	28
Multnomah	71	62	70
Polk	47	42	41
Sherman	38	23	28
Tillamook	58	45	47
Umatilla	37	32	29
Union	41	33	31
Wallow	39	35	28
Wasco	49	40	43
Washington	55	48	52
Wheeler	36	32	29
Yamhill	50	41	41