Interesting stuff. Since people who hold college degrees tend to vote Democratic, I assume the somewhat extreme Republican skew of college football is explained by the often southern and mostly non-urban small cities and towns where college football is king. I would have thought MLB would be more heavily Republican skewing, since most baseball fans I know are older and tend towards conservative politics but this factor is probably mitigated somewhat by Yankee/Red Sox/Dodger/Giant fans from liberal leaning areas of the country. It seems the college town effect REALLY has an impact on basketball, which goes from heavily Democratic leaning at the pro level to somewhat strongly Republican leaning at the college level. It also seems to lend credence to the theory that the NBA's "urban" image is a big turn off to Republican voters. I don't often like Commodore's posts, but this one at least interested me.
I love college football and the NFL. I don't like MLS, wrestling, golf, hockey, or NASCAR. Other than just about everything on the graph, it's pretty right on.
I/We have been saying this for years. Internet + Basketball = the reason for the BBS's larger liberal population.
People with college degrees vote more Republican, and it's one of the strongest indications of how you will vote. The trend is slightly less true if you restrict it to graduate degrees only. Democrats dominate inside of universities, but that's it anong the educated. Old data, but it still holds true:
They should have set it liberal vs conservative, then expanded it to Canada, I have a feeling people in Vancouver, Montreal, and Toronto would have changed things real quick when it came to the NHL.
I am curious how do they classify about 1/3 of the nation that are not Democrats or Republicans? Are we lumped in somehow? Never mind, I see Sam's site have a break down of IND. The data seems old though, are there 2010 updates?
Do southern Democrats also like Nascar? I think so but I'm not sure. I think this is more a cultural/geographical correlation. For example, college football is huge in the South and it is moreso a coincidence that the South is also more Christian. MLS is more "Democrat" probably because of Latinos - who are traditionally Democrat but obviously very conservative on many social issues. Soccer just happens to be a bigger part of Latino culture. It does look like conservatives are probably more likely to be sports fans. I do find that to be true in real like experiences too.
