EVS data collected in The Netherlands have been used by the Dutch team in response to quite some controversy this week after Kees van der Staaij, the fraction leader of the Reformed Political Party (an orthodox Calvinistic political party), signed the Dutch translation of the so-called Nashville-statement.
This declaration is supposedly providing a contemporary Christian stance towards ethical issues like homosexuality, transgenderism and gender roles. The Dutch team checked how progressive the electorates of the various parties are with respect to homosexuality by using the information collected in EVs2017 through the question whether people think homosexuality should never to always be justified. The team found that the Dutch who are most appealed by this Reformed Political Party are quite anti-lgbt, with a scale score close to the scale minimum. What’s more is that the youngest people attracted to this party are more negative towards homosexuality than elderly voters. Tim Reeskens (National Program director of EVS in the Netherlands) published a piece on this issue in the blog Social Vraagstukken. His interpretation of this controversy is, then, that marketing-wise, it serves the party quite well: as the only political party taking strong stance anti-lgbt, the party might attract some voters with similar homophobe opinions.  is, then, that marketing-wise, it serves the party quite well: as the only political party taking strong stance anti-lgbt, the party might attract some voters with similar homophobe opinions.