Individuals belonging to unfamiliar groups, especially those who engaged in unusual practices regarding food, cleanliness and sex, posed a higher risk of carrying novel (and therefore particularly dangerous) infectious agents. Perceiving such individuals would thus activate the behavioral immune system and cause avoidance behavior and the accompanying emotion of disgust…. This hypervigilance may be especially acute in those individuals who are especially sensitive to disgust, the emotion that drives the behavioral avoidance system. Because gay people almost by definition engage in “unusual” sexual behavior, one would expect more negative reactions to this outgroup on the part of those who are particularly disgust sensitive.

Delores Spraggins of Birmingham and her daughter June seemed to speak for the majority in both the red and the blue state. "There is a lot of hatred in the world. Love is good wherever you can find it," Spraggins said.

And then there was Kristin Kenneavy, who said, "I would actually want our kids to grow up in a place where they would see various types of people engaging in behaviors that [are] loving. As I walk by, I'm thinking 'Oh, that's sweet,' you know, that people are in love. I would have absolutely not a problem with our children seeing something like that."