(CNSNews.com) – The Pew Research Center released a survey on Wednesday showing that a majority of Americans, 59 percent, agree that “too many people are easily offended these days over the language that others use.”
Only 39 percent of those surveyed thought that “people need to be more careful about the language they use to avoid offending people with different backgrounds.”
Pew’s survey found substantial divisions in party affiliation, gender, and race in the survey results.
While 78 percent of Republicans agreed that people are too easily offended only 37 percent of Democrats thought that was the case, with even wider divisions among Donald Trump and Clinton supporters. Eighty-three percent of Trump supporters thought too many people are easily offended compared with just 39 percent of those who support Hillary Clinton.
Women were more likely than men to agree that people need to be more careful with language to avoid offending people. About half (51%) of women said too many people are easily offended by language today compared with two-thirds of men (68%).
Sixty-seven percent of blacks surveyed thought people should be more careful with language to avoid offending people of different backgrounds, and just 30 percent say too many people are easily offended by language these days.
The reverse was the case among whites, with 67 percent saying too many are easily offended, and 32 percent who think more care should be taken to not offend others.
The majority of all age groups agreed that language offends people too easily but those 65 and older were slightly more likely than younger adults to say people need to be more careful to avoid offending others.
Regardless of education level, the majority of people said that language offends people too easily but those with some college or higher levels of education were slightly more likely to agree.
The Pew survey was conducted June 7 to July 5 on Pew Research Center’s nationally representative American Trends Panel of 4,602 adults.
A recent poll conducted by Black Youth Project, the Associated Press, and the University of Chicago found similar results among the 1,965 millennials, ages 18-30, surveyed. The majority, 58 percent, either thought “people are much too easily offended” (33%) or said “people are a little too easily offended” (25%).
(AP photo) 
