VOICES OF FLORIDA -- POLL

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VOICES OF FLORIDA -- FAMILY VALUES

One of the things that's on people's minds in anticipation of the presidential election year -- along with crime and job security and worries about health care -- is that vague something called "family values."

But when you try to get a definition from people on what they mean by "family values," it's elusive. Concert 90's Sally Watt has more.

The term "family values" didn't even exist until a few years ago. There may not have been a need for it. It was the Bush Administration that made the term a household word. "Family values" is almost always used in reference to the past -- the way things used to be -- the way we used to be. Lois Stern knows the feeling.

"I kind of grew up in the Beaver Cleaver generation. And though my mother never came to breakfast with her apron on and her hair all done, we were brought up that we would get married, we would have families, and there was a kind of an expectation in the pattern to our life."

The Voices of Florida poll tries to quantify attitudes like this in preparation of the presidential election and the Florida primary. The poll found that Floridians agree on some basic values. The importance of teaching right from wrong, for example. And taking personal responsibility for your actions. 95% of the Floridians polled say avoiding drugs and being faithful in marriage is important. 81% of the respondents, like Sylvia Campbell, say religious faith is key.

"I would like to hear a politician be able to say that he goes every day and takes whatever work he is doing, puts it before God in prayer, and then does his best to do what is right according not just to the laws of the land, but according to how the laws of this land were originally set up, and that was through scriptures."

But what about other, less concrete kinds of family values, like love and respect and support within the family. Or, as Lois Stern, the woman who grew up in the Beaver Cleaver generation, says, acceptance of a family member's differences. She's a member of the group Parents and Friends of Lesbians and Gays, or P-FLAG.

"I think the idea of family is changing. I think that's where there is a lot of hangups. That a family is not necessarily a mother and a father, it can be a single mother, it can be a single father, it can be two moms and two dads."

Lois Stern's daughter is a lesbian.

"My family and my love for my children is something that is constant. It took some learning to accept homosexuality, because it wasn't anything I knew too much about. But I've certainly become closer to my daughter since she's come out to me. And we understand it. And we would not change her for anything in the world."

Although Sylvia Campbell has strong religious convictions, she doesn't consider herself a member of the far right. And she's upset about the breakdown in the family.

"The family itself is being torn apart by too much sex and violence on television. There's no more right or wrong, it's whatever feels good to yourself, just take your pick and do it. There's no teaching, there's no going down a line. The families have quit doing it. The schools have quit doing it. So the children out there are just left to try to make a decision on their own. And children being what they are, they can't make decisions yet."

That kind of frustration will likely play a big part in voters' choices a year from now. Again, Lois Sterns.

Stearns: "Some Republicans' ideas of family values are not my idea of family values. But really, at this point I'd be very hard-pressed to come up with somebody I'd like to vote for.
Watt: "Of either party?
Stearns: "Of either party."