I work with 17 people in a lab environment in the Deep South. About half work for one company and half for another. The demographics are interesting between the two: my company co-workers are majority female with mainly progressive views that we tend to hide from view due to company policy against political activism on the clock. The other company is staffed entirely by white males, of which most are very vocal conservatives.
Only two or three of the 18 of us are native to the area. We come from all over the country: Florida, Illinois, Ohio, Virginia, Maryland, and Maine (via England).
For the past 2 years the conservative voices have been the outspoken ones, the ones that drown out the rest of us. I know our silence encourages them and lets them think we all concur with the garbage they spew.
But the tide has turned in the past few weeks.
The other company welcomed a new face into the crowd a few months ago after he transferred from another location. He is just as outspoken as the rest of them. And he is an unabashed and enthusiastic Obama supporter.
On paper he really shouldn't be. He grew up in the land of Denny Hastert and entered the military right after high school. He lived in the Mideast for a few years as a result.
When our loudest McCain cheerleader starts up, Mr. Illinois gets even louder shooting down the BS. If someone asks him how he's doing, he always responds "Mavericky". He LOVES the SNL skits and plays them for everyone. Today alone he led a group discussion about Net Neutrality and he suckered me into leading one on health care (again, my company policy prohibits this, but my boss was out of the room...). His boss has been in a meeting all day (one of the biggest McCain apologizers) so he took the opportunity to tape a Republicans for Obama sign to his computer. He is extremely knowledgable about the issues.
I have been shocked that two others from his company have stepped forward as Obama voters. Others admit they are persuadable. Suddenly the loud conservative ones are looking like the minority.
Sadly, our state will not turn blue this year. But we're all voting. He took the initiative with his co-workers to make sure they were registered and I registered mine. I think we're edging closer and closer to purple state status. I hope to see it in the next 10 years.
The South is changing. We've just got a slower pace going on down here. :) The influx of people looking for affordable real estate, jobs, and warm weather, coupled with an aging backwards-looking population will change the dynamics here in my lifetime.