Real Courage

As somebody who used to work in, and manage in call centers, I can tell you that this is just all kinds of awesome.

Some three dozen workers at a telemarketing call center in Indiana walked off the job rather than read an incendiary McCain campaign script attacking Barack Obama, according to two workers at the center and one of their parents.

Nina Williams, a stay-at-home mom in Lake County, Indiana, tells us that her daughter recently called her from her job at the center, upset that she had been asked to read a script attacking Obama for being "dangerously weak on crime," "coddling criminals," and for voting against "protecting children from danger."

Williams' daughter told her that up to 40 of her co-workers had refused to read the script, and had left the call center after supervisors told them that they would have to either read the call or leave, Williams says. The call center is called Americall, and it's located in Hobart, IN.

"They walked out," Williams says of her daughter and her co-workers, adding that they weren't fired but willingly sacrificed pay rather than read the lines. "They were told [by supervisors], `If you all leave, you're not gonna get paid for the rest of the day."

People working in call centers runs the gamut from college students, to former stay-at-home moms returning to the work force, to people working a second job, to people trying to build careers. Like most working people these days, it's not an easy conversation to explain that you're losing a day's pay.

I admire the courage of Ms. Williams, and all of the others for taking a stand, and calling bullshit. Sadly, some of them, once the spotlight is no longer on them, probably will lose their jobs over this. This isn't dressing up in a flightsuit, and pretending you're a hotshot pilot. This isn't being a chicken shit Republican Delegate and donning a band-aid with a purple heart on it.

This is real courage. It's rare. It's precious. And for a democratic (small d) government to survive, it is absolutely essential.