A small business in Decatur explains how bringing people together is the root of their profession.
DECATUR, Ga. – It’s heard every election season: your voice is your vote.
It’s a reminder that behind every vote is a real person who had a reason to vote.
Candidates are spending money on polling and personnel to try to read the Georgia electorate.
But nothing beats a face-to-face conversation.
Meet Daphne Dail, small business and artist
Daphne Dail is co-owner of MudFire Studios & Gallery in Decatur. Dail has been operating small businesses for more than a decade.
“Mudfire is, at its core, a community space for people seeking an education in clay,” Dail said. “Anyone can come in and interact with the work and hopefully fall in love with a piece that they can take home.”
Dail explained that the main studio serves about 250 members and employs about 20 staff.
“They arrive as strangers,” Dail said, “but they make lifelong friends.”
Issues she cares about
Reproductive health
Dail explained that reproductive health is one of the issues she is most concerned about this election period.
“You can’t say you care about people and then take away their ability to access health care,” she said. “That’s huge for me.”
LGBTQ+ rights
For Dail, reproductive health care also flows into human rights.
“I think the LGBTQ community is routinely used as a punching bag to create laws and rules to control that community,” Dail said.
Dail’s take on the 2024 election season:
“I think what always concerns me is how disconnected we can become from the idea that the purpose of politics, the fundamental purpose of politics, is to take care of each other,” Dail said.
Dail is concerned with how identities and lived experiences can be used as a divisive issue to divide people. Referencing her identity as part of the LGBTQ+ community, she said she has seen it happen.
“I think being part of a marginalized community, we are very familiar with being used as a divisive football,” she explained.
Although politics can sometimes feel frustrating, Dail said he is optimistic about the next generation of voters and their potential to use modern communication tools as a means of connecting with one another.
“I am hopeful that future generations will be able to increase our digital media literacy and bypass some of the negative impacts of social media and use it to connect with each other in a real and supportive way,” she said.
By leveraging new ways to reach each other, Dail said he is creating space for people to talk and listen to each other.
“I think I’m more optimistic about the communication that’s happening between people,” Dail said.
Watch our Voice of the Voter segment during Georgia Voting Sundays at 11 a.m. on WXIA.
