On the fence

I’m having an afternoon meal with a small group of female friends, enjoying a lighthearted conversation about such lunch-appropriate topics as celebrity marriages, gardening tips and organic pet food, when the discussion takes a perilous turn toward a lunch-inappropriate topic: abortion.

At first, things are going smoothly, and it actually seems as though we’re going to discuss it without ruining any friendships or appetites—until I make the mistake of revealing my position on the issue.

“I’m on the fence about abortion rights,” I say, and as fast as you can blurt, “He’s a witch! Burn, burn, buuurn him!” they’re dragging me outside, tying me to a stake and setting me ablaze.

Naturally, I try to explain where I’m coming from—that most of my life I have been vehemently pro-choice, until about five years ago, when I began to suspect that the complexities of the issue were too massive for my one small brain to comprehend: Indeed, the origin and meaning of our existence lies at the core of the abortion debate, and the answer to such an epic question as “When does life begin?” is unknowable. My friends are not having any of it.

“Only cowards sit on the fence,” snipped friend A.

“It’s the chicken’s way out,” accused B.

“You can’t have it both ways,” insisted C.

“You gotta make a choice.”

They’re not alone in this worldview. Just Google the phrase “on the fence” and you’ll discover an ocean of anti-fence-sitting comments, such as this quote from motivational speaker Jim Rohn: “It doesn’t matter which side of the fence you get off on sometimes. What matters most is getting off. You cannot make progress without making decisions.” And that’s exactly the sort of myopic, feelgood gobbledygook you’d expect from one of these motivational dorks. Let’s analyze:

1. “You cannot make progress without making decisions”:

Well, thank you for that keen bit of insight, Dr. Obvious McObvenstein. The problem is, progress ain’t the goal, because not all progress is good progress. For example, progress on a bank heist

is not good progress. Progress on a terrorist plot to blow up an orphanage is not good progress. Progress on another sequel to Blue Lagoon—starring Whoopi Goldberg and Gilbert Gottfried as the stranded lovers, now older, flabbier and bickering over whose turn it is to catch and cook the termites—is not good progress.

2. “What matters most is getting off [the fence]”: Well, no, actually, what matters most is coming down on the correct side of the fence. For example, let’s pretend I’m undecided about the moral dilemma of, say, puppy raping, but, because my favorite motivational speaker told me the most important thing is to get off the fence, I rushed to judgment, came down in favor of puppy raping and, consequently, embarked on a puppyraping activist’s tour—lecturing about the social advantages of puppy raping, passing out pro-puppy-raping brochures, visiting schools and telling kids they should start puppy raping at an early age—thus making good “progress” for the pro-puppy-raping agenda. I think even Dr. McObvenstein would have to agree that it would have been better for everyone (especially puppies) if I had remained undecided.

So, yeah, I’m a proud fence-sitter.

The list of fences upon which my prolific white buttocks sit is righteous and long: I’m on the fence about leaving Iraq. We never should have invaded it in the first place, but who knows what kind of mess our departure would leave behind.

I’m on the fence about immigration.

While I tend to be in favor of amnesty and an easier path to citizenship, I understand why people want more control over who comes in.

I’m on the fence about extraterrestrials.

The notion that little gray men are zipping around in flying saucers is as unbelievable to me as the idea that we are the only intelligent life in the vastness of the cosmos.

Ditto God. The concept that the universe manifested by chance is as incredible as the concept of it being designed by an omniscient, white-bearded overseer who lives in a floating silver city in the clouds and makes public appearances on tortillas.

I’m on the fence about Avatar, as it was the most visually stunning movie of all time but had a screenplay written by a team of lobotomized monkeys who flung their excrement against a wall to create blotches that resembled words and sentences.

I’m on the fence about Nancy Grace. Would it be better to shoot her in the back of the head with a shotgun or lock her in a dungeon to endure a life of torture and degradation?

And, I’m on the fence about abortion, which is the reason my lunchmates have been berating me as a coward for the past 20 minutes, causing me to lash back in a totally lunch-inappropriate volume, “You’ve got a lot of nerve saying I’m the coward when you gang up on me three against one!” I tell them, “Being on the fence means having no allies, no sanctuary, no protection from the sticks and stones being hurled back and forth.”

I tell them, “The world needs more people who are brave enough to admit when they don’t know something. There are just too many people running around thinking they have all the answers, and you know what? Maybe you ladies do have the answers. Maybe you’re smarter than I am. Well, better that I recognize my stupidity and sit quietly on the fence than think I know what’s what and come down swinging on the wrong side.”

Write to ed@sdcitybeat.com and editor@sdcitybeat.com. Visit edwindecker.com.