A Foot in the Door

Nobody likes someone who likes everyone. It’s the truth. It may be one’s instinct to say “be nice to everyone and they will be nice to you,” and in fact that’s true… but when it comes to a conflict or anything in which everyone else must be the mediator, humanity demands that you follow one of three options.

• Take Side A – You must stand on this side, because Side A is in the right. In choosing this, you have alienated all advocates of Side B, but have earned the respect of Side A. You have also possibly gained some respect from Side B by sticking to your guns. People know who you are, what you are, and where you’re coming from, and therefore you are not feared and abandoned in times when this conflict comes into play.
• Take Side B – You must stand on this side, because Side B is in the right. In choosing this, you have alienated all advocates of Side A, but have earned the respect of Side B. You have also possibly gained some respect from Side A by sticking to your guns. People know who you are, what you are, and where you’re coming from, and therefore you are not feared and abandoned in times when this conflict comes into play.
• Take no side. – You do not take sides, or even involve yourself with the conflict. You maintain the respect of both sides, or are alienated by both sides, but either way, you remain guiltless.

Things are as clear cut as this most of the time. I have noticed, however, that humanity has found another alternative that spawns mostly from failed attempts at the third option. This is the option that few are aware exists… and for good reason, as this option can make one feel like the most liked in the world… even if in reality they are the most hated scum on this planet. Yes, these are the people who have unlocked the fourth bullet point.

• Take both sides.

This will probably sound familiar: You and a friend are having a spat. You have a mutual friend, and so you commiserate with him and ask what side he’s on. He refuses to name a side but commiserates and agrees with you, such that you are confident that if it came to blows, he would back you up. Later, you find out that your opponent believes the mutual friend to be on his side. Harmless enough, you suppose. The opponent is deluded. The opponent is continually friendly towards the mutual friend, and you find that you are unsure whether your friend is for you or against you: because he has listened to both sides, he is no longer uninvolved and must therefore choose a side. Perhaps the mutual friend maintains that he is simply fooling the other person into thinking he is on his side… but how do you know for sure?

In essence, the mutual friend is going to both sides and listening to them, gaining major empathy points from both and causing both to regard him as a trusted individual. However, any person who does not refrain from involving himself in the conflict, yet still refuses to commit to any one side is merely drawing attention. As such, he suddenly becomes untrusted when both parties realize he is a double agent, regardless of who he “really” supports.

The reason this is done? To be nice to everyone. The mutual friend figures he must be a supportive friend and be confided to by both parties, and then still remain uninvolved. EGHHHH. WRONG! Not involving yourself in the conflict is the key to not being attributed to a side. Entering the conflict is signing a release that gives others license to hate you if they so choose. Deal.

The other reason is curiosity. This is the worst: everyone’s confidant, the argumentative voyeur. Mind your own damn business if you don’t want to be involved but still want the juicy details. Taking advantage of someone’s venting needs to fill up your own personal file of someone else’s secrets is manipulative, and a one-way ticket to the Divine Penalty Box.* I personally don’t understand how these people sleep at night.

*The Divine Penalty Box is going to be my new word that can be replaced with hell, hellfire, Physics Lab… basically whatever “bad place” you decide to believe in.

Take a side, or stay uninvolved. If you take both sides, don’t fool yourself into thinking you’re everyone’s best friend. Sure, if both sides want to talk to you, let them talk, but don’t ever play one off the other, because in the end you’ll end up with no friends. And face it… if you still have friends after that, they’ll be the type of friends that would actually hang out with someone who might be BSing them, and I frankly have little respect for such peers.

Strangely enough, such indecision is rampant among humans. Nowhere is this also more telling than in relationships, when a girl or guy will start pursuing another partner without breaking it off with the first one. This is not cool on so many levels. It’s saving one’s ass, keeping a foot in the door so that if things don’t work out they have something to run back to. Unfortunately, do that long enough and you’ll have no one. Commit to a person, but don’t keep one just in case the second one fails. Bullshit. Make the full investment, or TWEEEET! Eternity in the Divine Penalty Box for being a world-class pussy, and an indecisive coward!