On the Fence Independence

Ok, here we go. It's taken me a year and a half to even broach this subject. Sure, I've touched on political topics here and there, but I've never really come out and said what I'm actually thinking. Why in the world would I want to do that?! After all, there is a chance, a very slight chance, that you just might disagree with me. (Gasp!) But I'm going to risk it. I think we all need to risk it. I think we need to lay our cards on the table, assert our opinions/wonderings/musings/questions/concerns/values and then humble ourselves to others. How else do we expect to grow into (or out of or around) ourselves and with each other?

If I had to give a brief summary of my political journey along the Liberal to Conservative spectrum, it would go something like this: unaware of the spectrum, unconcerned with the spectrum, what's the spectrum again?, ok, I think I get the spectrum, concerned with the spectrum, a little to the left, a little to the right, more in the middle. Hope that clears things up.

I'm realizing that my childhood was relatively politics-free, in the sense that we didn't really talk about it, nor did it have apparent influence on my daily life. My parents never used "God" and "County" in the same sentence and I did not grow up in a location with a rich, unwavering devotion to Red or Blue. After all, I grew up in New Hampshire: Live Free or Die. I lived in blissful ignorance of the journey ahead and I avoided a lot of political baggage that could have (and probably would've) strongarmed my future perspectives.

So, when college rolled around and I decided to get my degree in politics (of all things), you can imagine the process that was before me: How do I make sense of all this, get off the fence, and believe in something? College introduced me to the Other, in all senses of the word, as it related to my politics, but even more overarching, as it related to my faith. The Left seemed to stand for the Other. I was on board and off the fence. Post-college introduced me to hard-working people, removed from the luxury of collegiate idealism, who outlined for me values of the Right (and when I say Right, please do not assume the Religious Right), such as freedom, responsibility, and pragmatism, all values that would still compel and enable me to care for the Other. I was won over and still off the fence.*

And now, I'm thinking that on the fence is not a bad place to be. I do think we need to know where we stand on individual issues, events, values and ideals, but I think we should embrace the freedom and responsibility to think outside of our two political parties, to straddle the aisle at times and take the good from both. We need both Left and Right, and to accept one in totality while completely rejecting the other is to limit our own thoughts and our nation's possibilities. In this election season, we have heard of the incalculable importance of the "swing voters", the Independents. And to be an Independent is to commit to sorting it out for ourselves, free from blind devotions and scripted answers. That's a fence I don't mind being on.

*Disclaimer: I know this paragraph oversimplifies the values/platforms of the Left and Right. I know it's not that black and white and that these values can overlap.

More to come...