As many of you know, I am a member of the Volunteer Fire Department in our community. I am training as a First Responder (ECA in the state of Texas, but I'll be registered in both the national and state registries). Recently, we had an issue where one of our firefighters got into a verbal argument with another firefighter. The chief kicked off one of the participants in the altercation. I didn't take sides, because I don't have enough objective information to make an informed decision.
I didn't think a whole lot about it until talking with another individual in the community. He's angry at the fire department because he feels it is "exclusive". Whether the two issues are related or not, I don't know. I didn't pursue it, but I consider this individual a good friend. He and the chief, though, have a long standing feud that centers (sadly enough) on the chief's having left the church where the friend ministers (and where we have been attending church).
As this feud has come up in discussion with both of these individuals, I've been pretty clear: the beef they have with each other is not my beef. As a volunteer firefighter, I have a job to do, and that job, I believe, requires a pretty tight loyalty to the chief and to the heirarchy of the fire department. As such, I don't feel it's appropriate to pile on in any public discussion about the fitness or otherwise of my chief, or of other officers within our department, in part because I have access by the vary nature of my job to information most members of the community may not have about these individuals. And I understand emergency response well enough to know that there NEEDS to be a well defined heirarchy and allegiance to that heirarchy so that our response is both efficient and professional. After all, would you want two paramedics arguing over you about last Friday's poker game?
As for the friend, again, I have my loyalties, but they exist on a different level. Again, I'm privvy to information others might have, and entering into the conflict might compromise that confidentiality, among other things. And a loyalty to my friends is just as essential as a loyalty to my unit. Sure I will take sides when it comes to a direct criticism of the unit, especially when the criticism is based on misinformation, but in this case, I feel as if the friend is expecting me to resign from the department to reinforce his position, something I simply will not do.
This article was, of course, inspired by the recent developments within JU, but does not relate directly to it. I will say no more than that on the subject, except to say that I have one expectation of my friends, and that is that they understand I will not compromise my loyalty to other friends simply to prove my loyalty to them. It's unfair to expect that of me.
If that makes me a "fence sitter", so be it. I've had worse labels. But I'd much rather be a fence sitter than to get involved in piling on against someone I consider a friend.