Fence-Sitting Quotes

Fence straddlers have no balls. In compensation, however, they enjoy a comfortable seat and can retreat swiftly, when danger threatens, to either side of the fence. There is something to be said for every position.

I may have had a prejudice against agnosticism as a body of thought: sort of a fence-sitting theory, where you can't make up your mind one way or another.

A mugwump is a fellow with his mug on one side of the fence and his wump on the other.

The man who straddles the fence too long usually develops a sore crotch.

In any organization there ought to be the possibility of discussion... fence sitting is an art, and it's difficult, and it's important to do, rather than to go headlong in one direction or the other. It's just better to have action, isn't it than to sit on the fence? Not if you're not sure which way to go, it isn't.

Every politician must be able to keep both feet on the fence with his ear to the ground.

A politician is an animal which can sit on a fence and yet keep both ears to the ground.

Viewers don't want you to walk the fence - they do want a point of view - and that's what we bring.

He has sat on the fence so long that the iron has entered his soul.

The grey is certainly inspired by the photo-paintings, and, of course, it's related to the fact that I think grey is an important colour - the ideal colour for indifference, fence-sitting, keeping quiet, despair. In other words, for states of being and situations that affect one, and for which one would like to find a visual expression.

I try and sit on the fence because as soon as you voice any kind of opinion, people begin to think you're an idiot.

I will support Ireland at rugby, but when England and Ireland are playing, I sit on the fence.

Moderation? It's mediocrity, fear, and confusion in disguise. It's the devil's dilemma. It's neither doing nor not doing. It's the wobbling compromise that makes no one happy. Moderation is for the bland, the apologetic, for the fence-sitters of the world afraid to take a stand. It's for those afraid to laugh or cry, for those afraid to live or die. Moderation...is lukewarm tea, the devil's own brew.

Honesty is never seen sitting astride the fence.

I have been described by one of my colleagues as a 'militant agnostic' with my tagline, 'I don't know, and neither do you!' I take this hard-line, fence-sitting position because it is the only position consistent with both my scientific ethos and my conscience.