Yesterday, on my way into the local supermarket, I was accosted by two young girls selling pins. "Do you want to support cancer research?" they asked.

All right, how do you answer a question like that? "No" implies that you don't give a crap about cancer research. "Yes" means you're either forced to buy a pin, or you have to append your answer with something lame like "but I don't have any cash on me at the moment", or "I already made a donation at the office", or "I'm allergic to pins". It's a loaded question, deliberately designed to put neurotic people like myself in a moral bind. We don't want to seem callous, but neither do we want to buy any damn pins.

"Not right now," I told them, and walked into the store feeling a bit guilty.

I knew I had to deal with the question on the way out again -- like hyenas spotting the weak member of a flock, these pin-selling, cancer research-supporting, bubble-gum chewing kids had singled me out for the kill -- and that's when I started to think about how we're often shamed into doing things that we think of as The Right Thing To Do.

I don't usually walk around in supermarkets thinking philosophical thoughts. Usually, I'm thinking "where's the cheese", or "ooh, nice avocado", or I'm scouting out chicks (I really don't get out enough). Yesterday, though, I spent at least seventy-two seconds thinking about why a question like "do you want to support cancer research?" is an attempt to force us into doing something that we don't want to do, simply because saying "no" is a hard thing to do. Of course cancer research is important. Like, duh. Cancer is bad. We can all agree on that. I don't think that there's anyone out there who thinks cancer is a good thing -- if there is, he or she is probably also building bombs out of shoe-boxes, or injecting cyanide into candy. But guilt shouldn't be the motivating factor for contributing to a worthy cause; there has to be an element of free will in there somewhere.

So on my way out, when the two girls asked the same question over again (knowing that they'd made me uncomfortable the first time around), I grinned and said a big, happy "nope!".

That's right, cancer research ain't my thing, nah-ah, don't want to support that. At least, not by purchasing a pin. I'll give at the office, thank you very much.  ¶ 11:43