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The Paradoxes of Our Interactions with Strangers

Day by day, we are being exposed to contact with total strangers – walking on the street, attending public or private events, going to the office or even staying at home, as many of us do in the pandemic context of work-from-home. 

It is said that teleworking might be problematic as far as communication is concerned, that it is harder for us to read people from a distance, without direct contact. Is this really true?

In his book “Talking to strangers”, Malcolm Gladwell aims to explain a stressful dilemma, that of the often distorted manner in which we translate the gestures and words of strangers who come our way. 

Although there is no doubt that we can count on certain tools to translate the subtle messages sent by others, this reading shows how any of us can commit serious errors when interacting with people who do not fit into our stereotypes. 

Starting from memorable blunders of this kind, the book offers a demonstration of the mechanisms that make us bad at deciphering the words and intentions of those around us.

When we give the nearby stranger too much or too less credit

Paradoxically, those who were not wrong about Hitler were the ones who knew the least about him, people who had little or no personal contact with him at all, Gladwell points out. 

Ana Belén Montes, one of the greatest Cuban spies in history, managed to infiltrate for years in the Latin American office of the US Defense Intelligence Agency as an expert on Cuba’s issues. 

Although at one point she aroused suspicions in one of her closest colleagues, the very fact that he knew her personal results and exceptional conduct made him doubt his reason and hunches about her. This hesitation cost a lot.

But the issue of the unknown stranger can degenerate just as badly if we project the most grim of our suspicions on that person. In fact, the book “Talking to strangers” starts and finishes with such an example, that of Sandra Bland.

The confrontation between a young African-American woman and an all-too-suspicious police officer ended tragically because of a complete lack of confidence in a stranger that did not fit the police officer’s stereotypes.

How do we end up creating distorted images of others?

  • The default to truth is one of the fundamental theories developed in this book’s pages. Naturally, most of us start our interactions with strangers by believing in their sincerity. Therefore, “when a liar acts like an honest person, or when an honest person acts like a liar, we’re flummoxed.” This is how we end up overlooking questionable behaviours, finding excuses for charlatans and not confronting them openly right from the beginning.

Even when, on the contrary, we defy the default to truth presupposition and correctly identify strangers as impostors, we face the danger of other distortions. 

Harry Markopolos, an independent financial fraud investigator, was the first to uncover the world’s largest fraudulent pyramid investment operation (Ponzi scheme). However, he failed to make himself heard because he came to believe, unfoundedly, that his life was in danger and hesitated to provide the evidence to the authorities.

  • We also misunderstand strangers because we assume the hypothesis of transparency: when we do not have enough information about other people, we believe that we can decipher them by studying their behaviour and facial expressions. However, as in the case of Sandra Bland, we turn out to be weak translators when we meet strangers who simply do not correspond to our definitions of various gestures and mimics.

What can we learn from “Talking with strangers”?

  • Perhaps the most valuable lesson of this book is that we must understand the reality of the stranger next to us before jumping to conclusions about him. We have to pay attention to the context of his behaviour. We must take into consideration that the place and time of our meeting can influence the other person’s reactions.
  • “I always believed in you until I couldn’t anymore”. When we come to such uncomfortable truths, when the known or unknown person next to us turns out to be an impostor, it is important not to blame ourselves for assuming his sincerity. While we can occasionally be wrong about others’ honesty, it is good to remember that the default to truth helps us build meaningful social contacts.  Overall, this is an effective strategy. “Society cannot function any other way.”
  • Finally, we need to accept the limits of our ability to decipher strangers. Although we might have clues and intuitions about the unknown nearby people, we must study them carefully before labelling them in one way or another, positive or negative.

“Talking to strangers” urges vigilance and reserve, but also an appropriate degree of sincere openness towards strangers who cross our paths. This is how we can really keep balance in the dynamic and complex network of our day-to-day interactions.

How do you approach the strangers who come your way?

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Book review made with the help of Bookster

Book review