Why do human interactions go wrong with such frequency? Why do we struggle to recognise when we’re being deceived? Why do we jump to inaccurate conclusions, with often devastating consequences?
These are the sort of questions Malcolm Gladwell – a staff writer for The New Yorker once described as one of the world’s 100 most influential thinkers by TIME magazine – wants us to wrestle with in his latest book, Talking to Strangers.
The book begins and ends with the tragic case of Sandra Bland, an African American woman who committed suicide in police custody after being stopped by a Texas policeman, Brian Encinia, in 2015. What began as a random traffic stop ended up with a heated argument and Bland’s arrest and detention. Whilst for many this case was all about systemic racism, and for others it was simply one bad police officer, Gladwell takes it as a case study in what can go wrong when we don’t know how to talk to strangers.
Gladwell’s exploration of the issues involved in the Sandra Bland case takes him on a digressive journey through stories of Cuban operatives going undetected for years in the CIA, Neville Chamberlain’s infamous failure to read Hitler’s intentions in the run-up to World War Two, several notorious abuse scandals, the Bernie Madoff Ponzi scheme, the wrongful conviction of Amanda Knox, the ‘enhanced interrogation’ of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, and even the suicide of Sylvia Plath. At each stage he offers a simplified version of some complex research findings in the social sciences. No doubt at some points he crosses the line from simple to simplistic, but there are some interesting thoughts here.
Truth, transparency and context
First, he notes the way that we as human beings ‘default to truth’ in our interactions. We tend to assume that we are not being lied to. We could call that naivety, and it certainly leads to problems. But what is the alternative? Gladwell points out that whilst ‘we think we want our guardians to be alert to every suspicion’, this itself leads to problems. Brian Encinia, for example, had been trained in policing methods that were designed to overcome ‘default to truth’ – every vehicle stop was to be treated with suspicion. That put him on edge and precipitated a toxic interaction with Sandra Bland.
It would probably do us good to reflect on this material about ‘default to truth’ and its impact on our churches, particularly as it relates to safeguarding. How can we be communities of grace and welcome without being naïve about the possibility of both abuse and deception?
Second, Gladwell wants us to question the myth of transparency, ‘the idea that people’s behaviour and demeanour – the way they represent themselves on the outside – provides an authentic and reliable window into the way they feel on the inside.’
Third, Gladwell reminds us of the crucial importance of context: when and where are we talking with this stranger?
At its core, this book is a plea for humility: ‘We need to accept that the search to understand a stranger has real limits. We will never know the whole truth. We have to be satisfied with something short of that. The right way to talk to strangers is with caution and humility.’
That call to humility should resonate with Christians. We of all people ought not to be surprised that our knowledge of others is finite, and that the human heart is capable of astonishing deception. If we embark on pastoral counselling or personal evangelism with the assumption that the person in front of us is easy to read, we will quickly discover our mistake.
It’s a mistake that Gladwell calls, quoting the psychologist Emily Pronin, ‘the illusion of asymmetric insight’, the idea that ‘we are nuanced and complex and enigmatic, but the stranger is easy’. No one is easy to understand!
Indeed, we would want to go further, surely? The idea that we really know ourselves is an illusion too, isn’t it? ‘Who can discern their own errors?’ (Ps. 19:12)
Above all, humility about human knowledge – whether of strangers or indeed of ourselves – should make us marvel afresh at God’s knowledge of us, for, as Calvin says, ‘from the feeling of our own ignorance … we recognise that the true light of wisdom [rests] in the Lord alone’.
What a wonder it is to think that none of us is ever a stranger to the Lord; that He never relies on our transparency, but searches the hidden depths of our hearts.
Dave Puttick is Pastor of Mirfield Evangelical Church
TALKING TO STRANGERS: What We Should Know about the People We Don’t Know
By Malcolm Gladwell
Penguin. 400 pages. £9.99
ISBN 978 0 141 988 498
