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5.53k reviews for:
Talking to Strangers: What We Should Know about the People We Don't Know
Malcolm Gladwell
3.83 AVERAGE
5.53k reviews for:
Talking to Strangers: What We Should Know about the People We Don't Know
Malcolm Gladwell
3.83 AVERAGE
Apparently, Cubans are really good at few things: baseball, sandwiches, and spy craft. That's right, spy craft. What's that buzzing noise?
Maybe it's too soon for Havana syndrome jokes.
Anyway, In Talking to Strangers, Gladwell again demonstrates his remarkable ability to deftly weave many seemingly unconnected stories into a single unifying message: we are really bad at reading other people, like really, really bad.
How can Cuban spies infiltrate the DOD and be allowed to continuing working even up to 4 years after the first alarm was sounded? One Cuban defector came over with a whole list of active double agents, people we thought were giving us intel. Cold, calculating, computers can make more accurate predictions on recidivist behavior than human judges with more background information. It took years to get people to believe that certain high-profile people in sports might be sex offenders at best and pedophiles at worst. Bernie Madoff had plenty of time to build his pyramid scheme (the shame there is that he was a really successful guy without it, why grab for more?)
We want to assume the best about people. We've been trained throughout human history because it makes working together possible. There are so many variables in any given interaction that we can't track them all. At some point you have to take the plunge and trust someone.
Gladwell lays all of these case studies and concepts out as he tries to figure out how a young woman ended up dead after a traffic stop in Texas. It's used as a cautionary tale about how a policing concept designed for very specific limited circumstances and use became dangerous when applied to broadly.
We need our police. But we need them to be good decision makers. It's one of those professions where we can't afford to have any bad apples. Granted, I only know what I have read about in the Sandra Bland case. And that comes from Gladwell who has a definite point he wants to make. But having also watched the video, it is pretty clear to me that the officer made the situation worse because he got a little push back and it bruised his ego. And to what end? Maybe he was trained to be overly suspicious and maybe he wasn't.
Most police are good, hard-working people. Maybe it's impossible to weed out the bad apples before they create a fatal situation. Maybe we're all really bad at reading and understanding each other.
It doesn't mean that we shouldn't try to do better.
Maybe it's too soon for Havana syndrome jokes.
Anyway, In Talking to Strangers, Gladwell again demonstrates his remarkable ability to deftly weave many seemingly unconnected stories into a single unifying message: we are really bad at reading other people, like really, really bad.
How can Cuban spies infiltrate the DOD and be allowed to continuing working even up to 4 years after the first alarm was sounded? One Cuban defector came over with a whole list of active double agents, people we thought were giving us intel. Cold, calculating, computers can make more accurate predictions on recidivist behavior than human judges with more background information. It took years to get people to believe that certain high-profile people in sports might be sex offenders at best and pedophiles at worst. Bernie Madoff had plenty of time to build his pyramid scheme (the shame there is that he was a really successful guy without it, why grab for more?)
We want to assume the best about people. We've been trained throughout human history because it makes working together possible. There are so many variables in any given interaction that we can't track them all. At some point you have to take the plunge and trust someone.
Gladwell lays all of these case studies and concepts out as he tries to figure out how a young woman ended up dead after a traffic stop in Texas. It's used as a cautionary tale about how a policing concept designed for very specific limited circumstances and use became dangerous when applied to broadly.
We need our police. But we need them to be good decision makers. It's one of those professions where we can't afford to have any bad apples. Granted, I only know what I have read about in the Sandra Bland case. And that comes from Gladwell who has a definite point he wants to make. But having also watched the video, it is pretty clear to me that the officer made the situation worse because he got a little push back and it bruised his ego. And to what end? Maybe he was trained to be overly suspicious and maybe he wasn't.
Most police are good, hard-working people. Maybe it's impossible to weed out the bad apples before they create a fatal situation. Maybe we're all really bad at reading and understanding each other.
It doesn't mean that we shouldn't try to do better.
Great book. Get the audio version it's so worth it. "how we think of others based off their actions may not reflect how they actually feel"
Great book if understanding why communication situations we depend on fail.
emotional
hopeful
reflective
medium-paced
It’s good. All of his stuff is. I’m still processing this one.
informative
medium-paced
I found the central idea of mismatch between emotions/thoughts and overt signals interesting. He uses the example of the TV show _Friends_ as a situation where all the characters are matched or easy to read. But real life situations are more complex, and it's hard to read the emotions/thoughts of strangers.
A lot of the examples focused on crime, and in January I'm prone to seasonal depression. Consequently, I confess to skimming some sections because I couldn't stomach the details.
A lot of the examples focused on crime, and in January I'm prone to seasonal depression. Consequently, I confess to skimming some sections because I couldn't stomach the details.
challenging
informative
slow-paced
My only quibble is that I feel as though Gladwell doesn’t introduce race into the equation enough here—other than that the book is spot-on and he delivers fascinating insight into why we misjudge others —strangers or not—constantly.
I listened to this book which I think added depth to the narrative. Gladwell reads his book while incorporating audio of the people he discusses. Gladwell encourages us to interact with strangers with humility, while illustrating through examples the numerous times our inability to understand strangers have negatively affected the lives of many.