A recent article in the National Post with the snappy headline Man stabbed for saying hello on TTC bus caught my eye:
A west-end Toronto man was stabbed by a fellow bus passenger angry he had said hello, sparking a debate on how friendly Torontonians should be with strangers.
The 30-year-old-man greeted the fellow rider as he took a Lawrence Avenue West bus to work at 12:30 p.m. yesterday, police said yesterday.
“He said a courteous hello and was then asked ‘Why do you say hello to me, I don’t know you?’” Detective Jim Brons said. “This attack was unprovoked. It was a very weird thing.”
The still-angry young man followed him off the crowded bus at the Bolingbroke Road and Lawrence Avenue West, and then stabbed him three times.
Police are looking for a slim, 18- to 20-year-old black man, 6’2” tall with short, dark braided hair. He was wearing silver loop earrings with diamonds, a black toque, a brown or tan coat with the words “State Property” on the left side and dark blue jeans with a green bandana hanging from the rear left pocket. He carried a black mesh bag on his back.
Det. Brons said the two were sitting side by side when they made eye contact, and the victim decided to say hello. ‘‘He didn’t respond. Ten minutes later, the suspect blew up at him and asked him why he said hi when they didn’t know each other.”
The victim apologized on the bus, and again when they got off the bus, but the man pulled out a knife and stabbed him. The victim was taken to hospital and received numerous stitches.
In the spirit of honest racial dialogue called for by Barack Obama, I would like to openly state that when I see a 6'2” black guy on the bus with diamond loop earrings and a green bandana hanging from his pocket, I try not to make small talk. A large part of me of course would like to ask him if the “State Property” coat was meant to be an ironic statement about slavery, but I'd still resist. One of Ghandi's pithier statements was, “Be the change in the world you want to see.” Well, although I'd like to see a world where strangers of different races say a casual hello to each other, I'm not going to risk a stabbing to make that happen. Maybe that helps explain Harvard political scientist Robert Putnam's findings:
The results of his new study come from a survey Putnam directed among residents in 41 US communities, including Boston. Residents were sorted into the four principal categories used by the US Census: black, white, Hispanic, and Asian. They were asked how much they trusted their neighbors and those of each racial category, and questioned about a long list of civic attitudes and practices, including their views on local government, their involvement in community projects, and their friendships. What emerged in more diverse communities was a bleak picture of civic desolation, affecting everything from political engagement to the state of social ties.
In his findings, Putnam writes that those in more diverse communities tend to “distrust their neighbors, regardless of the color of their skin, to withdraw even from close friends, to expect the worst from their community and its leaders, to volunteer less, give less to charity and work on community projects less often, to register to vote less, to agitate for social reform more but have less faith that they can actually make a difference, and to huddle unhappily in front of the television.”
“People living in ethnically diverse settings appear to 'hunker down' -- that is, to pull in like a turtle,” Putnam writes.
In documenting that hunkering down, Putnam challenged the two dominant schools of thought on ethnic and racial diversity, the “contact” theory and the “conflict” theory. Under the contact theory, more time spent with those of other backgrounds leads to greater understanding and harmony between groups. Under the conflict theory, that proximity produces tension and discord.
Putnam's findings reject both theories. In more diverse communities, he says, there were neither great bonds formed across group lines nor heightened ethnic tensions, but a general civic malaise. And in perhaps the most surprising result of all, levels of trust were not only lower between groups in more diverse settings, but even among members of the same group.
“Diversity, at least in the short run,” he writes, “seems to bring out the turtle in all of us.”
Maybe the solution is as simple as saying a friendly hello to a member of another race on the bus!
Wait . . .
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