It’s one of the things that Americans abroad are most recognized by and very often criticized for: striking up conversation with total strangers!
Yes, we do that. We do it abroad not realizing that what we do at home is, in fact, not done in many other societies in the world. Americans consider it a good thing, a friendly gesture, a sign that there is no threat here. We rarely if ever consider that in some other societies it is, in fact, the opposite.
Americans are used to speaking our minds, even when our minds have not done sufficient quiet, interior work. It’s a fundamental right, encoded in our founding documents: Freedom of Speech! Everyone is entitled to an opinion, whether or not that opinion is of any actual value, even when expressing it exposes ignorance, prejudice, small-mindedness. We are free to make ourselves ridiculous with few limitations.
We don’t have the right to yell “FIRE!” in a crowded theater when there is no fire.
“Categories of speech that are given lesser or no protection by the First Amendment include obscenity, fraud, child pornography, speech integral to illegal conduct, speech that incites imminent lawless action, speech that violates intellectual property law, true threats, false statements of fact, and commercial speech such as advertising.” Wikipedia
When we address strangers in other societies there is that fundamental sense that we have the right to do so, that it should be a human right unfettered everywhere. But there are reasons why it is not so everywhere.
We have not had ingrained through our history that a careless word spoken to a stranger could be our death. We don’t care much if we’re accused of heresy because we don’t remember folk being burned at the stake for that. We don’t fear being drawn and quartered for making treasonous remarks about the head of state. We have rarely had to be that cautious about what we said to strangers. It may start with pleasantries about the weather, but when we’re itching to share an opinion about How Things Are Going, that’s dangerous territory in places where the foundation of society remembers with immediacy the reality of the absolute powers of religion and state. Someone who speaks up casually inviting you to share your thoughts and feelings beyond the weather could be a lunatic or a spy.
It’s not as if the US doesn’t have our own history of such personal risk particularly in marginalized communities like the sexually or gender or culturally divergent communities. Such carelessness of expressiveness is one of those privileges assumed by the dominant ‘white’ culture. But even here, it isn’t that kind of safe for everyone.
(Once again, I’ve fallen into that trap of the ‘privileged’ by using ‘we’ as if it’s really all of us. At least this time, I’ve noticed.)
LOOSELY SPEAKING... 