Filter Coffee #020

On Kindness, Children, and Judging others

☺️ World Kindness Day

Every November 13th, World Kindness Day is observed around the globe. With the year 2020 unfolding the way it has been, I believe a little extra kindness is needed now more than ever, don’t you? I do hope you guys had the opportunity to do one or more among many acts of kindness, knowingly or unknowingly:

• Call someone that you have not talked to in a while.

• Buy some food for hungry people on roads.

• Greet people with a smile on your face.

• Support your friends' small business.

• Visit an orphanage or old age home and buy some gifts for the people there.

• Be a good listener.

• Offer your help to someone.

• Be kind to yourself too!

🧒🏾 Children’s Day

November 14th is well known for two reasons. Chacha Nehru’s birthday and Children’s Day. Why do I get nostalgic about this? Simply because the child in me refuses to let go, and I am grateful for that. It takes me back to those wonderful years when life was carefree (except for homework). So I walked down memory lane and tried to recall my childhood escapades, my friends, my teachers and also a couple of bullies who terrorized me (I know now how Calvin feels when Moe accosts him).
As soon as we returned from school we ran out to play. We played barefooted in the rain, in the sun at the municipal ground, climbed trees, played marbles, gilli-danda, tennis ball cricket with the tree as a wicket and a rough board as the bat. Taking bicycles for 30 minutes after begging Mom for 25 paise, making kites out of newspapers and running around with a short string attached — oh! what thrill we used to get from such simple things! The biggest challenge was to climb up the 1000 steps to the temple on Chamundi Hills in Mysore. At the summit, we would get ice-candy, frozen coloured ice around a stick. Ice cream was considered expensive but health reasons were cited against it. Well, we were happy to lick the candy but I remember crying my heart out when the candy slipped from the stick and fell on to the hot sand and melted. Later in life, I correlated this experience to the proverb: “there’s many a slip between the cup and the lip.”

The house regulation required us to be back by 6.30 pm to wash up, recite tables (I hated 13, 17 & 19 tables), finish our homework, eat and be in bed by 9 pm. It was children's day every day until we reached the age of 13. Though the concept of teenager was alien, somehow once I got to that age, I was expected to behave more responsibly.

Our grandchildren have no open spaces to go to. Parental anxiety prevents them going out of sight. Mobile phones, iPads, and video games have made them literally housebound. If you recounted the experiences of your childhood to your children or grandchildren and told them what they missed, they would say, “look how lucky you are. You are playing video games with us and playing games on the iPad. You are enjoying a second childhood with us. You had the best of both worlds! So, stop telling us what we have missed and make us feel bad.”

Ah! Those were the days my friends! Please share some of your childhood memories and post them here.

📚 Don't Judge A Book By Its Cover

This proverb is said to date back to the 19th century, when it made an appearance in the newspaper Piqua Democrat, June 1867:

“Don’t judge a book by its cover, see a man by his cloth, as there is often a good deal of solid worth and superior skill underneath.”

I chose this proverb for its immense potential. It plays out in every walk of life and more often than not people tend to do exactly the opposite of what the proverb says. I would like to illustrate this by discussing a few scenarios.

“I don’t like his face” is a refrain you get to hear now and then. What does that imply? To me, it implies that someone is taking an instant dislike to a person whom he is meeting for the first time. This opinion about a person is made more with an unexplained subjective prejudice. If someone were to ask “why wouldn't you like his face?” the answer most probably would be “I don’t know why but I feel I can’t trust him”. So now, dislike morphs into untrustworthiness. It gets worse as you keep probing.

🗣 Gossip & Rumours

Gossip is understood to be a discussion about other people, their lives and at times it meanders into making some personal remarks. Rumour on the other hand is like a story or unconfirmed news spread among people. In gossip too, rumour can feature. For example, while talking about someone’s personal life one could be heard saying “I hear rumours that he is in debt’. Whether it be gossip or rumour you give credence to something to which you may not be privy or about which you have no personal knowledge.

Let me cite an example of a ‘WhatsApp rumour’. You get a forward of some kind with the caveat “forwarded as received” or “source and content not verified”. In my view believing in gossiping or rumour mongering of any kind is akin to judging a book by its cover. If there’s a gossip column about a celebrity, for example, we tend to lap it up and perhaps call up someone and ask them to read it. But I must put rumour at a higher level of misjudgment than gossip. This is simply because while gossip can be harmless, rumour can be a potential source of scaremongering or inciting passions or spread some sensational matter with an ulterior motive.

As a legal matter, gossip is not per se a crime whereas rumour mongering could become an offence under Sec.188 and 505 of IPC and also under the Information Technology Act which makes fake news punishable. Don’t be under the impression that gossip cannot land you in trouble. There are people (call them squealers, if you may) who will relay what you said to the targeted person and that could lead to avoidable consequences. In certain other instances, in the course of gossip, if you make a defamatory remark about the targeted person, it could potentially expose you to some legal consequence.

↕️ Extroverts & Introverts

These two categories of people are often judged by their appearance and attitude. They are classified as socially active or socially awkward. While an extrovert can greet a total stranger as if he has known him or her for years, the introvert will not do that. Not because he does not want to, but would do it with circumspection. An extrovert may like to be the centre of attention, while an introvert is a self-effacing person. An extrovert ordinarily has the gift of the gab (gab came from gob which in Irish means mouth) meaning he can get into a conversation easily and hold forth on matters. But we judge introverts and extroverts by the first impression they create on us.

Worse still, many men (and sadly some women too) judge an extrovert female with a harsh yardstick — they don’t hesitate to call her a “pushy dame”! Yet, if a lady is the quiet type and does not easily open up to her peers in college or office, she is branded as an introvert and men don’t hesitate to call her an “ice maiden”. A very chauvinistic attitude indeed. This is exactly the opposite of what the proverb advocates.

There is yet another aspect of personality which makes people form opinions. Imagine yourself joining a new company and meeting your immediate superior who comes across like a grouchy man who frowns all the time and yells now and then. You begin to wonder how long you will survive under him? You approach his secretary who seems very amiable and ask her if she finds it challenging to work for him. You are relieved when she says, “He is a stickler for details and he is always focused on what he is doing. I find him easy to work for because I know what he expects of me and there’s no room for surprises.” So, you are comforted and you quickly adjust to his ways of working and learn a lot from him.

😏 Flattery and Praise

Flattery is the most insincere way of praising or complimenting someone. If you take flattery at its face value, you will fail the proverbial test. That said, many people love to be flattered and the flatterers around them do it in return for some favour or to be in the good books of the person they flatter.

Just like gossip and rumour, flattery and praise also have some differentiation. Flattery can be completely unsolicited and be without a reason. Praise on the other hand is predicated on some achievement and in any case, is relatable to some achievement or accomplishment. It is very easy to mistake flattery for praise. That’s where you need to remember the proverb.

I came across this quote in ranker.com which reads: “A flatterer is one who says things to your face that he wouldn’t say behind your back.” Contrast this with praise. If I praise someone for something they achieved, I would not hesitate to praise them again when she is not around.

While praise is usually face to face, flattery can be indirect, like for example, praising a son, who is not present, to his father to curry some favour.

As a primary student, I was told an Aesop's fable in which a fox flatters the crow that it has a sweet voice and must sing for the fox. The crow gets carried away and opens its mouth to sing only to realise that a piece of bread it held with its beak is being gobbled up by the fox.

I am not discussing here people who flatter themselves or boast about themselves. But if you are around such a person you need to judge the ‘book’ before you agree or worse still, join the encore. Remember flattery is deception and praise is encouragement.

👗 Sartorial Elegance:

“Don’t see a man by his cloth…”

How you dress can well be a good enough reason for some, to judge you. ‘Sartor’ in Latin means tailor and sartorial means tailormade. But this word is used to indicate the need to dress as per the occasion. The way a person dresses can create an impression and people may form opinions that may be either unwarranted or unfounded.

Dress regulations are different. You need to follow them if you want to gain entry. The problem arises when you dress yourself up in a manner completely at variance with what the other person expected to see.

Take for example a person who is being interviewed turns up in bright uncoordinated colours. The panel, who is supposed to look at their track record and academic performance, is now distracted by what the person is wearing and forms an opinion that they are shabby and do not fit into the company’s dress culture. Merit takes a back seat and impressions decide their chance of landing a job.

Contrast this with a techie who is being interviewed. If they go for the interview in formal attire, the panel members, who are in Jeans and T-shirts, may exchange meaningful glances and there’s no way of knowing how that interview will progress. A woman could at times incur a double jeopardy. The men on the panel might think she has dressed smartly but the women on the panel may think that it is a bit much. Either way, the candidate comes under scrutiny for all the wrong reasons.

Just as we would not want to judge a book by its cover, we should apply that principle to all situations and not form opinions or draw conclusions that are far removed from reality.

While we’re on the topic of judging, take a look at this video to get a sense of how judgement can go wrong:

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Deepavali, the Festival of Lights is here to brighten up our mood which has been subdued by COVID. Tomorrow is Balipadyami. May God bless you and your family with health and happiness.

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That’s it for this week dear readers. I hope you enjoyed this festive weekend and had a joyful Diwali! Please take good care of yourself and hold on to that mask!