I just finished listening to Malcolm Gladwell’s latest audiobook and I highly recommend it, for a number of reasons.
Least among them is the fact that this was the first audiobook I’ve ever listened to that wasn’t first a print book that was simply read into audio form, but instead was a fully and very professionally produced audiobook in its original iteration. The music and actual interview audio clips artfully woven through the piece speak to some real quality program production. Very well done.
Now to the pith of the matter. This book is MG’s attempt at understanding the complexity and depth of the current social problem that most of us have identified with the recent events of Ferguson, MO and Minneapolis among others. This is a problem. This is a serious problem. And, most importantly, this is a complex, deeply rooted problem that can’t be explained away by a few bad apples in the law enforcement community in this country or the equally simplistic accusation of systemic racism in that same community.
To me, both of these attempts at understanding what has been happening to minorities when they come in contact with police in this country for the last 30 or 40 years seem reductionist, puerile and driven by base, thinly disguised political motivations.
Thankfully, MG has researched and masterfully laid out in his characteristically thoughtful, eloquent and compelling way a much more nuanced, plausible and satisfying, if also terrifying explanation of the phenomenon we’ve been seeing play out lately when police and racial minorities meet.
Things like truth bias, transparency bias and a whole generation of law enforcement professionals who, in most cases through no fault of their own, have been steeped and trained and molded by a fundamentally misunderstood application of a potentially very promising law enforcement theory are among the many places MG will lead you on this quest for a deeper, truer, and more accurate understanding of the tragic events that have been repeating themselves over and over again in the news and on the streets of our country with no end in sight.
This book has challenged my own biases, informed my opinion, held me enthralled and ultimately offered a surprisingly complete and comprehensive context and perspective around some of the most tragic events of our current times.
I admire the courage and integrity it must have required of him to write this book at this time in history. I won’t summarize or attempt to reduce the book to a set of bullet point takeaways that wouldn’t do it justice. I can only encourage you to read or preferably, listen to this masterpiece of storytelling, disciplined investigative journalism and logical common sense. I hope you enjoy it as much as I have.
