Tolerance, integrity, morals in a foreign culture

I have a hot topic this week. It’s a sensitive one and I don’t wish to offend anyone, so I’ll try to be gentle but honest. I’ll keep it brief but try to give you some insight into my concern in the hope that it might stimulate some conversation. There are not many comments coming in the other direction guys!

My thoughts relate to our perspective of integrity and tolerance of personally unacceptable behavior. This initially rose as an idea during a conversation between myself and a fuzzy friend. He was commenting on my Dad’s prestigious career title and said that I clearly didn’t have as much integrity as him. I said “How rude!” in response and he asked if he had perhaps misunderstood the meaning of integrity. I quickly sent him the web link to a definition ☺. I find myself saying things, thinking in ways and acting in ways here in Coo that I would not consider acceptable at home. Is it just a lack of accountability and my slow decline, or a normal cultural adjustment that needs to be on a leash?

My conversation with my friend got me thinking about how seemingly moral niceties or what one might term moral truths are not necessarily cross-cultural, and certainly don’t always cross into the business arena. My boss often invites me into his office to have a gentle chat in which he humbly admits a cultural flaw or more often, a cultural or ethical difference that I’m not used to and guides me how to work with it rather than against it. Recently, I’ve been running into the same problem time and time again when more than one of my colleagues have asked me for a seemingly innocuous piece of information such as a deadline or whether I’ve completed something, and when I’ve answered, I’ve inadvertently caused trouble for my boss. I’ve learnt the lesson now, but what I didn’t realize is that the people requesting the information knew they shouldn’t be asking me, which I would personally judge as a lack of integrity. Some may say taking advantage of naivety!

Dictionary.com defines integrity as:

1. adherence to moral and ethical principles; soundness of moral character; honesty.
2. the state of being whole, entire, or undiminished: to preserve the integrity of the empire.
3. a sound, unimpaired, or perfect condition: the integrity of a ship's hull.

A sense of integrity, or as per an expanded version of the definition above, an adherence to the commonly accepted moral or ethical principles, can be achieved and expected in a workplace if one and all know those accepted principles. Naturally, we must accept personal opinions, behaviors and style differences in order to be tolerant of others, but if there is a set of moral standards that guide the way humans interact with one another in order to believe what one says is truth, and what one does is not going to lead to harm of another, then I believe it should be our duty to respect those standards.

There is however, a problem when the standards are not known. Moving to Doo has meant trying to understand a new set of moral standards, accepting cultural differences, learning tolerance of attitudes, opinions and behaviors that I wouldn’t tolerate in my home country and learning to be MUCH better at keeping my mouth closed when I want to rebuke or argue a point. I can hear some of you laughing. I guess learning such standards of another culture happens over time, from making mistakes or being warned by citizens of the culture or watching another person’s mistake.

What should happen though when we disagree with one of the standards? Not mildly disagree which could be tolerated, but vehemently disagree? For example, that it is acceptable to tell or act a lie, or that women are second-degree citizens?

I personally struggle with tolerance of lots of behaviors and attitudes (many of you will know that watching or hearing someone bite their nails or cut them can reduce me to angry tears!), and I’m convinced that my intolerance is related to my pride in thinking that what I do or think is right and what others do is wrong, whatever the topic. I’m sorry for it, and I’m even more ashamed to admit that my tolerance for anything to do with other peoples’ nails hasn’t increased over time. Ha ha. My reaction has improved slightly – I think I hit my brother on more than one occasion and I certainly haven’t done that for a long time. Getting over such sad intolerance should be a matter of willpower and seeking assistance from above. Therefore, should intolerance of a more important matter be managed in the same way? I think so. But what does willpower look like when we’re objecting to an immoral practice that is only immoral by one’s own standards? Is it trying very hard to ignore the behavior and avoid looking annoyed? Is it trying to maintain one’s own integrity and hoping to lead by example? Is it speaking out against the practice and persisting in trying to change the practice? Is it writing on blogs and talking to friends and offering it frequently up?

I have more thoughts about the collective behavior of foreigners living as temporary citizens in Doo, but I'd like to save them for another occasion.