21 Jan Responding to Elon Musk’s Recent Gestures as an Immigrant and Cultural Sensitivity Expert

The recent gestures of Elon Musk have drawn fierce criticisms.

Are these criticisms fair?

Let me respond to this question
by wearing two different hats.

As an African immigrant, Elon Musk is one of my heroes. I consider him once in a century genius.

You don’t need to agree with all his political point of views to recognize his genius and admire his creations.

Whenever I find myself in disagreement with anyone including those who hate me :), I try my best to separte the individual from his/her point of views. While firmly stating my opposing positions, I stay objective and show respect toward the person. After all, he/she is a fellow HUMAN…

As a cultural sensitivity expert, however,  Elon committed a serious error.

We advise our clients to pay attention to the norms and taboos of the cultures they live in and visit.

For example, in some cultures, the V sign could be a sign of victory and peace. But, it could be considered an insult- equivalent to showing a middle finger- depending on whether the palm of the person faces inward or outward.

We all are somewhere on the Spectrum of Cultural Intelligence. To adavance forward and avoid ‘Fatal Cultural Transgressions’, we should keep working on our cultural intelligence.

In the 21st C where we interact, communicate, and work with diverse people from different cultures, Cultural Intelligence is more important than Emotional Intelligence.

But, there are thousands of cultures and subcultures. We can’t always cross pollinate effectively and get along with diverse people with different cultural backgrounds and perspectives.

I’m 100% sure. The gestures weren’t meant to glorify the Mustache Man! A person like Elon who is committed to FREEDOM of SPEECH and someone who dedicated his life to save humanity by giving the human race an alternative planet should never be compared with the Mustache Man.

However, Elon should have immediately cleaned this misunderstanding.

No one is perfect and we all can’t always say and do the right things and all the time.

Nonetheless, as soon as people pointed out our stumbling and expressed that they’re offended, even if that wasn’t our intention, we should immediately show empathy, clean the misunderstanding, take lesson, and grow in our cultural intelligence so that we won’t commit the same error again.

My two cents…