An odd encounter

[nancylebov]

On Saturday, I did a little flea marketing, and one passerby asked my name. When I said "Nancy", she said, "What's your last name?" and when I said "Lebovitz", she said, "Oh, you're Jewish, you look Jewish, I have Jewish friends." (dialogue approximate and from memory).

I asked for her name, and she didn't give it and left.

I'm somewhat nonplussed by this. While I can sympathize with her desire to see whether her impressions are correct, I felt a bit aggressed upon, and I think the fact that she wouldn't give her name suggests that she knew her behavior was at least a little out of line.

While this wasn't a great big deal (didn't spoil my mood for the day), it's still on my mind, and I'm wondering if anyone can help me unpack the issues involved and/or has suggestions if I run into that sort of thing again.

Comments

odd encounter

[fabricdragon.livejournal.com]

do the words "incredibly rude and possibly disturbed" mean anything here? I mean i can kind of understand the "you look like one of my friends, who are you" type question... but this goes waaaay beyond that. Sounds like this crazy lady who used to hassle me and a (jewish, now that i think of it) friend whenever we went to eat at this one place.....

[madfilkentist]

Possibly someone with no social skills, trying and failing to be outgoing?

[kip-w.livejournal.com]

The other comments seem to offer a partial solution. Another part may be that as someone in the position of a shopkeeper or salesperson, someone might feel okay in asking your name even when they wouldn't be okay at giving their own. There's a relation between buyer and seller in which sellers have by tradition made themselves a bit more available -- not quite subservient -- to the customers (who are Always Right and all that).

[redbird]

Asking your name and being unwilling to give her own would be off-base even if she'd said something like "Not Levin? You look like my old roommate Sue Levin" rather than commenting on your ethnicity.

I wonder what that woman would have said if you'd said "I'm not Jewish, but thanks for the compliment" or words to that effect. (My friend Lisa was often mistaken for Jewish by acquaintances, based on a combination of her looks and her German surname.)

[cellio]

I'm guessing clueless more than rude, but it's hard to tell without being there.

When someone who's making chit-chat (as opposed to someone who needs to know) asks my name, I usually say "Monica; what's yours?". That would probably fend off this particular problem; if she won't even cough up a first name why would I give my last?

[sartorias.livejournal.com]

Me too, and if she asked for my last name without furnishing hers, I'd say, "Do we know one another?"

[filkerdave.livejournal.com]

That is, indeed, most odd. What was her tone of voice?

[nancylebov.livejournal.com]

Cheerful, I think. There wasn't anything overtly nasty about it that I can remember.

[fidelioscabinet.livejournal.com]

So many people these days have no social boundaries, as far as what they are willing to ask/say/impose upon others, but are not willing to return the openness they demand of you.

I was taught not to ask a question I'd be unwilling to answer, unless I absolutely HAD to.

[nancylebov.livejournal.com]

That's a nice heuristic. It's a corollary of the Golden Rule, but I haven't seen that particular application before.

I haven't noticed a trend so far as rudeness is concerned.

[goldcube.livejournal.com]

She sounds disturbed in some way. Personally I don't feel any obligation to answer questions from strangers, & certainly not my last name or religion. I might tell them my first name if I was feeling friendly (which I'm usually not) but I'm much more likely to say "have we met before?" or at least "what's yours?" This may be a result of my living in New York City or being a curmudgeon, hard to say which came first.