Seems to me like a question of “how much do you forgive”, which people mostly choose instinctively. Forgive too little, and then you needlessly escalate unintended mistakes. Forgive too much, and then some people will exploit you.
In theory, the best solution would be to find out exactly what happened, and react accordingly. But of course people will lie about this. Another strategy is to be charitable first, but then put abusers on a blacklist. Which doesn’t work when you interact with strangers. Yet another strategy is to “trust but verify” the people you know, and automatically mistrust strangers. That also has some costs, plus the problem of how much interaction is needed to reclassify someone from a stranger to an acquaintance. (And some salesmen have a way to hack this algorithm, by insisting that you introduce them to your friends, which gives them fake “friend of a friend” credentials.)
Essentially, this is the thing I hate about salesmen and similar folks: A certain degree of forgiveness is socially useful, it reduces the conflicts, allows to overcome misunderstandings, etc. But there are people who burn the commons for fun and profit.
Seems to me like a question of “how much do you forgive”, which people mostly choose instinctively. Forgive too little, and then you needlessly escalate unintended mistakes. Forgive too much, and then some people will exploit you.
In theory, the best solution would be to find out exactly what happened, and react accordingly. But of course people will lie about this. Another strategy is to be charitable first, but then put abusers on a blacklist. Which doesn’t work when you interact with strangers. Yet another strategy is to “trust but verify” the people you know, and automatically mistrust strangers. That also has some costs, plus the problem of how much interaction is needed to reclassify someone from a stranger to an acquaintance. (And some salesmen have a way to hack this algorithm, by insisting that you introduce them to your friends, which gives them fake “friend of a friend” credentials.)
Essentially, this is the thing I hate about salesmen and similar folks: A certain degree of forgiveness is socially useful, it reduces the conflicts, allows to overcome misunderstandings, etc. But there are people who burn the commons for fun and profit.