Spitting: Gross or Unhealthy?
February 26th, 2008
Submitted By: Naomi Guy
The air is hot, sticky, and dirty. Your throat becomes itchy and a bad taste arises. What do you do? Well, in China you better not spit. Renmin University in China has created a Civic Index to measure the “civility” of their cities and gauge progress as the Olympics draw near. The index analyzes behaviors such as spitting, littering, and line forming from over a quarter million observations and surveys. According to this article, Beijing has been decreasing this behavior, but not as drastically as required before the Olympics. In 2007, Beijing scored 73.4 points, up from 69.06 in 2006 and 65.21 in 2005, but not up to the 80 point target. Changes were brought about using both positive and negative reinforcements ranging from flowers to fines. An example of an interesting (yet somewhat derogatory) program is one to promote the peaceful forming of lines. On the 11th of each month (standing for 1 after 1), uniformed officials swarm upon bus stops and subway stations waving flags at everyone to ensure they line up. The program was created by Zhang Huiguang, director of Beijing’s Capital Ethics Development Office. She is now better known as “Ms. Manners”, and claims that changing these bad habits before the Olympics is “crucial in providing a cultural and historical legacy to China and the world as a whole”.
So what’s the big deal? It seems obvious that any country would want to look as good as possible for the hundreds of thousands of tourists expected for the Olympics. Well, we all remember back a few short years ago when SARS was a major health threat. During that time, officials tried to stop spitting in public to help stop the spread of the disease. Sadly, more effort has been directed into putting on a clean image for the Olympics than protecting the health of the country, and the world, just three short years ago (article). A fairly drastic change in behavior has occurred in the past year to create a new image, three years ago, when lives were at stake, it was hardly a difference.
So why is this? Did the government not care as much about health, or were people too stubborn to believe the threat of SARS? Is an external image more important than internal wellbeing? Would you expect this behavior to be true outside of China? Do you agree with Ms. Manners that these changes are crucial to providing a legacy?
I’d like to leave you with this statement by, Zhang Faqiang, vice chairman of the China Olympic Committee, “Ultimately, China’s modernization rests on the quality of its citizens.” Do manners truly make a quality citizen? and can that lead to modernization? I’ve know some key American inventors with little to zero etiquette…
Entry Filed under: Pre-Departure, Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen, China, Guangzhou, Hangzhou, Hong Kong, Macau, Misc.
12 Comments Add your own
1. Darold Parsons | February 26th, 2008 at 11:09 pm
Manners do make a quality citizen. Everyone would rather be in a world with less spit, less pollution, and less disorder. Let’s face it, we all do things that are considered dirty, disgusting, or a bit rude sometimes, but we all would much rather live in a world without the guy looching out the window of his 81 honda. I mean who wants loogie on the bottom of their new tennie’s. In my perfect world, everyone holds doors open for old ladies, says gasundheit when others sneeze, and doesn’t have to worry about stepping in a warm mixture of snot and saliva. It makes me happy, and I would assume it has the same effect for most people, so yes, when people are polite they make others happy and are therefore better citizens.
2. Sin-Yaw Wang | February 27th, 2008 at 8:52 pm
http://blogs.sun.com/syw/entry/spitting_queue_jumping_swearing_and
3. Pierre Michael | February 27th, 2008 at 11:22 pm
This sounds very prisoner’s dilemma-ish. Individual’s often feel justified into spitting, cursing, and (insert filth here) because if they don’t someone else will, and it won’t matter. If we could somehow convince everybody that everybody else was going to follow the rules then….oh wait Ms. Manners seems to have already done that. Sweet!
4. Simeon Trieu | March 1st, 2008 at 9:33 pm
Education is the key. Many of the educated people I meet have the manners and the sense of respect for others that we would expect from Americans. However, it is the uneducated that typically don’t find many issues with throwing that fang bian mian (instant noodles) into the yangzi river. (I’m not bitter.) If you never think about the ramifications of your own actions, then it’s obvious that you won’t care much about spitting, littering, or anything else that is blatantly obnoxious to society. However, if that mental faculty is not developed, then it will never form the actions we consider to be “common sense”.
5. Dena Malloy | March 3rd, 2008 at 7:03 pm
If something is gross in one culture but not another, how do we decide which is civilized? My personal bias is that spitting etc. is in fact gross but why do I get to decide? There are many things that we do here in the US that Chinese find offensive. For example, when giving or receiving something (like a business card), it is proper to take it (or give it) with both hands. Trust me, it is very hard to remember to do this. The Chinese haven’t chosen to call us uncivilized. Also, fresh seafood in China is actually alive when you arrive at the restaurant. I’m sure they would be fairly disgusted to find that we eat fish that has been dead for days. I’m sure many of you will be able to poke holes in my argument, but I hope someone that is more familiar with China can come to my rescue and post more things that we do that the Chinese would find gross. It may even help us all prepare for the trip!
6. Woon Lam "Justine" Wong | March 4th, 2008 at 6:35 pm
SARS control and image building for the Olympics are two different things. We know much more about what the Chinese government did to prepare for Olympics, because they WANT us to know they are doing something.
As far as I remember, SARS control involved building new hospitals and finding the source of the SARS(which may not be
something that the government wanted the world to know).
In addition, the disease itself is not highly related to spitting, as people spitted for ages before SARS, so the government did not care much about civic education. Yet, the sense of urgency is found in establishing a good image for the Olympics, as Beijing is the host, so something needed to be done and shown to the rest of the world.
The improvement in manner may not necessary make someone more civilized, but at least “look” more civilized and prevent losing face in front of the world.
reply to Dena: um….it is my own opinion, which may not represent most Chinese, but I think eating raw broccoli, mushroom etc for salad is very weird.( I only eat cooked broccoli and mushroom) Besides, I can never understand why people put raw egg in hot drink during winter time…is it called egg-nog or something like that?
7. Matt Fencl | March 5th, 2008 at 11:07 am
Does anyone remember the movie “Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls.” Ace visits a tribe in Africa where it is a “great honor” for the chief to spit in your face. While this was clearly added into the movie for a laugh, it certainly illustrates the how certain customs or habits are perceived differently in different cultures.
Spitting, in most all developed countries, is frowned upon in various degrees. Apparently, this also holds true in China. Although our behavior may be more “excusable” given that we’re westerners, I think it’s still important to make a conscious effort to abide by the social courtesies to avoid perpetuating the “ugly American” stereotype. Additionally, spitting is pretty unbecoming, maybe you should consider quiting it in general.
8. Ashley Drum | March 5th, 2008 at 9:29 pm
It is extremely interesting to look at all that China is doing before the Olympics to create this idealistic image of their country. It seems like spitting is just the tip of the iceberg. Going back to a post I made during fall quarter, the Chinese government is going as far as looking into how to manipulate the weather systems to insure sunny skies during the Olympics. I am very excited to be visiting Beijing during this transformational period but wonder if we will be experiencing the true China. I don’t want to see people standing in lines if they are used to pushing together in herds. For me, there is a mystic about China that I want to experience first hand and I question if the government is making the right decision by encouraging their culturally rich people to conform to western standards. I don’t know about you, but I can push with the best of them.
I would also like to commend Matt Fencl for successfully working the content an Ace Ventura movie into a China blog.. haha.. good work!
9. Kyle Tripp | March 6th, 2008 at 1:06 am
I think the people in China should go on with their lives. If the want to spit, then let them spit. If they can’t form a proper line, then so be it. That is their culture and they shouldn’t have to change it because a bunch of visitors are coming. I know when I have visitors I am always on my best behavior, but I don’t practice for their arrival months ahead of time. China shouldn’t have to either. I am sure when the time comes if they want to spit then they are going to, even in front of the tourists. I bet the tourists will probably spit on the ground too.
10. Amy Linker | March 7th, 2008 at 9:52 pm
I find spitting to be gross and I am sure to some degree that it is unhealthy. On occasion, however, I even spit, usually when exercising. When I do, I make sure nobody is around to witness it. Nobody, including myself wants to see another person spit. I do not picture spitting to be as unhealthy as sneezing into ones hand and then touching a door handle or anything else for that matter. Although I find spitting to in the presence of another person to be abhorrent, it should be a personal decision which I do believe reflects on how a person is viewed. Could you imagine going to a high level business meeting and watching a CEO spit? I didn’t think so. If this is a social norm in China I think it is great that “Ms. Manners” is trying to change it. However, I hope they don’t go to the extremes that Singapore has where spitting is illegal; fineable up to $1000.
11. Mark Fairman | March 8th, 2008 at 4:17 pm
I think there are far more important image-changing attributes that a country can adopt to enhance their perception to others. That being said, I do think it is true that when change is desired, that doing something small can spread like an epidemic. When New York City wanted to decrease crime rates in the city, they instituted the “broken window” practice–where they urged store and home owners to immediately replace windows that were broken due to vandalism. This seemingly unrelated task ended up decreasing crime rates, including a large decrease in murder rates. Encouraging the Chinese citizens to adopt some healthier and more courteous practices can lead to a dramatic increase in society well-being.
12. Glenn Hughes | March 20th, 2008 at 8:29 pm
Odd, I never would have thought to make spitting one of the necessary reforms before the Olympics. China has definitely pulled out all of the stops, even going as far as trying to control the clouds. We are going over there to visit China and absorb some of the culture so that we have a better understanding. From some of the posts that we’ve seen, I wonder just how much of what we see will be China projecting what they believe we want to see as westerners. Sure, manners are great, and I will be the first to say that while they do not automatically make you a good citizen, they are definitely one of the qualities of one. That said, sometimes, when you gotta spit, you gotta spit.
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