What Counts as "Decorum" in the Age of "Because I Feel Like It"? Whatever It Is, Thinking Only About Your Own Words and Actions Won't Do

王朝靖 · 2018-09-07 · English translation

35 suggestions about decorum, offered for discussion.

Decorum, in any era, means nothing outside its social context. Take farting. At an all-staff meeting, with a colleague holding forth in front of a slide, letting out a loud fart is indecorous. Telling the girlfriend you have lived with for six months, "Ah, the mood calls for a fart," and then letting it rip, is intimacy. Medieval Germanic peoples treated a loud fart as a mark of virility, and the Irish had performers who farted on stage for a living. A small displacement and a weak blast marked a man as sickly and useless. It took centuries more for what comes out of the body to become private, and to get tangled up with shame. Dawson's Who Cut the Cheese? A Cultural History of the Fart tells of a 17th-century elder of the Ashanti people who let out a loud fart while bowing to his chief; so mortified that he hanged himself on the spot.

Put simply, decorum is a matter of time, place and occasion. Turning up at an earthquake zone to help out dressed like a runway model is indecorous, and so is cracking jokes for laughs under a news story about a school shooting. A dirty joke under Durex's official Weibo account might read as witty; the same joke in the comments of an LGBT rights platform is indecorous.

But why?

One problem: if decorum simply means obeying the established rules, what happens when the rules themselves are bad? In a country that forbids its people to speak, if you dare to speak, then in the eyes of those in power — and even of your fellow citizens — you are the one breaking the rules, the bad one, the indecorous one. In a society whose prevailing opinion holds that everyone should be married before 25, still being single at 35 is a scandal. Another problem: judged by today's universal values of freedom and equality, we can say those rules are bad and that obeying them is what's indecorous. But what happens when your freedom and equality get in the way of mine? You open a conversation on WeChat with "You there?" and think you are greeting someone politely, while the other person is going mad: "Why can't you just say what you want?" You believe that keeping public morality is what makes a society better, while he believes that wiping out humanity is the only way to save every other species and the environment.

Sartre held that hell is other people, that the nature of human relations is conflict. "I" shape myself into a certain image, and the appearance of the other brings demands, rules and expectations that hem me in, that interfere with my freedom to become myself. Which means that, strictly speaking, there is no such thing as decorum that belongs to me alone. Decorum only has meaning from the other person's point of view.

In other words, if I walk up to you in a full Armani three-piece and consider myself decorous, that doesn't count. You are the one who judges whether I am decorous. Isn't a gentleman simply every gesture that says "I am aware that you exist"?

So whether you are pleasing the law, pleasing morality, pleasing mainstream taste, or pleasing you — a person shaped by law, morality and mainstream taste — decorum is always something done for someone else. Just as modern civilization is at heart an effort to hold the primal instincts down as far as possible, and the "civilized" person, on seeing anything that reminds him of his animal origins, visibly squirms, decorum means trimming your foot to fit the shoe, muting your own individuality (even when the shoe is the kind that demands you "express your individuality").

So let's cut out the "I" first. Once we drop the line that "how I live my life is my own business, and I have my own decorum," we can finally try to talk about rules of decorum.

Individualism is on the rise, people ask for more and more personal space, and the independent self speaks louder and louder. But within a discussion of decorum, it makes more sense to define a person through relationships than through the individual.

If individualism is just two people shouting at each other, "Who am I, what do I need, what do I want to become," then treating people as two objects inside a relationship lets us reach a consensus that works like a contract. Physical contact between a man and a woman may raise the suspicion of harassment; once the two become a couple, a whole set of gestures that would otherwise look lewd defaults to sweet. A relationship comes with its own settled conventions: parent and child, author and reader, the stranger online who asks a question and the one who answers it.

On the internet, working out what relationship we are in first would spare us a lot of conflict. When someone in your contacts posts a selfie in their Moments, they are sending the message "I am putting myself in front of you, hoping to be approved of" — more precisely, they are asking for help. At that point the two of you are in a relationship of one person asking and one person helping. If you start chatting with other people under their selfie, ignoring them, or make fun of how they look, you have broken that relationship. Or say you cite sources and lay out an argument at length under a post, expecting a relationship of rational debate, while the other person is only there to vent and enjoys jabbing at you: your exasperation and confusion are just fuel for his feelings. The two of you are not inside the same system of relationship at all.

Only when both sides are in the same relationship, one both of them recognize, is decorum possible.

In an era when even whether to give up your seat can start an endless argument, what words and actions deserve to be called decorous? Drawing on several surveys by our QDaily Research Lab, let's try starting from these areas.

The decorum of sharing | Sharing was never a one-way act

Principle:

The essence of sharing is not "giving" but "asking the other person for help." However good you think the thing you are sharing is, what you are actually telling the other person is: "I have something good here, take it, and please respond with thanks and approval." So even when you mean well, you put them under the pressure of "owing you a response." And when they don't agree with what you shared, they have to go against their own wishes to accommodate you. You are their hell.

And when the other person is the thing being shared — introduced to someone else, say, or having their contact details or photos passed on — then if they had no say in it, they have been turned into raw material, an object. In this act of sharing a person, the person is missing, and any behavior that disregards them is indecorous.

If you aren't close to someone, don't recommend the films, music or books you like unless they ask. It puts them under pressure to like it too.
Don't put someone's photos online without their consent, group photos included. Don't retouch only your own face, and don't over-retouch theirs either.
Don't give out someone's contact details without their consent.
Don't add someone to assorted fun-and-red-envelope group chats without asking.
Unless you are using it as evidence to expose wrongdoing, don't post screenshots of your conversation with someone on social media without their consent.
Don't flood other people's timelines with your posts, and don't accuse others of flooding yours.
Other people's taste does not need rescuing by you, and other people's lives are not a stepping stone for your sense of superiority. If you aren't close enough to roast each other daily, don't leave comments on their post saying "that dress is ugly on you," "your face is so retouched there's no skin left," "I ate at that restaurant you're excited about ages ago and it isn't good." Pouring cold water in the comments is often no different from online abuse.

The decorum of chatting | Keep it balanced

Principle:

Communicate as equals. Whatever the other person's rank, wealth, fame or age, and whether or not they are the person you have a crush on, the two of you are equals; talking someone up or talking them down both stray from the most basic relationship there is, the one between one person and another.

Consider how the other person feels. Any decorous act carries the message "I am aware that you exist." They are the subject; the "I" in decorum never matters. Looking for a sense of superiority, trying to win, damaging the other person's interests — none of that is decorous chatting.

Don't add someone on WeChat and then ask who they are. Say who you are and why you are getting in touch.
When you can't tell how someone talks, go easy on slang and forms of address: "qin," "baby," "little sis," "little X," "old X," "Boss X," "Teacher X," "Brother X," "auntie," "my lady."
Even online, check first whether your intrusion is welcome. Ask if it's a good time before calling. Send as few long voice messages as possible, and don't use a voice message just to reply "mm-hm."
And don't hold a long conversation with B in A's comment section.
If you can't reply promptly, say why and ask to be forgiven.
Don't ask "You there?" (What makes "You there?" so annoying is that it usually means "I want a favor.")

The decorum of reading | Reading is a relationship between me and whom, exactly

Principle:

When reading involves only you — you alone with a book or an article — it is at bottom a relationship between "me and human values." What you read is only the material of that relationship, so reading that matches what humans value is decorous reading. If human taste still points toward the true, the good and the beautiful, then by the principle that decorum is done for others, reading books that bring you closer to truth, goodness and beauty is decorous.

And when reading involves the author, when you exchange something with them, the relationship becomes "me and the author," a relationship between two people, and it should follow the principles of decorous chatting.

(When there is an author) Don't leave comments under an article saying "too long, didn't read," "haven't finished it, sharing anyway," or "unfollowing." Even if you disagree with the author, don't pour cold water on it — but be clear about the difference between pouring cold water and offering a different view.
(When there is an author) If the author's information helped you, thank them in some way: share it, like it, tip it, leave a comment.
(When there is no author) Don't let someone else read a first-rate work for you in 10 minutes.
(When there is no author) Tell the difference between "I don't understand this" because you lack the background and "I don't understand this" because the author is being deliberately obscure.
(When there is no author) Control how much information you take in, and accept that there aren't that many things you "can't afford to miss." The way out of information overload is to know a field well enough.
(When there is no author) Find the right sources. Being unable to read actively, taking in whatever you are fed, is the illiteracy of our time.
(When other people are involved) Don't show off how much you read, and don't show off how fast you read.

The decorum of debate | How to take part in public discussion rationally

Chinese people hate to lose. See an opinion that doesn't match your own and the urge is always to set the other person straight. Everyone is a contrarian, and everyone thinks the contrarian is the other person. Disagreements online never go away, and a large part of the reason is that the people arguing don't share the same underlying premises. You attack a writer for plagiarism, for rehashing other people's work, for being short, because you want to prove he is a bad writer; his fans say he works hard, he's adorable, he has a gift, because they want to show they like him. Whether he is a bad writer is not what his fans care about most. Different positions, no common language. The rest of the reason is logical fallacy and mental habit. Before joining a public discussion, be clear about whether you actually know enough about the subject. If you don't, your aim should shift to "getting more information and more views," not to putting out your own opinion. A decorous participant never sets out to "feel superior" or "win the argument." When a discussion turns into pointless quarrelling, cut your losses in time and end it.

Principle:

Make sure you are both in a relationship of "me and the truth." First, understand that a meaningful public discussion is not a relationship between person and person; it is a relationship between person and viewpoint. In a discussion meant to tell right from wrong, treat the other person's views as information to read, and use it to correct your own deviation from the truth and get closer to it.

Discuss what is right, not who is right.
Don't expect to convince the person you are arguing with. The people to convince are the onlookers who haven't made up their minds.
Once you can tell the other person is the type who only wants to prove himself right, end the discussion early.
Speak with facts and figures wherever you can, don't trade in feelings and guesses, and be careful with "I feel," "I think," "I believe."
When you notice the discussion drifting off the main line, pull it back from the irrelevant details in time.
Don't attack the person when you argue, and don't answer personal attacks either. Don't fight petulance with petulance.
When you speak, be clear about whether you are promoting understanding, sharing a view, or venting.
Opposing an organization's ideas is not the same as opposing the people in it. The Nazis being evil does not mean every Nazi Party member was a bad person.
When a subject has no dissenting voice at all, spend a moment thinking it through from the other side.
Don't just throw out your view. Explain it, tell people why you hold it.
Remind yourself that you might be wrong. When you find you were wrong, admit it, and end the discussion.
In a discussion, a mistake should be pointed out but not denounced.
Explain complicated things in plain language, and be wary of famous quotations and technical terms.

The decorum of asking for help | "Don't be a burden to others"

The Japanese writer Osamu Dazai wrote a story that may be the best gloss on the Japanese spirit of not being a burden to others. A young sailor is shipwrecked, thrown into the sea and washed ashore by the waves, barely alive. He clings to the window ledge of a lighthouse and is about to scream for help when, through the window, he sees the keeper's family cheerfully getting dinner ready. Ah, he mustn't. If he cries out in his misery for help, he will ruin this family's evening together. His fingers go slack, a great wave comes in, and the sailor is carried off by the sea again.

It would be easy to call the sailor's choice foolish, a fuss over nothing, but it was a decision made after thought, and it went against animal instinct — and anything that goes against animal instinct has something of civilization in it. Here, we call the sailor's act decorous.

When we ask someone for help, we are sending the message "you will have my thanks." Whether a request is decorous depends on how I weigh those thanks. The sailor judged his thanks to be worth nothing next to the keeper's family dinner; trading his thanks for that dinner would leave the keeper worse off. Anything that is not for the other person's benefit is indecorous. If the sailor had had a fortune and, once saved, repaid the keeper with a great deal of money, it would come to the same thing: the question is whether trading that fortune for the keeper's family dinner leaves the keeper out of pocket.

Translate that into daily life. You have your boyfriend travel all the way from Beijing to Xi'an to see you and repay him with "lasting love"; if he thinks love weighs far more than the trip from Beijing to Xi'an, he won't find your request unreasonable or indecorous. You ask a friend to design a logo for you, thinking your friendship weighs far more than one logo; if he doesn't see it that way, then in his eyes your request is you getting something on the cheap, and it is indecorous.

One question: how can we ever be sure that "what I can give back is not less than what the other person gives"?

At bottom these are two people with two systems of valuation, tied to the relationship between them and to their cultures. Japanese requests for help always come wrapped in apology; when a Japanese person is helped, what they say is often not "thank you" but "I'm sorry" — for the trouble I've caused you. In that Japanese humility, asking anyone you aren't close to for a favor is by definition at their expense, so you must come to the request carrying an apology.

Principle:

If you aren't sure that what you can give back is worth more than the help you are asking for, don't ask.

Once you have been helped, give something back. As a rule, repay material help with material things, and emotional support with emotional support.

When you can't be sure the other person has the will and the time to chat with you, remember that most of the problems you run into in life have answers in a search engine. If you can't find one, you may first need to find the answer to "how do I find answers with a search engine."
Unpaid help can only be offered; it cannot be demanded. Don't use your position to get people to do free design, free photo retouching, free translation or free counselling for you.

Illustrations by Lin Xiaoyao

Translated from the original QDaily article. Original publication date retained.