In Chinese culture, public toilet belongs to the public arena, which is not of any interest to any individual; therefore no people will care about what will happen to such a place. Not just public toilets, but anything public is subject to greater risk of sabotage or careless damage.
If you have experienced living in Tongzilou, the old concrete residential building about five to six storeys without elevator, you would surely have observed a very interesting phenomenon: Many family will place their private belongings in the public staircase and corridors. Some are actually not belongings but merely useless trashes. They do not want that in their home for they are mindful they would case inconvenience and hygiene problems but they just place it in public places. Some foreigners also complain by saying many Chinese people like spiting and that is really disgusting.
But if you observe closer, you will not fail to see some people will never spite at home but will spit casually in public places. Even in another arena that is thought to be much more “civilized”, such phenomena are not rare. That is the university campus. In a rainy day, if you go to the canteen of a campus, nine times out of ten ,you will see many vacant seats are not fit for you to sit there, for they are wet with pools of raindrops. That means many civilized university students will subliminally place wet umbrella on seats that belong to human beings. Most of those “culprits” will never do the same thing at their own home, because they are culturally trained so. Ant this may further illuminate a valuable point of view put forth by Professor FEI Xiaotong: What is prevailing in Chinese culture is not individualism but egoism.
Everbody’s business is nobody’s business. This is especially the case in a community that is dominated by personal connections rather than social and legal obligations.
The toilet is everybody’s business; it is thus also nobody’s business.
If you have experienced living in Tongzilou, the old concrete residential building about five to six storeys without elevator, you would surely have observed a very interesting phenomenon: Many family will place their private belongings in the public staircase and corridors. Some are actually not belongings but merely useless trashes. They do not want that in their home for they are mindful they would case inconvenience and hygiene problems but they just place it in public places. Some foreigners also complain by saying many Chinese people like spiting and that is really disgusting.
But if you observe closer, you will not fail to see some people will never spite at home but will spit casually in public places. Even in another arena that is thought to be much more “civilized”, such phenomena are not rare. That is the university campus. In a rainy day, if you go to the canteen of a campus, nine times out of ten ,you will see many vacant seats are not fit for you to sit there, for they are wet with pools of raindrops. That means many civilized university students will subliminally place wet umbrella on seats that belong to human beings. Most of those “culprits” will never do the same thing at their own home, because they are culturally trained so. Ant this may further illuminate a valuable point of view put forth by Professor FEI Xiaotong: What is prevailing in Chinese culture is not individualism but egoism.
Everbody’s business is nobody’s business. This is especially the case in a community that is dominated by personal connections rather than social and legal obligations.
The toilet is everybody’s business; it is thus also nobody’s business.
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