Company employees going out to drink after work and on weekends is pretty common phenomenon. (I did last night...and I am still feeling a little, um, unnatural in my stomach as I write this post) Even bosses and senior colleagues would likely to join for a few. The atmosphere is generally pretty rowdy as people's characters start to reshape toward a more spontaneous side after few.
To such a biological certainty, one colleague said it well after a couple of beers, "I may get drunk,but I will not lose my consciousness." To someone from the West, that may just sound like the guy bragging about how much control he has over his alcohol-infused mentality, but the phrase, I realized, sort of takes on a double meaning in the Japanese context.
As with anything else in Japan, the hierarchic power structure of any group environment can clearly be felt and is expected to be maintained even as rowdiness takes over. Even as alcohol renders the body incapable of performing prohibitive bows, the mind seems to retain that clear knowledge of who is ahead and who is behind in terms of status within the company.
Yet, furthermore, what really surprises me is that a drunk Japanese can actually show even greater affinity and willing to concede to such a structure when his ability to make decisions are clearly impaired. The discussions on seniority (age, education, etc) seems to become even more intense when people are drunk, people seem even more sensitive toward who to use honorary language (or what the alcohol-impaired mind can actually piece together) and who not to.
It is a phenomenon that baffles me from a biological standpoint. As I have come to observe over the years (well, at least outside Japan), any sort of social construct, including rules of hierarchical arrangements, weakens with alcohol due to overpowering strength of raw emotions that are usually suppressed to prevent social blundering when sober.
That is precisely the reason why people use alcohol as a social lubricant. Joy and excitement become primary expressive tools of inebriated people, allowing them to overcome sense of embarrassment and fear of negative social consequences from doing/saying otherwise socially "stupid" things. This process is simply biological and should be present in all humans, which is why alcohol is enjoyed in all societies without religious restrictions.
So, perhaps, for Japan, a new definition of what is "socially stupid" must be created. If outright expressions of social hierarchy becomes something common when people are drunk, what does it say about the entire social order during normal business hours? It says that social order is never defined verbally (or explicitly in any particular way) but by mutual understanding.
So Japanese social order is like the English "common law." Not much is written but all the judgments can be made by looking at precedents. Do exactly what people of the past did in the same situation. Open challenges to the precedents can screw up the entire premise of the system. This, I suppose, is why Japanese corporate structure, and seniority system in Japanese society as a whole, is so resistant and incapable of change.
To such a biological certainty, one colleague said it well after a couple of beers, "I may get drunk,but I will not lose my consciousness." To someone from the West, that may just sound like the guy bragging about how much control he has over his alcohol-infused mentality, but the phrase, I realized, sort of takes on a double meaning in the Japanese context.
As with anything else in Japan, the hierarchic power structure of any group environment can clearly be felt and is expected to be maintained even as rowdiness takes over. Even as alcohol renders the body incapable of performing prohibitive bows, the mind seems to retain that clear knowledge of who is ahead and who is behind in terms of status within the company.
Yet, furthermore, what really surprises me is that a drunk Japanese can actually show even greater affinity and willing to concede to such a structure when his ability to make decisions are clearly impaired. The discussions on seniority (age, education, etc) seems to become even more intense when people are drunk, people seem even more sensitive toward who to use honorary language (or what the alcohol-impaired mind can actually piece together) and who not to.
It is a phenomenon that baffles me from a biological standpoint. As I have come to observe over the years (well, at least outside Japan), any sort of social construct, including rules of hierarchical arrangements, weakens with alcohol due to overpowering strength of raw emotions that are usually suppressed to prevent social blundering when sober.
That is precisely the reason why people use alcohol as a social lubricant. Joy and excitement become primary expressive tools of inebriated people, allowing them to overcome sense of embarrassment and fear of negative social consequences from doing/saying otherwise socially "stupid" things. This process is simply biological and should be present in all humans, which is why alcohol is enjoyed in all societies without religious restrictions.
So, perhaps, for Japan, a new definition of what is "socially stupid" must be created. If outright expressions of social hierarchy becomes something common when people are drunk, what does it say about the entire social order during normal business hours? It says that social order is never defined verbally (or explicitly in any particular way) but by mutual understanding.
So Japanese social order is like the English "common law." Not much is written but all the judgments can be made by looking at precedents. Do exactly what people of the past did in the same situation. Open challenges to the precedents can screw up the entire premise of the system. This, I suppose, is why Japanese corporate structure, and seniority system in Japanese society as a whole, is so resistant and incapable of change.
Comments
Post a Comment