English political correctness in China

I've never heard it used in that way.

I kinda like it, though!

I agree but the host only said "Western Weddings are VERY civilized" which, in my opinion, could bring the same connotation as "too civilized".

Spare us from civilised weddings. Gogol Bordello's "American Wedding" is good: "Have you ever been to American wedding? / Where is the vodka, where's marinated herring?"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=islQTpVGJFE

On the other hand, I've been to some extremely uncivilised weddings in the west :-)

If it was possible to do a word count in public places of my city, I believe that 文明 could be ranked one. It appears on and in most major buildings, many billboards and public notices, on every taxi (several times), and on almost every red banner. In fact, apparently I don't live in 昆明; I live in 文明昆明。 :)

Right, but when calling them very civilized when comparing them to Chinese weddings, it's easy to make the jump to: 'Chinese weddings are not very civilized'. I'm not saying that's what he meant, but I'm not surprised that's how the viewers understood it.

Great song and great band. Was just listening to their new album yesterday in fact. :)

So have I! haha I think occasional extreme drunkeness is something the whole world can relate to.

Isn't it fun? Nanjing was the same way for the last year I lived there. (and probably still is?) It was generally great for the city I think, but there were a few little things that no one liked. The biggest was the removal of almost ALL of the street food in and around the city center. It made a comeback in little pockets here and there, but the ubiquitousness of it was never the same.

Really? I do see your point, but it is surprising to me all the same how quickly sometimes (frequently?) Chinese people respond as if they've just been insulted by foreigners. Almost seems like they think they're the only badly misunderstood people in the world.

But that's the whole point of this post of Kimiik's isn't it. As Julien did, he took away from this that "civilized" is a more sensitive word in China than we might ever imagine, and as a foreigner I appreciate him passing that on. Now I'll certainly avoid the word too, as long as I don't mean 文明/不文明.

Zut alors! I have been to an extremely civilized birthday party for a classmate (as an 8 year old). I don't think it's hard for us English-speaking people to picture what Julien meant by "very civilized" in that context. He meant people being all dressed up correctly and stifled and affected by the ceremony and imposed formality of the occasion, not being themselves or having a good time, didn't he? That was what that strange birthday party for a child was like, a full course dinner in a candle-lit clubhouse dining room with proper silverware and cloth napkins, after which there were no games and no throwing our heads back with laughter, or any laughter, that I can recall. Not to judge, but we were just kids! Her parents (dad, really) meant well of course, but he didn't like rowdiness, or well, fun. It was different anyway. One of those things we didn't really talk about later.

Hi Zhenlijiang,

In french, the closest equivalent of "civilized" would be the adjective "policé" from the verb "policer" :

http://fr.wiktionary.org/wiki/policer

But, in english, I don't think the adjective "policed" and the verb "to police" could be used that way.

Thanks Kimiik, I have to say I'm not too confident about the nuances indicated in Wiktionnaire. But right, first of all we virtually never describe anything as "policed". To "police" in my understanding is to sort of be like a watchdog. These don't seem to have anything to do with "civilized".

Are you saying Julien may have been a bit off with his use of "civilized? I thought he was just trying to pacify there; I mean his English is obviously very good.

Yes, Julien misused "civilized" but it was totally understandable to me as I did exactly the same mistake before.