Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, February 20, 1992 TAG: 9202200163
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: E-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Joel Achenbach
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
SPINACH IN YOUR TEETH IS EGG ON MY FACE
Q: Why don't we tell someone when they have a rogue blob of food stuck to their face?A: Of all our fears, two stand out as most intense:
1. We will be obliterated in a nuclear holocaust.
2. As we are leaving a party, we will notice, in the foyer mirror, that we have a Brie Nose.
That the latter should be so shattering is no mystery. People are supposed to put their food in their mouth, not apply it to their face as though it were a Maybelline product. What is far more bizarre is the fact that the other guests at the party say nothing. They just let it happen! They nod and smile and slowly creep away, mumbling about refreshing their drink. Why do we get betrayed?
This is a perfect example of the complexity of human social interaction. We have strict rules about our comportment - so strict that a mere speck of food can turn into a social nightmare. The observer suffers most, initially. There are only two options, both unsavory. If you tell the stricken party that he or she is wearing a blob, you will likely trigger great embarrassment. But if you say nothing, you will engender subsequent resentment when the humiliation is discovered.
Much depends on the blob. A leafy vegetable affixed to a tooth should incite no crisis. Judith Martin ("Miss Manners") has written that it is best to alert the victim in such a way as to raise doubt as to whether the problem even exists; she suggests you say, "Excuse me - I can't quite tell. Is there something on your tooth?"
But, we must rush to note, this won't always work. The following sounds phony: "Excuse me - I can't quite tell. Is there roughly half a slice of pepperoni pizza, soaked in orange-tinted grease, plastered to your chin?"
What you are more likely to do is forsake helping your fellow human and, in sheer self-interest, concoct an activity that will later give you plausible deniability. Like, you'll suddenly become enraptured by the ceiling beams. Or you'll discover a kaleidoscope on a shelf and plant it on your eyeball for 20 minutes, feigning fascination.
Why such weirdness? Because "face," in the larger meaning of the word, is not merely important to one individual; it is the collective acceptance of "face" that makes a social situation tolerable. If you acknowledge the blob, you shatter the entire structure of the social interface. You will suffer if you speak, even though the blob isn't on your face. If one person is slimed, everyone is slimed.
Erving Goffman talked about this situation in "Interaction Ritual: Essays on Face-to-Face Behavior." You would assume only the discredited person would feel shame and embarrassment, but instead, writes Goffman, "the discreditor is just as guilty as the person he discredits - sometimes more so, for, if he has been posing as a tactful man, in destroying another's image he destroys his own."
Why is a blob so significant? We spoke to Margaret Visser, author of the wonderful book "The Rituals of Dinner," and she told us that human beings are obsessed with presenting themselves as self-contained, impermeable, sealed units.
"Orifices must not be thought of," she said. "We are undermined by the thought of having orifices and gates where things can come in, or alternately where things can come out."
Again, the composition of the blob is critical.
"If it's a crumb, it's not so upsetting. We don't mind dry, hard things. We hate ooze and slime," Visser said.
This is why spitting out inedible food is taboo. The uncompromising Emily Post wrote in 1931, "If food has been taken into your mouth, no matter how you hate it, you have got to swallow it."
\ Washington Post Writers Group
Joel Achenbach writes for the Style section of The Washington Post.