8: Disgust and Contempt
Disgust is a survival emotion, a reaction to things that seem unhealthy. We are disgusted by rotten food, dead bodies, feces, and other things that can make us physically ill if we are exposed to them. We are disgusted by injuries and disease and by unhealthy practices.
Disgust toward people extends this to our social interactions. We may be disgusted by the appearance of a person who is ugly, injured, sick, or deformed. We may be disgusted by people who engage in practices we consider unhygienic.
When we feel the emotion when we witness behavior, it is disgust - but we may feel a similar emotion at a person who does disgusting things but is not doing them at the moment. This is contempt.
Sickness, disease, decay, and waste are universal triggers for disgust. There are also cultural and personal triggers: some cultures eat dog meat and find it delicious, while others find this disgusting. Some people enjoy eating foods that disgust others in the same culture.
People often show signs of disgust at the sight of another person suffering pain or who has been deformed by an accident. Only 20% of people display signs of genuine sorrow or pity. Neither empathy nor compassion is an emotion - it is a learned social reaction.
One theorist classified four causes of disgust: the unfamiliar, the unhealthy, the unfortunate, and the morally objectionable. The author generally agrees with this theory: when people are asked to write down a list of things that disgust them, the vast majority fall into one of these four categories.
The author adds another category, which he calls "fed-up disgust." It is evident in ongoing relationships where a person is upset by behavior that another person is unwilling to change. For example, a wife may be upset by her husband's habit of leaving his dirty clothes on the floor, and asks him not to do so - and after months or years of this behavior, she becomes disgusted with him, and feels a general sense of revulsion toward him because of his continued behavior.
Conversely, people will often suppress or overcome their disgust in intimate relationships. The idea of having someone else thrust their tongue into your mouth is disgusting, but some people enjoy "French" kissing. Having your face wiped wit ha handkerchief wet with another person's spit is unwelcomed, but children tolerate it from their mothers. This is theorized to be necessary for taking care of the sick and injured - to clean up the vomit and feces of a loved one and minister to their infected wounds.
In this sense the sensation or absence of disgust has a social function: we feel disgust at people who are not our group or kind, and suspend disgust with people with whom we are or wish to be close. A person who wants to be accepted into a group will muster the courage to eat "their" food even though he finds it initially disgusting.
It's noted that disgust generally shows itself between the ages of four and seven. Very young children do not experience disgust: they will happily flick a dead cockroach out of a glass of milk and drink it, or eat chocolate that is shaped like feces.
In later childhood and adolescence, there is a fascination with disgust, particularly among young boys. While they do not wish to be exposed to things that are disgusting, they often show great fascination in them vicariously - through pictures and video of disgusting things, and they find feces, urine, vomit, mucus, and the like to be fascinating and funny.
Social disgust is the most widely varied: people are disgusted by things that are culturally unacceptable. Being cruel to weak people is contemptible behavior in some cultures, but being kind to weak people is contemptible in others.
In some instances, behavior that is disgusting to a culture is punishable by law, even if it is not otherwise harmful to others. Many laws against certain sexual practices among consenting adults are based on societal disgust rather than societal harm. Codes and jury decisions often show a much harsher punishment for actions that are considered to be disgusting - to murder a child is considered worse than to murder and adult.
Where a person or society wishes to justify treating someone poorly, it is often seen that they will feign and promote disgust toward them. A person may be called "filthy" or "scum" to justify contempt and mistreatment. Racism is common in wartime rhetoric to justify killing one's enemy - soldiers and policemen are trained to view certain individuals with contempt in order to be able to brutalize them.
However, contempt goes both ways. A group of people who wishes to ostracize or oppress another will view them with contempt, but the oppressed people will feel contempt for their oppressors. This is also true in rivalries: students feel contempt for those who outperform them academically, and workers feel contempt for those who get promotions and raises.
Contempt and disgust are considered to be negative emotions - while it may make good sense to feel revulsion and want to get away from something or someone, it is better not to be subjected to that stimulus at all.
The emotion varies in intensity. We may feel slightly annoyed at the presence of a contemptible person, or we may want to escape or even attack them. Disgust likewise varies from a mild sense of uneasiness to an overwhelming sense of nausea, even to the point that it manifests itself physically through vomiting.
When contempt increases in intensity, it results in anger. We are at first annoyed with someone's behavior, then we attempt to avoid them - but if they pursue us, we become angry. We may signal anger to discourage them from pursuing us, or as a genuine emotional reaction to their presence, preceding a verbal or physical attack to get them away.
Recognizing Disgust and Contempt
The physical sensation of disgust, whatever the cause, is similar to the olfactory reaction to a bad smell: the moth draws tight and the nostrils narrow, and there is a constriction of the throat. In extreme cases, disgust an cause a gag reflex.
The facial expression of disgust is narrowed eyes and a sharp frown. The eyes are generally relaxed, and the mouth may open slightly resulting from a raised upper lip.
Physically, people attempt to avoid what disgusts them. They lean backward and sometimes turn their faces away. They may cover their nose and mouth with a hand.
Social Uses of Disgust
Expressions of disgust toward another person are generally used to discourage their behavior - signaling them to "stop doing that" or "get away from me."
Manipulative individuals use false signals of disgust in an attempt to control the behavior of others. Teenage girls, in particular, often signal disgust and contempt for others (including their parents) in an attempt to get their way.
In certain situations, disgust is signaled as a method of showing obedience or compliance. In some cultures it is expected for a groom to show disgust of his bride to signal that his marriage is the performance of a duty to his family, rather than his own desire.