Japanese TV Introduces "Mask Manners"

Even before the age of covid-19, sickness masks were widely worn in Japan, especially during hay fever season. But now that people wear them every day, throughout the day, it seems as though there’s a notion as to what’s good and bad mask manners.

This week on Asashi TV’s Morning Show (via Afternoon News), there was a segment on mask manners for work. These “rules” are aimed at business professionals, and run contrary to the creative D.I.Y. masks people in Japan have shown off online.

The following guidelines were put together by Mariko Suzuki—who specializes in manners, especially in corporate environments—after apparently talking to people in workplaces. If you’ve ever been to a bookstore in Japan, you’ve seen how many books there are on business manners. If you’ve ever been to the country, you’ve probably experienced it first-hand.

Japanese business manners can get quite complicated, with rules existing for who should stand where in elevators or where different employees should sit in the same taxi cab.

According to the segment, the following are good and bad mask manners at work:

Light pink masks: Good

Dark pink masks: Bad

Black masks with white shirts: Bad

Black masks with dark suits: Good

Masks with illustrations or patterns: Bad

Masks with company logos: Good

Much of the rationale, as unnecessary as it might seem, was that in a work environment the goal is not to draw attention to the mask. At the start of the segment, the host said that white masks were the best—probably because they’re most widespread and thus would draw the least amount of attention.

Even during the segment there was push back by the panelists, who said things like, “Who cares?”, “Wearing a mask in itself is important and good manners,” or, “What’s good manners is not getting [covid-19] or giving it to others”.