野性消费yě xìng xiāo fèi

Wild spending

jīn tiān wǒ yào yě xìng xiāo fèi!今天我要野性消费！Today I’m spending wild!

野性消费 means spending without restraint, on purpose. It is a play on 理性消费, “rational spending”, the usual advice to shop with care.

Took off: 2021
Started in: A brand’s livestream
Today: Now everyday Chinese

What it means

野性 means “wild” or “untamed”, and 消费 means “spending”. 理性消费, “rational spending”, is the stock phrase for careful shopping, and in 2021 a brand’s livestream hosts used it to calm buyers down. Swap one character, 理 for 野, and you get a cheerful refusal.

Today it means a splurge you choose on purpose, often to support someone, often as a joke about your own shopping cart.

How people use it

It is now a joke for any happy splurge: a sale, a payday, a bonus. The opposite, 理性消费, is still the normal phrase, and you hear it in every big shopping festival.

灯灯

你买了什么？天天都有快递
nǐ mǎi le shén me? tiān tiān dōu yǒu kuài dì
What did you buy? Packages arrive every day.
刚发奖金，野性消费了一下
gāng fā jiǎng jīn, yě xìng xiāo fèi le yí xià
I just got my bonus, so I spent a little wild.
那下个月吃什么？
nà xià gè yuè chī shén me?
Then what will you eat next month?
下个月再理性消费
xià gè yuè zài lǐ xìng xiāo fèi
Next month I’ll spend rationally.

More examples

发工资了，今晚野性消费。
fā gōng zī le, jīn wǎn yě xìng xiāo fèi.
Payday. Wild spending tonight.
双十一我不想理性消费，我要野性消费。
shuāng shí yī wǒ bù xiǎng lǐ xìng xiāo fèi, wǒ yào yě xìng xiāo fèi.
For Double 11, I don’t want to spend rationally. I want to spend wild.

Where it came from

In July 2021, heavy floods hit Henan province. Around July 21, news spread that the sportswear brand 鸿星尔克, Erke, had pledged 50 million yuan in relief supplies. Posts online claimed the company had lost money the year before, and people rushed to its livestreams to buy.

The brand and its hosts kept asking viewers to 理性消费. Viewers answered that they would 野性消费. Its Douyin livestream sold more than 15 million yuan on the night of July 22, according to Jiemian.

The magazine 咬文嚼字 put 野性消费 on its list of the popular words of 2021, The China Project reports.

The original. Livestreams from July 2021 in which the hosts ask viewers to spend rationally while orders pour in. Jiemian’s report describes them. Jiemian (in Chinese)