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Go Piss, Girl: The plight of the public potty

24 points prismatic 1 day ago 56 comments

bell-cot 1 day ago | parent

At least in print, my sense is that this topic is dominated by angry voices proclaiming that public bathroom are a disgracefully neglected human right. Especially for themselves. But with amazingly little to say about the practical realities on the supply side. Public restrooms don't come from Santa Claus, and they cost a lot both to build and maintain. Then there are the costs and miseries of security. Gratitude toward business providing restrooms seems nonexistent.

(Comparing to, for instance, people campaigning against hunger. Those folks seem keenly aware that food for the needy has to come from somewhere - whether donated or paid for - then be sorted and stored, possibly repackaged and transported, maybe prepared and cooked, then regularly distributed to those needing it. And if you botch even one step, then you have failed at feeding the poor.)

Joker_vD 1 hour ago | parent

> public bathroom are a disgracefully neglected human right.

Well, they are. Just as drinking fountains.

> Public restrooms don't come from Santa Claus, and they cost a lot both to build and maintain. Then there are the costs and miseries of security. Gratitude toward business providing restrooms seems nonexistent.

s/restroom/park/g. Hey, it's still true! And explains why there are almost no public parks around.

Edit: oh, and before someone comments on unhygienicity of drinking fountains: you're not supposed to kiss the nozzle or, heavens forbid, to fellate it to drink. Let about 1/2–1/3 of the top of the spout inside of your mouth and drink it; leave the rest outside.

pizzafeelsright 37 minutes ago | parent

I live near a park. I watch that drinking fountain. They bathe in there at times. They lift their dogs to drink from it despite. It breaks because they kick the button.

They are the losers, the educated affluent, the youthful of our society.

They are the problem. What is the solution?

user43928 29 minutes ago | parent

In Switzerland I did not see such issues with the drinking fountains which are everywhere.

It's certainly a different environment from a large American city, though we also have misbehaving youths and a few drug addicts that are perhaps homeless.

forgotusername6 1 hour ago | parent

You pay taxes and taxes fund things which are good for society as a whole. It's not that hard. You don't beg for donations. This stuff isn't optional or the result of benevolent benefactors. If you live in society then you contribute to society.

pizzafeelsright 40 minutes ago | parent

Not optional -> force of men with guns who will kill you unless you bow down. This is good for society.

rjbwork 38 minutes ago | parent

>This is good for society.

This is society. Its origins are people banding together to collectivize violence and its legitimate uses in order to protect themselves from the state of nature in which the strong take what they will and the weak suffer what they must.

squidmaster 37 minutes ago | parent

You can't pay janitors enough to deal with degenerates who routinely deliberately destroy public bathrooms in western countries. It's a job for police and the courts, but those are dysfunctional in a way which "more money" doesn't fix.

Result is all the clean and useful bathrooms are private, because only thus can shit-smearing vandals be reasonably excluded (and only then, somewhat.)

franga2000 14 minutes ago | parent

So you can't pay a janitor enough to deal with vandals, but somehow the minimum wage bartender that already has to tend to a bar and cash register is able to keep their toilets clean no problem?

It's not that hard to make toilets that are nearly indestructible and can be very efficiently cleaned by a guy in a "hazmat" suit with a pressure washer. It probably wouldn't be that hard to largely automate this. But the market for this is small and mostly governments, so prices are high and innovation is low.

xdennis 10 minutes ago | parent

It is hard and taxes are irrelevant.

If taxes are what matters, America would have the best public restrooms in the world because it's the richest country.

But what really matters is culture. If you have a small percentage of people who are bad actors and are not punished for it, they ruin it for everyone.

---

Let me give you a small example of culture and enforcement. I live in a small city in Romania. I once traveled by plane to London. The airport in my city is very small. When boarding, despite the fact that the zigzag queue was 3 lines long, people lifted the cordon and went straight to the door. I was probably the only one who followed it.

When we arrived at Heathrow, people did the same thing. The zigzag queue at Heathrow is very long, so it feels slightly fairer to skip it if there's literally no one in front of you (it was 2 AM or something). But as soon as the first person skipped the line and a second person was going for it, a guard noticed him and ordered him to go back. He tried to "negotiate" but the guard only lifted a finger and told him to "go back".

No one tried to skip after those two.

When you have a culture with no enforcement, a small minority (maybe 2%) of people ruin it for everyone and you feel like an idiot still following the rules. This makes the majority imitate the bad actors because "I might as well too".

No amount of money in the world can fix bad culture.

atoav 1 hour ago | parent

Yes. I am one of those voices. And my argument isn't that they do not cost money. My argument is that we can afford it, but chose to instead give the money to people and companies who already have enough. And I know literally no one who claims public restrooms are free to maintain.

Toilets and water should be basic infrastructure (and in some places they are). Business with toilets are a really unreliable way to offer toilets, since they will all come up with their own rules.

And it is ridiculous to pretend they can't be afforded. Ever been to Japan? Every train station has toilets since the 80s, literally every other store has freely usable public toilets. They all use the same signage. They are clean and free to use.

What is the point of society if not creating an environment within which we all can thrive? Yes I know, some want it to maximize the thriving only for certain (rich) people. I call these egoists.

crote 35 minutes ago | parent

Exactly. If a business can't afford to provide a bathroom, it can't afford to run a business.

It's like saying child labor should be legalised because your business would go bankrupt without underpaid child workers: it just means your business model isn't viable!

hobo123 31 minutes ago | parent

That's the thing. No one ever got filthy rich of basic infrastructure.

But that's all the more reason to get and keep the infrastructure working.

crote 58 minutes ago | parent

Should we also be grateful for restaurants for having seats, or for stores having breathable air?

Cities should not be incompatible with basic human existence. I can bring a bagged lunch and eat it on-the-go. Would people be as open to me taking a shit in a bag on the sidewalk?

squidbeak 26 minutes ago | parent

Pragmatic, but have you considered the predicament you'll be in if you need to go before lunch?

sublinear 41 minutes ago | parent

You're absolutely correct, but the sense of entitlement from the typical HN commenter is boundless.

Many of the people who downvoted you may want nice things, but would never contribute back. They're exactly the people who would immediately ruin it. Sometimes the grass really is greener, and it's usually because there's a system at work to keep it that way.

troupo 33 minutes ago | parent

Everyone who downvoted contributes back. They are the people who would not ruin it.

You on the other hand would definitely not want to contribute, and if any were built you'd go out of your way to ruin it, though indirectly (e.g. by working to reduce/remove funding for maintenance)

squidbeak 4 minutes ago | parent

This is just a question of resource allocation and priorities. If a society can afford the displaced costs of unregulated production and extraction, or fleets of aircraft carriers and upkeep for however many thousand nuclear weapons it possesses, or oligarchs (how many is it now?) diverting wealth into superyachts, it can also afford sufficient spaces for people to piss in and janitors to clean them.

kleiba2 1 hour ago | parent

Is it not possible to get your point across using more decent language?

nightfly 1 hour ago | parent

You know the answer is yes. You also know they can, and did, choose not to do that. If you have to object actually object.

monster_truck 1 hour ago | parent

What are you, some sort of fucking nun? It might be sunday but this ain't church

defrost 1 hour ago | parent

The problem with

   I need to micturate a lot.
is few would know WTF the author is referring to.

jhbadger 50 minutes ago | parent

What's wrong with "urinate" or "pee"?

iammjm 40 minutes ago | parent

What’s wrong with “piss”?

TFNA 38 minutes ago | parent

Just view the article as an interesting sign of a shifting social norm. It has been decades now since "shit" and "piss" have been pretty normal, not taboo, words in European English (possibly aided by their resemblance to German and French counterparts that are less profane than the English words), and I had already observed that a softening has been occurring in North American and Australian English at least since social media gave people the opportunity to broadcast their use of the words.

defrost 37 minutes ago | parent

Varies by culture and class, you'll find some people up in arms about almost any mention of bodily functions.

ie. for some urinate and pee are just as bad as piss or wee.

Luckily my cup runneth over and I can decently speak of pissing, going for a slash, splashing the porcelain and otherwise making water in a multitude of ways in my own locale.

mft_ 14 minutes ago | parent

German has a word for everything; English has more alternate words for bodily functions than one could ever need :)

ButlerianJihad 24 minutes ago | parent

“Oh freddled gruntbuggly,

Thy micturitions are to me,

As plurdled gabbleblotchits,

On a lurgid bee,

That mordiously hath blurted out,

Its earted jurtles,

Into a rancid festering confectious organ squealer.

[drowned out by moaning and screaming]”

—Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy

It is quite interesting to note, that when I read this as a teenager, I did not even try to find out what “micturitions” are, because I confidently assumed that these were all nonsense words.

nervai 1 hour ago | parent

Japan blew my mind. You're never more than 5 minutes walk away from a free public restroom in any city or town I visited. They were always clean and supplied.

They show up on Maps apps and have reviews. I remember walking a few minutes more once, in Osaka, to try one that had excellent reviews (it was a fun and original design).

In some more rural areas these became squat potties with no toilet paper, so carry a pack of tissues with you.

atoav 1 hour ago | parent

Japan was amazing in these regards. It truly feels liberating when going somewhere means you literally do not need to worry about that specific thing.

When I first went to Japan I felt like we in the west live like fucking savages.

user43928 33 minutes ago | parent

While that's good, Japan has other issues to worry about.

Since there are no trash cans, you have to carry garbage with you until you're back home, or maybe find another store where you can dispose of it.

The toilet paper and tissues in Japan are extremely thin and in my view quite inconvenient.

bschwindHN 23 minutes ago | parent

People get so hung up on garbage, I don't get it. Keep a single plastic bag with you, put your trash in it. Take it back and throw it away at home or your hotel or wherever you're staying. Most train stations have plenty of garbage cans, and if you're traveling in Japan, you're probably taking a train.

The toilet paper sucks, sure, but that's just cheap single-ply for public use toilets. People can and do buy the good stuff for their homes. Hardly an issue to worry about.

shoobiedoo 30 minutes ago | parent

What's savage is what Japan does to drug users and dealers. If the west did the same, we'd be a lot cleaner, too, since washrooms wouldn't be open door fentanyl naptime rooms. But at what cost?

For what it's worth I think a middle ground leaning closer to the west is the best approach. Save injection sites like the one in Vancouver have been a disaster, however

squidmaster 22 minutes ago | parent

You call it savage, but the result is more civilized. Why should we settle for a middle ground? Why should we negotiate with degenerates who can't even be trusted with a toilet?

There is nothing savage about the way Japan treats those who are incompatible with civilization. On the contrary, to parley with the savages is what makes you a savage too.

Toutouxc 11 minutes ago | parent

I live in Europe and public restrooms don’t feel like fentanyl naptime rooms. Maybe that’s more of a North America thing?

shoobiedoo 9 minutes ago | parent

I can only speak for Vancouver. New West, specifically, which is probably more crack-denny than other areas. But yeah, even Starbucks will hang fake "out of order" signs on the door because it's guaranteed to become an impromptu vein shooting gallery at some point during the day.

o_m 55 minutes ago | parent

I also was pleasantly surprised of the availability when I visited. But I would recommend bringing your own soap. A lot of the restrooms in the more rural areas, and even some places in the cities, don't have any soap. Hand Sanitizer won't kill norovirus, which usually spreads in restrooms.

pembrook 52 minutes ago | parent

Turns out when you're an ethnically homogenous, xenophobic, low immigration country that brutally enforces social norms and anti-drug policy, you can achieve enough compliance to have nice public things even in urban environments.

You cannot have high birth rates, high growth, high immigration, libertarian personal freedoms or much innovation however.

There is no perfect design, only different trade-offs.

saagarjha 48 minutes ago | parent

You didn't even mention high trust society this time, I feel like you're slipping

pembrook 45 minutes ago | parent

High trust is a byproduct of an ethnically homogenous society.

I prefer not having good public bathrooms and instead prefer more personal freedoms, economic growth/dynamism, and immigration. But it sounds like you would prefer different trade offs.

I just think its funny that internet populists believe you can have everything. You can't.

CursedSilicon 29 minutes ago | parent

Your bewildering obsession with "populism" sure does define your entire worldview

pembrook 25 minutes ago | parent

Care to offer a rebuttal to any of my statements?

Would love to hear you destroy me with superior logic and/or educate me where I'm wrong.

Or we can just stick to attacking me personally because what I've said makes you emotionally upset.

mft_ 20 minutes ago | parent

In the West, I’d argue (from personal experience) that a high trust society probably correlates more with high level of employment and (maybe as a second order effect) reasonably high income.

Taking Switzerland as an example, it’s possible to have a managed/positive approach to immigration and maintain very high societal standards.

saagarjha 2 minutes ago | parent

Not that I would particularly like to live there but Singapore has fairly clean public restrooms. I suspect there is more to this than the ethnic makeup of the country.

JimDabell 22 minutes ago | parent

Singapore is a melting pot of many different ethnicities, it’s not xenophobic, and more than 40% of people living in Singapore are immigrants. And it has extremely low crime.

This lauding of ethnic homogeneity and xenophobia just seems to be a dog whistle from the American right because they want to say “See? If we kicked out all the non-whites it would fix our problems!” it’s not true; It’s just a very, very, very old racist playbook.

squidmaster 19 minutes ago | parent

Singapore whips the shit out of degenerate criminals, they don't get coddled as westerners think appropriate. Where there's a whip, there's a way.

JimDabell 14 minutes ago | parent

You sound like a Nazi when you call people degenerates. Was that your intended meaning?

pembrook 14 minutes ago | parent

Singapore is just further evidence of my statements being true.

They also brutally enforce social norms and anti-drug policy, and in 2025 they had a total of 35K people granted permanent residency (in a country of 6M people).

In Singapore you're confusing temporary foreign workers with true immigration. In fact Singapore is an extremely low immigration country.

None of these foreign workers qualify for Singapore's public housing or healthcare for example.

I'm pro immigration and left-leaning, but I don't disagree with the right wingers that ethnic homogeneity leads to higher social trust (many studies have demonstrated this). I prefer having immigration though.

JimDabell 12 minutes ago | parent

> Also, imo Singapore is just further evidence of my statements being true.

Not anything to do with race it isn’t. It’s a direct contradiction to your claims.

NordStreamYacht 29 minutes ago | parent

Use the bidet. Tissues are for savages.

khazhoux 21 minutes ago | parent

Bidets without tissue paper only works for people with very super fiber intake or mega-absorptive intestines. Otherwise, no amount of hot streaming water will wash you completely.

tete 28 minutes ago | parent

Japan is great, because they realized that if you stop giving a fuck about public debt you can make a great country happen.

Who could have thought that with investment rather than letting everything crumble things would get better?

Meanwhile here everyone is close to tears if you propose anything for the public, because that might lead to lowering the tax break for some huge multi national that then would not get the well-deserved pay-off for their lobbying work.

And to be fair who wants to live under a regime that is the worst kind of communism, treating people who want need pee, but don't pay with respect, like Japan? (sarcasm)

brap 27 minutes ago | parent

I think it’s been like 20 years since I had to use a truly public toilet.

Is this really such a common occurrence for people? Because I feel like toilets are being discussed way too much.

elric 21 minutes ago | parent

Do you not have a bladder? Do you never leave home for longer than a few hours? Are you aware that some people may have smaller bladders or produce more urine for various reasons?

If anything, toilets aren't discussed nearly enough. There is a huge lack of public toilets pretty much everywhere in the world.

ViscountPenguin 19 minutes ago | parent

Yes, most people have to use a toilet occasionally?

I can personally attest that having mild gi issues can make most of Europe a bit of a hellscape, with their expensive and simultaneously gross toilets. As an Australian I never appreciated clean public toilets before going there.