A Word on Equality and Urinals, Yes, Urinals

We shouldn’t let politics divide us as it does, but we absolutely should remain wholly divided in the bathroom. Who is with me?

I often wonder if I am alone in my thinking when it comes to an issue. When it comes to using public bathrooms, the issue that burdens my brain is privacy as it relates to how the world approaches women’s and men’s bathrooms. This reality was never more obvious than on my latest trip to the United Kingdom (UK).

Now, I want to state that I am a big advocate of ensuring the women’s bathrooms contain ample stalls so that women don’t have to stand in line as long as they have had to do throughout history. Too many women have missed key parts of games, concerts, and shows because the que for their bathroom was too long due to a scarcity of stalls. Last week at a theater production in London my lovely lady friend and I attended, the women didn’t even wait for a line to start at the intermission, they just took over the stalls in the men’s bathroom so as not to miss a moment of Andrew Lincoln and Joe Alwyn on stage. I took me a hot minute to get comfortable with a dozen women INSIDE THE MEN’S BATHROOM watching me head to the urinals before I could muster the courage to enter the lionesses’ den. Would they count how long it took me to go then look at me with eyebrows raised as I turned around? What if a toot escaped, as it often does for we men? The pressure was enormous as you can imagine.

Thus, I firmly support the modern building trend to correct the inequity to women in stalls so that men and women can remain very very separate, but equal.

When it comes to men’s bathrooms, I believe society needs to adopt a new trend.

I’ve never been inside a women’s bathroom, but well-placed sources tell me the toilets are not just sitting in the open so that everyone can see each other doing their business. Yet, in men’s bathrooms, urinals often times are lined up one after the other with no divider providing users with a modicum of privacy. In some cases, men are provided with nothing more than a trough in which to stand shoulder to shoulder like cattle at a watering hole. How am I supposed to do my work with some drunk stranger bumping me as he looks me in the eyes and tries to start a chat about how Ohio State’s offensive is looking? Geez guy, the bro code requires silence at the trough!!!

Lest you think my concern for the lack of privacy at urinals is due to “stage freight” caused by drunk talkers, which I’ll admit has occurred sporadically in my life, my real concerns are two-fold. First, I’m 54-years-old man with a 54-year-old bladder. Though cancer free, I’ve learned that it occasionally might take men of my vintage a tad bit longer to conduct our business. That process is much easier with a divider that conceals the lack of production. I realize this information fits nicely in the TMI box; nonetheless, millions of men suffer in silence, so I feel compelled to be their voice.

Next, also in London last week, as I was trying to do my business in a divider-less urinal, I noticed a man standing just at the edge of my peripheral vision who had already finished before I began. I turned my body away from him and hugged the urinal to gain some privacy. Once complete, I turned to see him just staring at me with his smartphone up. He then stated that he was taking a video, but had waited until I finished. I was shocked, but, given that we were doing our business on the 69th floor of The Shard viewing area with a window, I felt I couldn’t ask him to see his video to ensure I was not starring in it. Again, a divider would have been much appreciated.

Though not a urinal privacy issue, I had another awkward moment in London when my lovely lady friend failed to do her job to prevent someone from entering a bathroom that didn’t lock. As I was washing my hands, a funny British man opened the door to both our surprise. I looked out to see my lovely lady friend engrossed in her smartphone. When I noted her abject failure to do her simple job, the British man said we could have had an embarrassing international crisis that would have changed our countries’ “special relationship” in ways we both would have deeply regretted. Utterly brilliant stuff:-)

More importantly and hygienically, dividers serve a vital health function. As any man can attest to, some younger men do their business as if they hadn’t done so in days, so the force is similar to a fire hose connected to a fire hydrant. The back spray can be significant. Without a divider, their business can end up on the arms, pants/legs, and shoes of neighbors, which is beyond disgusting.

Similarly, some men then shake vigorously after doing their business as if the power and velocity of shaking is directly correlated to their manliness. I’ve seen men shaking so hard you would have thought they were playing an Eddie Van Halen solo on guitar. Such full-throttled shaking again can result in their business causing collateral damage to their neighbors. Dividers would stop such damage. For the curious, see this video using ultraviolet light to show just how far the damage can be.

I’m sorry if you didn’t find this column funny, but it is an important public service. Maybe three odd moments in the UK were just coincidental, but they spurred me to pen this much-needed missive as I’ve remained silent for too long. Like long suffering women desperate for more stalls, too many men have silently endured divider-less urinals subjecting them to awkward moments, defenselessly getting someone else’s business sprayed on them, and, yes, being filmed by some strange guy who plans to include you doing your business in his “Asian memories from Europe” home video.

C’mon world, is it asking too much to put dividers in between urinals? We shouldn’t let politics divide us as it does, but we absolutely should remain wholly divided in the bathroom. Who is with me?

P.S. Upon landing in Philadelphia, it was great to be back in the land of hand towels (but not overly rude airport workers). I hope America never adopts the UK’s practice of hand air dryers over hand towels. The former don’t work; the latter do. Perhaps the UK’s obsession with hand air dryers is due to its love of Sir James Dyson, creator of the hand air dryers and great (but overly priced) vacuums.