News-Record.com

Back when I was a sixth-grader, I visited my aunt and uncle in San Jose, California. The first time I went to use their toilet, I was shocked to discover that someone in their house had not flushed. Prior to that moment, I had regarded my aunt and uncle as very clean, decent folks. I must have gotten up the nerve to ask them about it because I recall them educating me about the "If it's yellow . . . " doctrine. I was at least relieved that I could continue looking up to my aunt and uncle as positive role models. I have never heard anyone address possible health hazards of using the toilet after someone who has not flushed. Maybe someone can comment on that.

Years later, I was much more disturbed by someone in the Hinton James dormitory regularly leaving brown stains on our suite's toilet seat. I finally complained to my suitemates about how gross that was. Days later, one of them left some candy bar debris on the seat for me to discover.

Urine has antiseptic properties, so that's not an issue. The issue is pollution, which the anthropologist Mary Douglas defines simply as "matter of out place." All bodily functions--from eating to sex to menstruation to defecation--acquire taboos as they are brought under a regime of social regulation. Concepts of cleanliness and dirtiness are inherently part of such regimes. Most Americans are regulated to think of a water-filled toilet as normative; a few don't care much about flushing, a few insist on the blue toilet water.

The more interesting question, though, is why Allen, who's been haranguing neighbors--indeed, imposing a one-man panopticon against them--about watering their grass (something he admits he's never done himself), suddenly gets defensive when asked to change one of his own behaviors. Isn't what's sauce for the goose sauce for the gander as well? Shouldn't we all make sacrifices in the name of the public good?

Or are you, Allen, the local version of Al Gore, who waxes indignant on the carbon motes in the eyes of others (i.e. their use of internal combustion engines) while remaining blind the carbon beams in his own eyes (heating swimming pool, private jet, etc.)? With your fastidious laundry practices, showers-as-thought-exercise, and neurotic flushing compulsions, shouldn't you be contributing something to the cause? The people of Greensboro demand a sacrifice!

For my own part, I plan to start haranguing my friends--most of them leftists, environmentalists, and other unsavory sorts--whenever I find a flushed toilet in their houses.

Hey Allen, if you think let it mellow if it's yellow is unclean, what to you think of the School Board approving of allowing children with lice in their hair to attend school.
Or at the least come to school with nits in their hair. Talk about unclean.
And they don't even notify the parents of children in the class.

Hardy:
I'm glad I didn't read your comment about the stains over breakfast.
I'm still checking on the health hazards of unflushed urine, although I do recall a story about trapped miners who survived their ordeal in part by drinking their own urine.

That survivor guy on cable--Bear something, I think--advises peeing on yourself if you cut yourself in the wild.

I'll keep that in mind the next time I'm in the wild.