You must log in or # to comment.
That door closer is installed on the wrong side of the door if its a pull, it’s actually a push.
Y’all worry way, way too much about this stuff.
It’s c/humor, it’s not that deep.
Use a paper towel to open the door and toss it into the next garbage you see outside the bathroom. Or toss it into the trash as you leave.
…just use your tongue to pull the door open, that way you can keep your hands freshly-cleaned…
Or just simply lick the hand clean after you’ve opened the door.
There are a good reasons for this:
Inward opening doors pull air into the bathroom area and both contain the smells and germs, (the opposite is true for outward opening doors) but also bring additional fresh air in.
Doors that open outwards into hallways (where public access toilets are most commonly found) is a huge hazard to people passing the door.Not to mention foot pulls and automatic door openers are becoming more common so you dont have to touch the handle as often.
Lots of newer public toilets (at least in australia) are designed with an s-bend entrance to eliminate doors completely (however require constant exhaust).
Toilets in commercial buildings often have ante-chambers where doors open both ways into the chamber so you have to touch a handle regardless of direction of travel. (Common in offices and hospitals)Many places put these on the bottom of the door for this very reason. Granted they only help people able to use them.
Most general public bathrooms (ie. not ones found within stores/reataurants) in Australia don’t have doors - but rather an S-shaped path that provides privacy, without the necessary “stickiness” of having to touch a door handle.
Is this not common elsewhere?
In facilities that have lots of room, yes (malls, schools, etc). Workplaces generally less inclined to devote that much space to it.
Yeah we have that in Europe on highway stops and other places with high traffic of people like stadiums, big concert venues etc.
That’s what most airports, schools, and such seem to have in my experience. (U.S.)
My workplace does this, there’s still a door but it’s always open
I wish. I’m surprised we haven’t brought back pay toilets in the US.
I have been joking with my roommate lately that we’re probably only a decade or so out from landlords putting coin-op toilets in apartments. What a capitalist dystopia it’ll be.
Like the cigarette dispenser in Dallas’ apartment from the 5th element. Pretty sure he had advertisements in his apartment when he woke up. I need to revisit that gem, been a while.
Nothing like losing your balance or getting your foot jammed when someone slams the door open from the other side. I prefer the wheelchair buttons
Best I can do is a Palantir face recognition device that verify your identity before allowing you out of the bathroom
Those things fucking suck when you can get them to work and they are downright dangerous otherwise.
I’ve hyperextended my knee using one. Good times. Hyperextension used to be a “oh that sucked” but as I get older they’re more and more a "oh shit is this the time it fails on me? " territory.
The way people behave in airport bathrooms bothers me. The bathroom gets cleaned 5 times a day and people still use a mountain of tp on the seat and flush the toilet with their foot like a bunch of homo zombies with norovirus just rode the handle.
But if you must do the above, in any restroom with soap, wash your hands afterwards. You’d want your doctor to.
I almost always flush the handle with my foot if the handle looks gross. I’m sorry but cleaning it is not my job.
that bothers you? Consider yourself lucky if you’ve never heard/seen someone disgustingly snorting their snot into the sinks, or washing their feet in it.
I’m unlucky :\
Theoretically, if everyone did the Yes, the But wouldn’t be that big of a But.
Sadly, I’m well aware not everyone does the Yes. Going into a men’s public bathroom is disgusting; it’s disgraceful how many men I’ve seen leave without washing.
My favorite was a guy in college who came in, used the urinal, used the hand dryer, and left.
i hate this so much
And then they ask why you stopped handshaking
Do you expect him to leave with wet urine on his hands? Those dryers are made specifically for drying urine and blowing away the smell. That’s clearly what the little picture on them means.
I know where my dick has been. Usually.
Edit: Why so serious?
I genuinely don’t even know what you’re trying to say with that comment.
They are saying that they don’t feel like their hands are getting dirty by touching their dick because their dick is in their underpants all day.
The flaw to this argument is that your dick and balls can get sweaty and gross in there. And when you touch it, your hands can get gross too. Not to mention that your hands can get gross just by walking around and touching things in society. And the bathroom stop is meant to be a bio-break that enforces washing all the germs from your hands from walking around in society.
All the more reason to wash.
My hands harbor far more bacteria than my dick. And so does that door handle, the grossest part of the whole business.
Just use the paper towel you used to dry your hands to open the door
This is an additional reason I hate places that use air driers instead of paper towels
after you’ve peed on your hands, open the door, then quickly wash your hands and run out. the wind will dry your hands.
this is why i usually pee on my friends hands. then they have to open the door
Why the unnecessary steps? Just pee on the door handle.
It’s truly amazing how many people including who ever made the picture don’t realize this. It’s kind of like those conversations where people talk about washing spoons and always getting water sprayed on themselves. Or the people that can only wipe standing up. It’s like somehow they just are going through life and not managing the most basic thought processes.
And some places are smart and put a garbage can by the door, for the reason.
If the trash is not close enough to the door, that paper towel goes on the floor. I know it’s a bit rude, but every public restroom should have it close enough to do this.
I’ve noticed a lot of places now have a trash can conveniently located by the door for this.
I’m that asshole who leaves paper towels by the door until they get the hint.
Just move the bin yourself. They’ll get the hint without extra work.
Eww then ya gotta touch the bin
Some (most) are mounted into the wall though.
I’ve settled into a routine of pulling the door open with the paper towel, flinging the paper towel into the nearest trashcan, and darting out quick enough without having to keep the door open with my foot or anything. Not necessary, but fun
This is the way
IDGI
You clean your hands but then you have to touch a probably dirty handle to open the door.
Use the paper
There’s definitely solutions to the problem. You could carry disposable gloves. People with dogs carry plastic bags everywhere. That could work in a pinch. You could wedge the door open and use your foot to open it to leave.
I personally just try to not use public toilets as much as possible. I carry hand sanitizer spray and a bottle of water in my backpack. It’s definitely gross, but it’s not unsolvable.
People don’t know they can hang on to the paper towel to open the door, then Kobe that shit on the way out?
A lot of places put the waste basket by the door for this very reason.
I worked security in pubs, nightclubs and licenced venues for a decade and to this day, I do not wash my hands in public bathrooms. I touch as little as humanly possible and use paper towel to open the door.
My wife thinks its gross but Ive seen shit that cannot be unseen.
Why does any of that lead to “I don’t wash my hands”? In what scenario is washing your hands the dirtier option? Unless somebody took a shit in the soap dispenser, your hands will be cleaner after cleaning them.
Please clean your hands.
Maybe their bathroom has a manual handle to turn to get the water to start and stop.
Then use the same paper towel they use to open the door to shut of the faucet.
You need to use the paper towel to turn on the faucet, then wash your hands and turn it off with the towel again.
A lot of bathrooms don’t even have paper towels, so OP possibly is at a bathroom where there’s a manual faucet and no paper towels.
I touch as little as humanly possible and use paper towel to open the door.
They said there are towels but they don’t wash their hands.
That’s the best version. People leave with washed hands so hands remain clean and it’s possible to enter by pushing with a foot.
The other way requires using the door handle while entering. That can contaminate the hand that is going to touch or get close to the private parts. It’s better to have that hand as clean as possible.
Clean, dry and uncut hands create a formidable barrier to pathogen transmission. And the most dangerous pathogens tend not to live long outside a living body.
So better not wash hands, especially if one had to touch a dirty door?
So better not wash hands, especially if one had to touch a dirty door?
No. My point was that dry, unopened human skin makes pathogen transmission by touch nothing to worry about.
In my country it is illegal to have bathroom doors open to the inside. Same with doors leading outside. It was weird to move abroad as I couldn’t get used to them opening the other way.
It’s unsafe for doors to open into hallways, so you need to design alcoves for every entrance otherwise, so far more space is wasted.
Also, use paper to open the door, and a lot of places have foot pulls now, easier for handicapped people as well.
The best entrance, especially for handicapped people, is a maze entrance, but uses even more space.
I don’t know by what magic a door is safe opening one way but not another. It surely depends on where the door is.
Kid running down a hallway gets a door in the face when it opens in the hallway. Or someone evacuating during an emergency.
On the other hand doors opening to the inside are less safe in case of an emergency. In my country, all doors in public places must open towards the exit of the building.
That’s due to a panic response and people pressing against the doors so you can’t pull them open. That only happens after a certain amount of people. The couple dozen max in a bathroom or most office and conference rooms won’t have that issue. But all the doors from the hallways out will swing towards the path of egress though.
Codes stipulate the occupancy amount that requires it, I believe the model building codes of NA and most of Europe calls for 100 people occupancy. Unless it’s been changed in the last few years.
I’ve seen a lot of places add those foot pull handles to doors since COVID. Not the best, but it’s a solution
I never saw this but want them everywhere. I just have to try to grab the doors/handles on unusual places where not many people would touch them
Some places have little foot hooks at the bottom.
I wonder if push to enter doors cut down on injuries of people rushing to the toilet, or if it’s just because they usually open into corridors.
As everyone has already said, use the paper towels. Some doors are also equiped with a small piece of metal at the base of the door which you step on, and pull with your shoe
That foot thing is an awful design IMO. Rather than a step-on to pull, it should be a design that allows you to flex your foot up and hook it under something to pull. The step-on kind necessarily requires you to put weight on it, letting off pressure on your other foot thereby causing instability. This can be difficult to manage for lighter people or on doors requiring a heavier pull force to open. The hook under kind would stabilize the person trying to open the door.
Edit: there have been some good arguments for why the step-on kind has advantages. Clearly the only answer is for bathrooms to have two doors. One with a step-on and one with a hook-under.
But realistically the hook-under could easily have a top portion allowing step-on utilization as well.
Counter argument: having to hook your foot runs the risk of damaging the tops of your shoes (often softer material) or your foot if you’re wearing sandals. You can be sure that the bottoms of everyone’s shoes are designed for at least minimal impact protection.
I like the foot step and use them when I can, but it helps to reinforce that the paper towel with a well-placed trash can is the best method imo.
Handicapped people can press down, but not lift up, especially those in a wheelchair.
Neither option is good, tbh. Hook under allows better grip for those capable, but doesn’t allow for some disabled people. Step on increases the likelihood of usability but also increases the likelihood of becoming unbalanced and falling.
Both options ignore the possibility of broken toes when someone on the outside attempts to push the door in at the moment you’ve got your foot planted on it or hooked under it.
We live in an era where automatic doors and push buttons to open them are a well established thing. Do that instead.
Barring that, the hallway with two turns like Walmart uses is an option. Just make sure they’re wide enough for the widest wheelchairs and power chairs, and the turns aren’t too tight.
Ah-ha, so this is the maze entry the other comment was talking about.
I don’t disagree, I still use a paper towel. When it was first installed they forgot to modify the mechanism that closes the door on one of the bathrooms. The tension was set still set to prevent someone from being smashed in the face (or the door from slamming shut), but that meant you needed apply a fair amount of force to open the door. They’ve since adjusted it and now it’s pretty easy to open with just one foot
The kind you describe is the only type I’ve ever seen.
You also pull up your pants before washing your hands. If I were a germophobe, I’d be terrified of the two spots I grab to pull my pants up after pooping.
@humorlessrepost @The_Picard_Maneuver I’m a germaphobe and yes this is literally true.
Finger 2 & 3: poop.
Fingers 1, 4 & 5: trousers.
I sure hope people aren’t going to the sink with their pants still around their ankles
are… are you getting poop on your pants???
Are you getting poop on your hands? I’m not, but I still wash my hands after.
Foot pulls are a part-solution. Accessibility button as well.
Long sleeves
