Skip to the loo – why public toilets matter is a fascinating article by Michael Harris in the Walrus magazine.
Have you ever been caught needing to use a public toilet and yet not being able to find one?
Ever talked your way into a restaurant bathroom, a restaurant that you weren’t eating at and weren’t supposed to be using their bathroom?
Ever been traveling and REALLY had to go and didn’t know how to ask in the local language where the bathroom was?
Ever been faced with a toilet in another country that you weren’t exactly sure how to use?
I’ve been faced with all those situations, situations I’ve found myself in because of being privileged …. privileged to be able to speak in such a way that I could convince an ornery bathroom gatekeeper, privileged enough to be able to travel, privileged enough to be wearing clothes that weren’t weeks in need of a wash.
Imagine if you couldn’t. You couldn’t access a public washroom. Either because they didn’t exist in your community or because you were denied entry because of the way you looked and dressed and perhaps smelled.
Imagine.
It’s perspective changing.
