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Comment by benten10 | Hacker News Reader

My first reaction was extreme anger at your first statement. Now that I have cooled down a bit,

Would you ever consider rubbing yourself with paper a valid realistic alternative to showering?

Then WHY are you more comfortable with merely rubbing the shit off you, at the dirtiest part of your body (than cleaning it using water, and washing it, like your wash the rest of your body).

Those that use hands at least have clean butts and clean hands (most do wash hands now!) -- you, on the other hand can't be completely confident about one.

: )

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> Would you ever consider rubbing yourself with paper a valid realistic alternative to showering?

Yes, all the time, for many classes of uncleanliness. Pants and paper towels are amazing. I'm careful with your wording, though -- those are an alternative, not a substitute, and especially an alternative for right now. If I had infinite time I'd love to take a full shower after every crap. If I worked up the slightest sweat bead on my forehead, I'd love to go shower and cool down immediately rather than rub against my shirt or a paper towel and continuing with what I was doing.

One day I might get a fancy Japanese toilet. For now, wiping is a fine alternative to a full shower and even in the gross cases of not washing hands afterwards you're still going to be less likely to spread disease than you would be in a culture where touching things with the left hand is frowned upon. As you say, I can be sure about one, and it's the most important one from a public health standpoint given that the other even if not super clean is contained until shower time.

I think the reasoning goes something like this: The anus should be assumed to be an unclean portion of the body, with the exception of directly after washing it with soap and water, and should always be treated under that assumption. By using paper in between the hand and anus when wiping you are attempting to avoid cross contamination with the hands, which is a part of the body that is understood to be much cleaner. Simply avoiding contact between the two areas is the most direct route to maintain this distinction. Washing your hands with soap and water after wiping serves as a further action to maintain the usefulness of the hands.

You will notice that I highlighted soap above, I do this because I believe it is the key factor often missed in discussions like this. You can argue that hand + water can make your anus appear cleaner than hand + paper, but without soap it is at best marginally more sanitary for your anus, and significantly less sanitary for your hand. There is a reason we clean our bodies with soap and water, not just water.

The problem is that only institutional toilet paper -- the kind used in hospitals and prisons -- actually maintains any kind of separation between hand body. The kind that everybody actually uses just absorbs and distributes fecal matter.

I was unaware that using toilet paper meant I couldn't ever shower. It seems strange that a person should only ever be allowed to use one method to clean themselves.

What are you going on about? You do understand that most people use toilet paper to wipe themselves and also wash their hands afterwards?

But they don't wash their butt.

An analogy I always like was whether you'd be happy enough wiping your hand with a paper towel if you accidentally tripped and put your hand in dog feces.

I am not suggesting we all use deutsche toilettenbecken or anything, but if your diet is good then there is nothing to clean up either.

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