Gonna cut to the chase with this one. The hostage situation in TX was 11 hours long. How does the hostage taker go to the bathroom? Not only in terms of the heightened emotions and danger causing the bowels or bladder to overreact, but logistically too. Would he just go to the bathroom in front of everyone? He certainly wouldn’t say “stay here while I take a leak.” And how does he handle hostages who need to go too? I asked a while ago about guards and prisoners with this topic concerning POW camps and the like. But this is only one guy, and nature has to call at some point. Incidentally, going to the bathroom is a private act. Fight my ignorance, please!
I believe there were only 4 hostages, and one was set free relatively early.
What I would do is march the 3 or 4 hostages into the bathroom, have them face a wall, pee with my gun pointing at them while warning them that I would shoot if anybody moved.
If a hostage wanted to go to the bathroom, I would peak into the bathroom to make sure there was no window to escape through, and let them go. Trying not to forget that there is someone in there.
The man with the gun pisses wherever he wants. In a cup, in his pants or on the wall. If you are putting a gun to someones head what is a little lack of privacy in your final hours on earth?
If you want a factual answer, it seems it would have to come (directly or indirectly) from someone who has been in that situation, either as a hostage or as a hostage taker.
So the first thing any respondent in this thread should do is to tell us how they know the answer.
That sounds like logical reasoning to me. The speculation sounds logical too, though. It’s interesting how mundanity and our shared human experience can manifest in a tense and horrible situation.
I never worked a hostage situation like that one, but I was a local police crisis negotiator and team leader for a dozen years of my 22 year law enforcement career. And I can tell you that there is no “normal.” From my experience with barricaded subjects, they are very rarely as rational as what you might see in the movies. And they are almost always impaired by drugs, alcohol, or both, and, dealing with mental crisis of some sort.
Regarding the bathroom, there would be many approaches. And the victims are often too scared and/or terrorized to be able to take advantage of what you might think is an opportunity for action.
I am more curious about the ability to actually discharge a weapon or defend oneself while vulnerable in that way. I guess logic and rationality don’t really enter into a fraught situation like this, as has been stated previously.
See, this is why the Dope is full of the brightest minds on the web, because it appears that your typical hostage taker hasn’t given this enough thought. A casual Google search reveals THIS
Here’s a case where the hostage taker had to handle being outnumbered by his captives. These types of drug addled maniacs can be nothing if not resourceful.
My search of news articles doesn’t seem to find the scenario where it’s the hostage taker who has to pee, but I can imagine (in this case) that the pot is for communal use. Diapers (mentioned upthread) are another viable option.
More importantly, what I get from my searching is that you should always ask to use the bathroom if you are taken hostage, as that’s the most viable means of escape.