Something I’ve wondered about for a long, long time:
It seems like half the men who use urinals spit into them just before or while starting to urinate.
Is this a cultural thing, or a social thing, or where does this come from? I don’t spit much at all, myself. It’s not like I think spitting into urinals is a societal evil – I just think it’s a) weird and b) far more common than I’d have expected.
Insights?
The categories are Authors, Chaos Vs. Superstring, and Rub-a-dub. Magnolia, scr. Paul Thomas Anderson
I’d rather you spat in the urinal than on the floor, but I guess I’m wondering why spit at all. It’s just an odd link – spit, then pee. Not one I’d made on my own, but popular enough that it seems like more than coincidence.
The categories are Authors, Chaos Vs. Superstring, and Rub-a-dub. Magnolia, scr. Paul Thomas Anderson
Probably just because we want to spit and the urinal helps make it go away after we’ve done it. When you’ve rid yourself of a mass of mucus, you don’t want to accidentally spit on it. Whenever I have a cold, I take every possible opportunity to spit. Unfortunately, I spend a lot of time indoors, so trashcans and toilets (when I’m alone, of course, no need to upset others’ sensibilities) have to suffice. I’m just trying to clear my sinuses.
Of course, if you wanna see real class, bowling alley bathrooms will often have a wall-mounted ashtray right next to each urinal. Now if they just had someplace to set your beer, , , - MC
MC, excellent point! I hate putting my beer on top of those nasty old urinals! Eechh! Don’t wanna leave it sitting around for someone to spit in either though…
Hawk and spit, guilty. In fact our men’s room is not all that good for keeping noise in…
It’s easier to spit before or after, you don’t want to do it while urinating, might miss.
The way I look at it, it just has to be some MACHO thing right up there with guys always grabbing their balls, farting in each others faces and think it’s funny and scratching their asses no matter who is around. I mean, you get a bunch of men standing around and instantly each has to start acting MANLY, developing a pecking order or something. If beer is present, expect a lot of guzzling and heavy belching and contests to see who can belch the loudest and throw spew the furthest. The spitting. Lotsa spitting. They spit when they talk, when they’re crotch digging, when they’re digging 4 fingers into their hairy asses (and then inspecting their nails to see what they dug up), when they’re leaning against trees and strolling along. (For a REAL laugh, watch how guys in their twenties suddenly develop a ‘swagger’ when they get around another group of guys.)
Now, spitting seems to go along with urinals the way guys are always offering to slam their man meat up other guys and laughing about it. (Other posters have mentioned THIS endearing and suspicious little quality.) Then the ‘positioning’ of their winkie every couple of minutes, like they lost it or something and have to keep on checking that it is still there.
Makes me glad I’m a woman.
Luckily, with MOST men, the spitting seems to go away once they get into their 30s.
I will not get into nose picking or what they do with whatever they maul out of there.
Oh come on, it’s not a macho thing. I do it once in a while but try not to when there are other people around. “Because it’s there” is probably the right answer. Same reason that when you get home you suddenly discover you need to go to the bathroom, though you hadn’t been feeling the need during the trip.
As far as ‘positioning of the winkie’ goes, well, , uh, , , every now and then I am guilty. I prefer looser cut jeans so it’s not nearly the problem it is when pants are tight. Sometimes by chance, things don’t sit well, and it feels like sitting on a thumbtack. It’s not very painful in the regular sense, but it can be very distracting and sometimes, the merchandise has just gotta be rearranged. - Guys who do it every couple minutes though, usually are trying to play the major leagues with a pee wee bat, and think it’s the only way women will notice it’s there at all. It may look ‘cool’ when arrogant rappers do it on MTV, but MTV is not the Real World. - MC
Yeah but what I want to know is what the hell is up with urinals and guys picking their noses and flicking it on the wall above or beside the urinal. I’ve never seen it done but all those boogers on the wall didn’t just grow there. Sickos. :-p
Boogers around the urinals have kind of caused me some problems in understanding also. I’m still trying to figure out why so many of my male counterparts just HATE to flush public urinals. Not to mention actually HITTING the urinal.
I just love standing in accumulate piss to take a leak, don’t you? Makes me want to see if I can get a law passed requiring that all public urinals have an antiseptic shoe bath we can step in upon leaving.
Some public toilets I’ve been in need to have an automatic flush cycle that comes on every few minutes and flushes the floor clean. Most do have that big drain in the enter after all.
Interesting question here; Why do most bars have such cramped and TINY bathrooms for guys, when they KNOW that every night there is going to be spewage all over the floor and toilet as well as pissage all around the urinals?
Well, if you were the bar owner, would you rather clean up 10 square feet of “spewage and pissage”, or 1000 square feet of it? And remember, that bathroom space is non-revenue area (except for the machines that sell that funny-tasting bubble gum)…
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-Popular Mechanics, 1949
