by yosemite:
If I may hazard a guess, yosemite, it’s because we can see trash with the naked eye. People complain about it not because it is gross and nasty (in a clinical, health-threatening sense), but because candy wrappers, wads of newspaper, and crushed soda cans are unpleasant to see in the middle of the street. It doesn’t take a lot of imagination to see the results of trash or its negative consequences. It doesn’t matter if its a soiled diaper or a used tire.
The crime involved with not washing one’s hands, on the other hand, is not quite so macroscopic. Furthermore, it is pretty invasive of a stranger (or even an acquaintance) to demand an explanation for somebody not washing their hands when they are not privy to all the facts, and I think this was what lezlers and others have been saying. It’s pretty obvious when someone is littering. You clearly see evidence. It is not so obvious when someone is befouling the environment with dirty hands. Assumption often have to be made.
A few times I’ve dashed into a stall to make adjustments to my clothing (e.g. straighten my nametag, tighten my bra strap) and I’ll be damned if I’m going to go through the hand washing ritual just to appease a few bacteriaphobes who pay way too much attention to what other people are doing in the restroom. Granted, I still may wash my hands out of habit or because I think the door handle felt kind of slimy. But if I choose not to wash my hands, why should I not feel rightfully insulted by somebody asking (in a demanding way) “Why aren’t you washing your hands?” Uh, maybe because I’m grown-ass woman who is capable of deciding when washing my hands is necessary and when it is not? Why are you even talking to me? Unless there’s toilet paper hanging off my shoe and you’re nicely pointing it out to me, get the hell out of my face.
Wouldn’t it be rude to say to a perfect stranger who is smoking a cigarette outside, “Why don’t you quit smoking?” Afterall, they are polluting the environment in their small way and posing a risk to public health. They should be respecting your ideas of cleanliness and healthiness. How dare they don’t!
A woman is taking her kids to a fast food joint for dinner. You don’t know her, she doesn’t know you. But you, as a concerned citizen looking out for the welfare of her children and the whole world, demand an explanation for the “unwholesome” decisions she is making concerning the diet of her offspring.
Rude? Yeah, especially if you do it in front of the whole restaurant.
Let’s make it personal, yosemite. You have a multiple cat household. It’s guaranteed those critters jump on the furniture, leave hairs all the place, dump dead skin cells on your clothes, and get this…** they walk around in each other’s shit and piss and never wash their paws with a FDA approved antimicrobial soap!** Nevertheless, you’d probably be offended if someone started insinuating horrible things about you because you live in such filth (and understand when I say this that I live in the same kind of filth, since I too have a cat). And if a busybody started probing into your hygiene standards during Potluck Day at the office, you would be justified in taking offense.
The point is, everyone has different standards and not everyone is grossed out by the same things or to the same degree as you. Nor should they. light strand echoes my scientific assessment on the whole hand washing deal. It serves it purpose, but it ain’t the end all be all. Realize that it mostly brings folks psychological comfort, but that is it. Most hand washers do not let the soap actually sit on the skin long enough to kill all the germs anyway (minimum contact time of antibacterials is most often between 10 and 15 seconds) and if you are worried about catching pinworms from somebody, an average handwashing won’t do much to fight contamination because the worms are most often trapped under the fingernails. And how many people do you see scrubbing under their nails after every visit to the restroom? I’ve seen zero. Oh no! The horror!!!
Be realistic. That is all.