I understand that we do it so that we smell good and so we do not offend others. But this is more of a recent development. It can’t be because we have indoor plumbing now because the Germans have that, yet, many bathe once a week. I have thought that it may have come from Asia where some folks bathe more than twice a day. I’ve also heard that it came from the plague in Europe causing those who did not bathe to die out leaving the ones who bathed. If that’s the case, it looks like Darwins theories kicked into high gear.
Water is cheap here and most homes have modern plumbing with large water heaters. That isn’t true for some European homes.
I think you may need to turn the question around and ask why everyone that can doesn’t? I skip days showering sometimes and I can’t go more than one day before I must find a bathing facility and get rid of the oily, scaly, itchy feeling. Lots of people are neglectful and lazy about just about everything else in their lives but I don’t know any able-bodied person that doesn’t bathe at least every other day. The compulsion is a strong one once you get into the habit.
I think my professor credited this to several factors:
1)the World Wars- GI’s were all taught basic hygiene
2)young men’s organizations(YMCA,Boy Scouts)/health clubs(Dr. Kellogg’s)- which stressed excercise and “cleanliness is next to godliness”
I don’t, but if I don’t shower at least every three days, then my hair gets incredibly oily, and I start to feel very uncomfortable. This may have had suervival value at one point, but I;m considerably easier to be around and to look at if I’m washed at least that often.
Spread of the plague in Europe was due to poor public sanitation (wretched waste disposal practices, large numbers of rats and plague-spreading fleas), not poor individual cleanliness.
I was brought up in the 70s to bathe once every two days. At the time, heating costs were very high - and my and everyone else’s parents had post-war rationing thrift - so we shared bathwater, in rotation. Nowadays I feel disgusting if I don’t shower once a day.
Could climate have something to do with it? Here in humid Louisiana, you can get pretty sweaty from just a few minutes spent outdoors from about March through October.
Also, from a physiological standpoint … people differ quite a bit in, well, natural body odor. Some are more blessed than others in that department.
I shower every day because I am a very stinky man.
Seriously, though, I work in the casino industry and come into direct contact with customers. As a valet driver, I run around a lot and can get sweaty, fumigating the cars I park. I must remain clean and deoderized everyday.
Germans may bathe weekly, but I doubt they wash weekly. There’s such a thing as a spongebath in Europe; here it’s a lost art, unless you’re hospitalized.
I tend to bathe every other day, or roughly 3 times a week. I don’t have a lot of oil in my skin, so I tend to really dry out if I bathe every day.
Sometimes, of course, I’ll bathe every day- but that’s if I’m doing a lot of sweaty outdoors stuff. Normally, even after three days, I don’t stink- I just don’t sweat that much in my job.
I am a very structured person when it comes to my morning routine. I shower every work day, right around 5:17am. Same thing for the last 10 years or so.
Occasionally, I will wait till later in the day if I’m just hanging at home, and working on the house.
But, for myself, to be on the road to work at 6am I almost need to shower to get the whole thought process “I’m up and awake, let’s do it” going. And I would feel like shit warmed over if I didn’t shower and had to sit at work all day.
According to comedian Tim Wilson, it was due to intense marketing campaigns by a couple soap companies at the turn of the century. They wanted to sell more soap, naturally, so their ads extolled the virtues of daily bathing.
There’s no way I couldn’t shower every day. I work out nearly all weekdays, so that kind of requires it right there. I’ve organized working out into my weekday routine so that the post-workout shower is the same shower I’d be taking anyway.
Also, I like to wear jeans more than once between washings, and that’d be pretty hard to defend if I didn’t shower daily.
For me, it’s because my hair looks like hell unless it’s freshly washed. (Well, it actually looks like hell anyway, but if it’s freshly washed it looks a mite better.) Spritzing it with water doesn’t work, and damned if I’m going to stick my head in the sink. The only way to fully wet it is to get into the shower.
No, they bathe daily. I’m an American with an intimate knowledge of Gemany, having studied at a German university, married a German citizen and lived and worked over there for years. Although I’m back in the States now, I keep an apartment in Germany. I’m here to tell you that that the Germans are fanatical about bathing and personal cleanliness.
