Have you been following the brouhaha about public bathrooms and the new automatic toilets that are planned for installation in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida? I traveled through Europe and discovered that ideas about elimination and the disposal of human waste differ widely from ours. Now, my travels were in the Army at the end of World War II but the primitive “necessaries” were on a par with the old-fashioned but necessary bedside commodes that are modernized by use of empty milk or orange juice cartons.  My old question arises once again: what do poor and homeless people do?

In Ft. Lauderdale the mayor has made a political and moral statement about the use of bathhouses and public toilets and has gone public with a campaign to get rid of multi-stall facilities.  There, he states with certainty, is where bad men (he does not use the word, “gays”) go to commit deeds of depravity.  I thought the public toilets were to provide a safe and sanitary place for ANYONE to dispose of full colons and full bladders.

I bring up this uncomfortable topic in order to continue discussion I began years ago when I had a class in Utopian Studies work on designing public facilities where there were none.  I suggested that the lobbies of huge banks and other public buildings be opened at night for shelters of the homeless.  If there were not enough “rest” rooms, then military style portable shower facilities and toilets could be moved to places where the homeless were known to cluster.  Our streets would be freer of persons sleeping in doorways and who knows where they disposed of their wastes.  In more rural areas, the people know each other and are usually more friendly and can offer sustenance as well as the “necessaries” if not over abused.

What it comes down to is that we do have a very large and dispersed homeless population and do nothing on a large enough scale to reduce the disgust with which we deal with their presence.  Morality aside, it is only human kindness that impels us to find solutions that the Mayor of Ft. Lauderdale finds he can and cannot support.  At least he brings them out in the open as he opens himself to ridicule as a jackass. Whatever happened to public bathouses?

But the problem exists, just like the problem of our war in Iraq and Afghanistan.  Something must be done.  The human need for comfort “stations” should not be offered with a price tag.  We need these places for those who cannot afford to pay the price for a private dumping station and a mirror and spigot to help oneself to clean up and feel more human.  What do you think?