Haha, I always wondered if I'd find a thread on HN that actually recognized that workers are human and to be human is to defecate. Truly the one thing we have i

Haha, I always wondered if I'd find a thread on HN that actually recognized that workers are human and to be human is to defecate. Truly the one thing we have in common with kings. The true art is to speak about it obliquely.... probably won't accomplish that here. In All Quiet on the Western Front, there's a passage about this, where the men discover a tremendous camaraderie about their shared shitting time - since there's no way to have privacy or any nicer facilities than what they can scrape together, it's basically just a purely functional experience. They sit in a field and provide each other dignity, instead of privacy; something we could well learn from. Interestingly, the Romans also had this - https://www.history.com/.image/t_share/MTcxODU0MDM4OTM2MDY5NDQy/roman-latrine-gettyimages-639163710.jpg https://www.history.com/.image/t_share/MTcxODU0MDM4OTM2MDY5N... - and it seems they did fine by it. It may be only really in relatively recent Western culture that we added a layer of shame over a natural act, and in turn required immense privacy for it. Wasn't the Tuilieries garden in Paris a place where fancy ladies might pop a squat? I once worked at a startup with 300 people on a floor with one bathroom with 3 stalls. 90% men. You'd always be waiting, you'd always be voiding yourself next two two other people. Maybe people you'd be going back to sit next to in a few minutes. You begin to know things about people you don't want to know. I myself of course do prefer the privacy, like most anyone, and further prefer a single occupancy bathroom because the hygiene opportunities are much better when you have direct and private access to a sink. I think the 300 people to 3 stalls situation was probably close to violating some kind of building code and at the very least it's just not a good example of treating your workers as though you value them. On the far polar opposite, I worked at a startup that had 5 single-occupancy bathrooms for 50 people. Two of them had showers. It was so much nicer in every way.... just that feeling that you were as comfortable at work as you are at home. Not just cattle, but treated with modern dignity; there's a cost to the employer to do this, but it might actually have ROI in the sense that your employees are more comfortable and healthier.