Are You a Poopfoot?

Scott Hardie | May 19, 2025
Until reading the second question in this morning's "Ask a Manager" advice column, I had no idea that anyone flushed public toilets with their feet. This is something that I've literally never heard of, nor (thankfully) observed. The letter writer's jerk-ass co-workers mocking her behind her back are rude and out of line, sure, but my assumption was that the letter writer's mother taught her a weird habit that no one else does, akin to the classic "poop knife" story, and thus their mockery of its outlandishness was understandable. Then I waded into the comments section, and, wow, the flushing-with-feet phenomenon is apparently way more widespread than I realized. Some people said that as many as 60% of people flushed public toilets with their feet. I am gobsmacked. How could I have never heard of this? I asked Kelly and she confirmed that she's well aware of it, but does not do so herself.

So, do you flush this way, and are you willing to identify yourself publicly and take questions about it? Or have you at least heard of it?

My first question is: Aren't the lack of foot-operated flush petals on the ground a clue that flushing is supposed to be done by hand?

My second question is: Is this a women thing? AAM's readership skews heavily female. Women are culturized to think more about hygiene than men. Have I never seen nor heard of this because it doesn't happen in men's rooms?

What I think fascinates me most about this is that it appears to be an entirely cultural phenomenon. By that, I mean that it is not rooted in science (like hand-washing is), nor is it universal (the AAM comments make clear that it's only an American thing, possibly driven by the lack of lids on American public toilets). The commenters say they do it for two reasons: Firstly, that they don't want to touch the gross toilet handle with their hands even though they're about to wash their hands and apparently don't mind making the handle and floor dirtier by cross-contaminating their germs, and secondly, that they want to avoid the "plume" of germs that flies upward when the toilet is flushed, but plumes cannot be avoided: They spread outwards in every direction, filling a bathroom whether there's a closed lid or open lid or no lid. There is no way to flush differently to avoid getting a tiny amount of germs on your body; the sensible solution is to be fine with this safe low level of contamination, and to wash your hands to avoid spreading it onto your food or into your face holes. I think of Middle Eastern norms treating the left hand as "unclean" or Biblical declarations that women are "unclean" after childbirth when I think of our notions about toilet plumes making us "unclean" or toilet handles being "unclean": It's in our imagination, within a safe threshold maintained by hand-washing and routine disinfecting of surfaces, and made-up efforts to avoid being "unclean" are thus a bit silly. I wouldn't mock someone behind their back with a grade-school-appropriate nickname over it, but I would regard their efforts as amusingly futile. Am I wrong?

Scott Hardie | May 19, 2025
I have observed men do one similar thing in public bathrooms, which is to use anything at all but their bare hands to open the door handle to leave: Paper towels, tissues, toilet paper, even their own sleeves. There is some truth to the dirtiness of door handles, but shouldn't the fact that we wash our hands immediately before opening the door eliminate that risk? Of course, I realize that plenty of people don't wash their hands despite us living in a society, but the behavior still feels more rooted in superstitious culture than in established science, even if it isn't. Maybe if we all just cleaned and disinfected door handles as often as we cleaned the rest of the bathrooms, it wouldn't be a problem. Parents out there who are teaching your kids to flush with their feet, teach them to disinfect bathroom door handles!

Samir Mehta | May 20, 2025
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