Is public urination immoral?

[TheManeki]

The Land of the Big Chicken has passed a new law on public urination. While the practice was banned previously, the new law makes it quicker to ticket and fine someone for doing it.

The new ordinance prohibits public urination and lets Marietta police issue tickets to offenders instead of arresting them using a more time-consuming state warrant for public indecency.

"It allows us to provide continuous protection instead of taking an officer off the road," said Marietta police Commander Joe Duvall, who proposed the ordinance as part of the department's strategic plan to improve efficiency.

Duvall said it can take two hours or more to lock up an offender, issue a state warrant and go before a judge...

The offense remains a misdemeanor punishable by a fine of $500-$1,000, but now, said City Councilman Van Pearlberg, "the city gets the money" instead of the county.

Duvall said the ban applies not only to people leaving bars and nightclubs but to any person who answers the call of nature in public view or a public place that is not an official toilet...

Officer Mark A. Bishop, a department spokesman, estimated the number of people arrested in Marietta per year for public urination at "50 or so, easy."

He said some of the violators have been homeless people in Glover Park in the Marietta Square.

Full article here. It may require a free registration to view (I usually make the information up or use BugMeNot.com).

So, I wanted to throw out the following questions:

• Is public urination immoral? Why and how?
• Is it unhygenic? Why and how? If so, is there a way to make it hygenic?*
• Is this really just a plan to force the homeless to stay elsewhere?

I'll pop back in later with my thoughts on the matter.

* Which reminds me -- one of my goals is to see a Urilift in action before I die.

 

[Eudaimonist]

Hmmm, it seems to me unfair to fine someone for this unless there was a public lavatory available nearby that could easily have been used. What are people supposed to do? Hold it?

I can understand that one might want to discourage public urination as a way of discouraging "public indecency", but this just doesn't seem right to me.


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[stan1980]

Most of us have been there, after a few drinks at a bar making your way home and you get "caught short". Most public lavatories are locked up at night time, so you really have no choice but to urinate in public.

Unless you have a healthy amount of public toilets open, this law is unjust.

The police should be concentrating on catching "real " criminals, instead of money making schemes like this.

 

[Eudaimonist]

The police should be concentrating on catching "real " criminals, instead of money making schemes like this.

Yeah, it does come across like a money making scheme.


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[Verv]

Public urination which was attempted to be discreet (e.g. in an ally, cornered off at a building) is really a victimless crime barring the urination on a really nice object or something.

It is yuppie overreaction to pass laws like this.

 

[jayem]

• Is it unhygenic? Why and how?

For the most part, no. Freshly voided urine from healthy individuals is sterile. No bacteria present. Unless the person has a urinary tract infection. But even then, the bacteria will not survive once the urine dries. HIV has been found in urine, but in very low amounts, and I'm not aware of any documented infection transmitted this way. Hep B and C viruses have also been found in urine. But again, the chance of being infected by coming into contact with spilled urine is extremely remote. Public urination is certainly crude and unaesthetic, but in general, any health risk is quite small.

 

[cantata]

I'm fine with public urination being legal as long as both boys and girls are allowed to do it, and as long as people don't do it in places where it doesn't rain - like in subways and car park stairwells, people, that's horrible - or on other people's property.

There's a house in Brixton with a sign on the door that says "DO NOT P*SS HERE - IT IS OUR DOORSTEP, NOT A TOILET." Seems fair enough to me.

 

[Eudaimonist]

I'm fine with public urination being legal as long as both boys and girls are allowed to do it, and as long as people don't do it in places where it doesn't rain - like in subways and car park stairwells, people, that's horrible - or on other people's property.

There's a house in Brixton with a sign on the door that says "DO NOT P*SS HERE - IT IS OUR DOORSTEP, NOT A TOILET." Seems fair enough to me.

Yes, I agree that this is fair enough.


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[KarateCowboy]

The Land of the Big Chicken has passed a new law on public urination. While the practice was banned previously, the new law makes it quicker to ticket and fine someone for doing it.



Full article here. It may require a free registration to view (I usually make the information up or use BugMeNot.com).

So, I wanted to throw out the following questions:

• Is public urination immoral? Why and how?
• Is it unhygenic? Why and how? If so, is there a way to make it hygenic?*
• Is this really just a plan to force the homeless to stay elsewhere?

I'll pop back in later with my thoughts on the matter.

* Which reminds me -- one of my goals is to see a Urilift in action before I die.

For a moment there I thought you were talking about Poland, since their national animal is the Polish chicken.

Anyway, I peed in public once. Well, it was on private property.

 

[cantata]

Incidentally, I consider peeing in the woods to be the best.

*cough*

 

[igotbegot]

I don't think it's immoral, but in many places in the U.S it could get you on a sex offender registry.

 

[WatersMoon110]

This is why I prefer rural areas to urban ones, so long as no one can see you, it doesn't really matter if you pee outside. *wink*

If a public restroom is available, I don't think it's unreasonable to encourage people to use it. However, I think anything beyond a warning is really too much (it's just urine, people, everyone urinates). I think that time wasted on passing laws like this might be better spent making sure that areas were people might have no other option contain public restrooms.

 

[TheManeki]

Great points so far. I especially appreciate jayem bringing up the fact that urine by itself is not unsanitary (although too much of it does stink and kill plants).

I think it's really neat that some cities have installed pop-up urinals like these from Urilift for after hours.

The cynic in me, however, makes me wonder if this is a way for the city to urge the local homeless to move elsewhere...

 

[cantata]

I think it's really neat that some cities have installed pop-up urinals like these from Urilift for after hours.

The cynic in me, however, makes me wonder if this is a way for the city to urge the local homeless to move elsewhere...

Most public toilets in London are either tiny boxes that you'd be hard-pushed to sleep in, or else they get locked at night - but I think that's mainly to do with preventing people from using them for drug abuse.

The main problem I have with these magic urinals is that ladies aren't catered for. And there's *always* a queue in the ladies' toilets as it is.

 

[TexasSky]

After having seen Hollywood and Vine in the late evening, I won't say it is a "victimless" crime.

I don't think of it as immoral really, but I guess flashing people in public, which is likely to happen, would be immoral.

It is a sanitation issue though. (I wouldn't have generally thought that until after seeing Hollywood at night. There was a huge number of people urinating in public there, and the street reeked of the scent of urine, and you actually had to watch where you stepped to avoid walking in it. VERY nasty, very gross.)

 

[TexasSky]

This is why I prefer rural areas to urban ones, so long as no one can see you, it doesn't really matter if you pee outside. *wink*

If a public restroom is available, I don't think it's unreasonable to encourage people to use it. However, I think anything beyond a warning is really too much (it's just urine, people, everyone urinates). I think that time wasted on passing laws like this might be better spent making sure that areas were people might have no other option contain public restrooms.

I suspect the main issue, beyond health, would be "exposing yourself in public". (I wonder if someone stood still, remained clothed, and urinated on themselves if that would be illegal under this law.)

 

[stan1980]

The main problem I have with these magic urinals is that ladies aren't catered for. And there's *always* a queue in the ladies' toilets as it is.

You could always buy one of these then http://www.shewee.com/

 

[TheManeki]

Most public toilets in London are either tiny boxes that you'd be hard-pushed to sleep in, or else they get locked at night - but I think that's mainly to do with preventing people from using them for drug abuse.

The main problem I have with these magic urinals is that ladies aren't catered for. And there's *always* a queue in the ladies' toilets as it is.

I guess we need more Sheinals for the ladies...

 

[dlamberth]

• Is public urination immoral? Why and how?

• Yes/No. There is no absolute answer. It depends upon the culture. In 3rd world countries people have no choice but to relieve themselves in public.

 

[cantata]

You could always buy one of these then http://www.shewee.com/

That's actually pretty awesome, except for the funny looks you'd get rinsing it out in the public toilets