In a city with generous public spaces and a commitment to equal access, no one would ever have to use the street. Bathroom access should be considered a basic right, and it’s worth considering the idea of banning “customers only” toilets. The city has installed 25 small self-cleaning public toilets and recently commissioned a set of futuristic-looking new bathrooms, but a few dozen toilets for a city of 870,000 is woefully insufficient. There are even websites offering tips on how to go to the bathroom in San Francisco, such as by pretending to be interested in furniture at Crate & Barrel or finding the “hidden gem” of a bathroom on the second floor of a Banana Republic. But the “privatization of bathrooms” means people are left without obvious places to go. Many businesses restrict their bathrooms to customers only, precisely because they don’t want their facilities to be frequented by the homeless. Poop on the streets has another obvious cause: a lack of restroom access. The city routinely clears away encampments, causing people to wander around the city in search of a new temporary space. Development has pushed homeless residents out of secluded spaces, and there is less and less space for them to inhabit as “places where homeless people used to sleep becoming offices and housing”, in the words of a city official. While there aren’t actually more homeless people than there have been in the past, the gentrification of San Francisco has had a severe effect on the homeless. It’s impossible to talk about street feces without talking about homelessness and housing. The incidents are part of a broader failure of the city to provide for the basic needs of its citizens, and show the catastrophic, socially destructive effects of unchecked inequality. People aren’t pooping on the streets because they have suddenly forgotten what a bathroom is, or unlearned basic hygiene. ![]() ![]() But the uptick in street defecation is the symbol of a human tragedy. A city covered in poop is so disgusting it has to be almost comical.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |