Crazy blogger got into the news about demanding her rights to use the disabled toilet. Local paper is shiiiit man.
My response ***
I must say something about disabled toilets, firstly because its not enough that they are everywhere physically, they also have to be everywhere in the news. But of course, nothing like a story everyone can understand while trying to concentrate on taking a shit.
After all, if theres space in a paper that has to scrimp to be filled up, why not filler up. No one would want to advertise in a paper with nothing in it, and since more press freedom has not proven to result in further economic prosperity, why should anyone care about domestic articles that could actually mean something to the local population. As long as the stories are good enough to sustain the ads, what does it matter.
To quote our Senior Minister, "The media is free to put across a range of worthy different viewpoints to encourage constructive social and political discourse. With this, one must realize that talking about disabled toilets in the National Paper is constructive discourse. After-all, everyone has to take a shit at some point in their lives, so it must be an important social issue.
At school, we have a number of disabled toilets, although I have not seen one single permanently disabled person attending the university course as of yet. I have no problem with that of course, as there is nothing like being able to have a shit in a large spacious toilet with handle-bars to grab on to for that extra oomph in your gut. I quite like using the disabled toilets myself, and Im not the only one there that does. But no one ever fights over their usage.
The first time Luna and I took a toilet break together (were not one of those girls that feel the need to take toilet breaks together so I remember it quite well) she hesitated before the handicapped toilet before making as if to go on with me into the general one. I told her I used it all the time too and that she should use it anyway if she wanted to, because its there and it just seems quite pointless that she shouldnt enjoy it just because I couldnt not unless she wanted me to watch her take a piss of course, which I dont suppose Id mind- really.
Handicapped toilets are one of lifes pleasures and shouldnt be denied normal people if it didnt inconvenience anyone else. Its one thing for wheelchair and pram ramps to be used by skaters thats annoying and dangerous- and another for normal people to want to take a shit in a handicap toilet.
If you think about it, what are the chances of a disabled person on a wheelchair coming by to your handicapped toilet cubical in the 10 minutes you are taking a shit in it (possibly while reading an article in the local paper about other people wanting to take a shit in that same cubical) in some shopping mall on a floor full of retail shops selling shoes that dont have wheelchair friendly entrances anyway; With some commonsense, one should be able to come to the conclusion that people who have just suffered a major accident and are temporarily bound onto a chair with wheels would not feel like going out to shop. Also, people who have mobility disabilities normally have better things to do then go shopping (why bother when someone else would be perfectly willing to do it for you as karmic service).
The way I see it, there is no necessity to deprive normal people of this little bit of luxury. We are the majority that buy the crap in the malls anyway, and the toilet space allotted for disabled people is just disproportionate to the amount of wheelchair bound persons that actually turn up in these places.
Anyway, Singaporean people arent generally selfish when it comes to things like giving way to someone else that needs it more. Luna didnt even want to use the disabled toilet because only one person could use it at any one time, and she felt awkward that she should have it while I couldnt. And Im not even disabled.
If I were taking a shit in a disabled toilet and I saw a pair of wheel-chair wheels waiting outside, I would feel too guilty to continue and will come out with my pants up to my knees, apologizing profusely about the bad smell while attempting to kindly ease the wheelchair bound individual in. All while remembering to Flush After Use, of course. On that note, if people are that concerned with disabled people getting to use the toilets designed for them the instant they want to, without compromising the concession for able-bodied individuals to use them occasionally, I suggest lifting the doors higher off the ground. That way, whoever is using the cubical will be able to see if the cubicles appropriate patron is waiting their turn.
The truth is, it does not make much of a difference to the disabled and the wheelchair bound whether or not some healthy girl is having a shit in a toilet that was Built For Its Own Sake. Not many of them are out in the public spaces that actually have toilets meant for the wheelchair bound, which are normally places like shopping malls and office buildings. You see them around the coffee-shops and parks of HDB estates, but the toilets built specifically for the disabled in these areas are not easily accessible and few and far in-between, from personal observation. At any rate, they are certainly much less noticeable than the toilets for the disabled in the shopping malls.
The presence of available disabled toilets in shopping malls and office buildings does not matter as much to the disabled as we seem to be making ourselves believe they do. If you were wheelchair bound, taking a piss might be a hassle for a while, but we cannot deny that some people in wheelchairs are in better physical shape then some of us completely able individuals, and there are some that slam dunk from a mile away, swim and even hike up a mountain if they wanted to. That taking a piss, for them, is as big of a deal as we have made it out to be, is nonsense.
Disabled people that do not have bladder specific problems or mental illnesses (with respect to the latter, they will also be the ones that will probably be out often enough to make use of a few public toilets) have better bladder control; You would develop one too if you couldnt get to the bathroom as easily as an individual with working legs, and thus without the hassle of dealing with a wheelchair.
The physical limitations for these people are under their control, and sooner or later, they will adapt to it. Their bodies are as useful to them as our bodies are to us, and it isnt the primary reason as to why we dont see more of them in society.
Like it or not, people are uncomfortable dealing with the disabled. Were not used to them, and we have all these assumptions about them that make no sense. The fact that we really think it matters whether or not they have immediate access to a toilet as the thing most worthy of discussion pertaining to the disabled last week proves that well enough.
The disabled dont want or need more unoccupied special toilets then there already are. All our buildings are over-specified when it comes to that component of interior architecture. So over specified it seems like we really do care for the disabled. We care so much were concerned about them to even the littlest detail, like them taking a shit.
The reality of it is that, thats what we think of when we think about people that cannot walk.
Must be difficult for them to have a shit are you sure they can do the job properly? They need special toilets to do something that normal people do so easily wah lau. So simple thing also so mah fan better hire a normal person that can make coffee for me without hitting over the flower vase.
My response ***
I must say something about disabled toilets, firstly because its not enough that they are everywhere physically, they also have to be everywhere in the news. But of course, nothing like a story everyone can understand while trying to concentrate on taking a shit.
After all, if theres space in a paper that has to scrimp to be filled up, why not filler up. No one would want to advertise in a paper with nothing in it, and since more press freedom has not proven to result in further economic prosperity, why should anyone care about domestic articles that could actually mean something to the local population. As long as the stories are good enough to sustain the ads, what does it matter.
To quote our Senior Minister, "The media is free to put across a range of worthy different viewpoints to encourage constructive social and political discourse. With this, one must realize that talking about disabled toilets in the National Paper is constructive discourse. After-all, everyone has to take a shit at some point in their lives, so it must be an important social issue.
At school, we have a number of disabled toilets, although I have not seen one single permanently disabled person attending the university course as of yet. I have no problem with that of course, as there is nothing like being able to have a shit in a large spacious toilet with handle-bars to grab on to for that extra oomph in your gut. I quite like using the disabled toilets myself, and Im not the only one there that does. But no one ever fights over their usage.
The first time Luna and I took a toilet break together (were not one of those girls that feel the need to take toilet breaks together so I remember it quite well) she hesitated before the handicapped toilet before making as if to go on with me into the general one. I told her I used it all the time too and that she should use it anyway if she wanted to, because its there and it just seems quite pointless that she shouldnt enjoy it just because I couldnt not unless she wanted me to watch her take a piss of course, which I dont suppose Id mind- really.
Handicapped toilets are one of lifes pleasures and shouldnt be denied normal people if it didnt inconvenience anyone else. Its one thing for wheelchair and pram ramps to be used by skaters thats annoying and dangerous- and another for normal people to want to take a shit in a handicap toilet.
If you think about it, what are the chances of a disabled person on a wheelchair coming by to your handicapped toilet cubical in the 10 minutes you are taking a shit in it (possibly while reading an article in the local paper about other people wanting to take a shit in that same cubical) in some shopping mall on a floor full of retail shops selling shoes that dont have wheelchair friendly entrances anyway; With some commonsense, one should be able to come to the conclusion that people who have just suffered a major accident and are temporarily bound onto a chair with wheels would not feel like going out to shop. Also, people who have mobility disabilities normally have better things to do then go shopping (why bother when someone else would be perfectly willing to do it for you as karmic service).
The way I see it, there is no necessity to deprive normal people of this little bit of luxury. We are the majority that buy the crap in the malls anyway, and the toilet space allotted for disabled people is just disproportionate to the amount of wheelchair bound persons that actually turn up in these places.
Anyway, Singaporean people arent generally selfish when it comes to things like giving way to someone else that needs it more. Luna didnt even want to use the disabled toilet because only one person could use it at any one time, and she felt awkward that she should have it while I couldnt. And Im not even disabled.
If I were taking a shit in a disabled toilet and I saw a pair of wheel-chair wheels waiting outside, I would feel too guilty to continue and will come out with my pants up to my knees, apologizing profusely about the bad smell while attempting to kindly ease the wheelchair bound individual in. All while remembering to Flush After Use, of course. On that note, if people are that concerned with disabled people getting to use the toilets designed for them the instant they want to, without compromising the concession for able-bodied individuals to use them occasionally, I suggest lifting the doors higher off the ground. That way, whoever is using the cubical will be able to see if the cubicles appropriate patron is waiting their turn.
The truth is, it does not make much of a difference to the disabled and the wheelchair bound whether or not some healthy girl is having a shit in a toilet that was Built For Its Own Sake. Not many of them are out in the public spaces that actually have toilets meant for the wheelchair bound, which are normally places like shopping malls and office buildings. You see them around the coffee-shops and parks of HDB estates, but the toilets built specifically for the disabled in these areas are not easily accessible and few and far in-between, from personal observation. At any rate, they are certainly much less noticeable than the toilets for the disabled in the shopping malls.
The presence of available disabled toilets in shopping malls and office buildings does not matter as much to the disabled as we seem to be making ourselves believe they do. If you were wheelchair bound, taking a piss might be a hassle for a while, but we cannot deny that some people in wheelchairs are in better physical shape then some of us completely able individuals, and there are some that slam dunk from a mile away, swim and even hike up a mountain if they wanted to. That taking a piss, for them, is as big of a deal as we have made it out to be, is nonsense.
Disabled people that do not have bladder specific problems or mental illnesses (with respect to the latter, they will also be the ones that will probably be out often enough to make use of a few public toilets) have better bladder control; You would develop one too if you couldnt get to the bathroom as easily as an individual with working legs, and thus without the hassle of dealing with a wheelchair.
The physical limitations for these people are under their control, and sooner or later, they will adapt to it. Their bodies are as useful to them as our bodies are to us, and it isnt the primary reason as to why we dont see more of them in society.
Like it or not, people are uncomfortable dealing with the disabled. Were not used to them, and we have all these assumptions about them that make no sense. The fact that we really think it matters whether or not they have immediate access to a toilet as the thing most worthy of discussion pertaining to the disabled last week proves that well enough.
The disabled dont want or need more unoccupied special toilets then there already are. All our buildings are over-specified when it comes to that component of interior architecture. So over specified it seems like we really do care for the disabled. We care so much were concerned about them to even the littlest detail, like them taking a shit.
The reality of it is that, thats what we think of when we think about people that cannot walk.
Must be difficult for them to have a shit are you sure they can do the job properly? They need special toilets to do something that normal people do so easily wah lau. So simple thing also so mah fan better hire a normal person that can make coffee for me without hitting over the flower vase.
VIEW 3 of 3 COMMENTS
Heh! Thank you, PM Lee.
I love how the government trumpets international rankings to the sky when they place Singapore (or NUS, or whatever) near the top, but turns around and derides them as being filtered through "the prism of Western liberals" (damn those Western liberals!) when they do not.
I have never grasped why anybody cares what Xiaxue has to say, either.
I read through it and agree on a lot. Disabled parking lots are a different issue. They should stay open to the disabled only but sometimes they are not bigger they just got a disabled parking sign added. These make no sense at all.
I think you should take a good look at one more argument! Why not build toilets in a way that all can use them???
I saw a documentary about toilets in the TV!
For men the toilets are set into the wall with a distance of 35 to 40 cm while it is proven that any distance less than 45 cm produces stress and makes it even impossible for many men to take a piss at all. The result is that only half of them get normally used. That adds up to a lot of wasted space!
I am amazed by the amount of thought you gave to the issue of the disabled toilets. I am also amazed that I actually read through all of it! Only proves that weird topics still can draw attention!!!