This article seems to exist in a weird middle ground of both going too far, and not going far enough.
Private bathing is a modern luxury few people would be willing to give up, but at the same time, should they realistically advocate for it, they need to go beyond just considering communal bathing as a single concept. They need to instead consider the cultural environment which surrounds it, and consider communal living as a practice.
While there are many arguments to be made against this (some by me, even), it's a lot easier to conceptualize people bathing together when they actually know each-other on a more intimate level, instead of just strangers getting naked and pouring water on one another.
If there was a nice "bathing house" per 1000 people, as suggested in the article, that would make it at most ten minutes walking distance for me. I could absolutely see myself shifting some of the weekly showers in that direction for social reasons.
But completely giving up on the option to comfortably and conveniently wash myself without leaving the house? No way!
A surprisingly thought provoking article. A few thoughts I had:
- Is individual bathing really that bad on the environment, or should we be chasing other things? (looking at you, consumerism)
- If we use renewable energy sources, like the article suggests should be used for a modern bathhouse, then couldn't we just use that for individual baths and call it a day?
- Who has time for a multi-hour bath/shower each day in our modern society where productivity is everything? Even a few times a week is pushing it. Makes you feel like we're going backwards, where something as basic as bathing we are no longer "allowed" to enjoy (have your 4 minute shower and back to work!).
- No discussion of hygeine. This seems like a critical point which needs to be evaluated.
- I believe we do need many more small/medium community things in the spirit of a shared bathhouse. We are getting too individual and closed off in modern Western society.
> - Who has time for a multi-hour bath/shower each day in our modern society where productivity is everything? Even a few times a week is pushing it. Makes you feel like we're going backwards, where something as basic as bathing we are no longer "allowed" to enjoy (have your 4 minute shower and back to work!).
> - I believe we do need many more small/medium community things in the spirit of a shared bathhouse. We are getting too individual and closed off in modern Western society.
These points contradict, right? Maybe we don't need to be more productive. The cost of this productivity has been our communities with the rise of individualism.
I do wish the article explored how bathhouses impacted communities more. Were people happier? More connected?
Yah the points do contradict. I agree with you that the interaction between bathhouses (or similar) and communities is interesting. I can imagine a society with bathhouses, but certainly not our current society. The whole thing needs an overhaul to realign values with something that could successfully support public bathhouses. In fact I think that's the more interesting takeaway than the sustainability argument.
So much focus on energy use with only a passing note on health and disease makes the entire essay useless: with no attempt to gauge how much more energy would be used if water was replaced more frequently (and how often would that need to be?), it makes for incomparable measures.
Running water was a boon for the health of the civilization[citation missing].
I don't put chlorine in my bath at home, but it would absolutely be required in a public bath. Other health issues aside, I'm not sure this would be a net positive for the environment.
This article seems to exist in a weird middle ground of both going too far, and not going far enough.
Private bathing is a modern luxury few people would be willing to give up, but at the same time, should they realistically advocate for it, they need to go beyond just considering communal bathing as a single concept. They need to instead consider the cultural environment which surrounds it, and consider communal living as a practice.
While there are many arguments to be made against this (some by me, even), it's a lot easier to conceptualize people bathing together when they actually know each-other on a more intimate level, instead of just strangers getting naked and pouring water on one another.
If there was a nice "bathing house" per 1000 people, as suggested in the article, that would make it at most ten minutes walking distance for me. I could absolutely see myself shifting some of the weekly showers in that direction for social reasons.
But completely giving up on the option to comfortably and conveniently wash myself without leaving the house? No way!
A surprisingly thought provoking article. A few thoughts I had:
- Is individual bathing really that bad on the environment, or should we be chasing other things? (looking at you, consumerism)
- If we use renewable energy sources, like the article suggests should be used for a modern bathhouse, then couldn't we just use that for individual baths and call it a day?
- Who has time for a multi-hour bath/shower each day in our modern society where productivity is everything? Even a few times a week is pushing it. Makes you feel like we're going backwards, where something as basic as bathing we are no longer "allowed" to enjoy (have your 4 minute shower and back to work!).
- No discussion of hygeine. This seems like a critical point which needs to be evaluated.
- I believe we do need many more small/medium community things in the spirit of a shared bathhouse. We are getting too individual and closed off in modern Western society.
> - Who has time for a multi-hour bath/shower each day in our modern society where productivity is everything? Even a few times a week is pushing it. Makes you feel like we're going backwards, where something as basic as bathing we are no longer "allowed" to enjoy (have your 4 minute shower and back to work!).
> - I believe we do need many more small/medium community things in the spirit of a shared bathhouse. We are getting too individual and closed off in modern Western society.
These points contradict, right? Maybe we don't need to be more productive. The cost of this productivity has been our communities with the rise of individualism.
I do wish the article explored how bathhouses impacted communities more. Were people happier? More connected?
Yah the points do contradict. I agree with you that the interaction between bathhouses (or similar) and communities is interesting. I can imagine a society with bathhouses, but certainly not our current society. The whole thing needs an overhaul to realign values with something that could successfully support public bathhouses. In fact I think that's the more interesting takeaway than the sustainability argument.
So much focus on energy use with only a passing note on health and disease makes the entire essay useless: with no attempt to gauge how much more energy would be used if water was replaced more frequently (and how often would that need to be?), it makes for incomparable measures.
Running water was a boon for the health of the civilization[citation missing].
Bathing is no longer considered a luxury, and so will never be given up.
Some would go a step further and demand it be mandated.
What's the deal with the 1990s-style dithering? For a moment I thought my machine had temporarily reverted to VGA and Windows 3.1.
I don't put chlorine in my bath at home, but it would absolutely be required in a public bath. Other health issues aside, I'm not sure this would be a net positive for the environment.