A question obviously for those who don’t

  • yaroto98@lemmy.world
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    2 days ago

    Disclaimer: I usually wash my hands.

    Those that don’t wash their hands touch the door handle leaving the restroom. They also likely touch the main door handle leaving the store. If you wash your hands, aren’t you undoing it immediately?

    I thought about this a lot at my last office I worked at. We had a wide variety of washers, non-washers, religious who also washed their feet (over and under socks), and people who washed and used the paper towel to open the bathroom door but subsequently opened the next door bare handed, and the germophobe who never touched any surface barehanded.

    There’s no good answer. Though, metal is a pretty bad surface for germs to live on if that helps. My recommendation is to just wash your hands and then try not to think about the rest.

      • yaroto98@lemmy.world
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        18 hours ago

        Worked with a lot of people from India. I’m guessing it’s from one of the many Hindu sub-religions (is that the proper term?). They worship a lot of different gods in different ways. Though some were Muslim and did call to prayer in the afternoons. Noticed some would slide the shoe and sock off and wipe down the bottoms of their feet after washing their hands. Others didn’t go quite that far and would more touch the bottoms of their socked heels with a damp hand. I presume a more symbolic gesture than anything. Which is why I also assume it’s religious and not for hygiene.

        It was only a few from hundreds that I saw this behavior from.

        Wasn’t super crazy as the washing of hands and feet is also symbolic in Christianity as well.

        • rothaine@lemmy.zip
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          18 hours ago

          Ah I see. For some reason I was imagining someone soaking their socked foot in the sink, and then slish-sloshing their way out of the bathroom 😂

    • smiletolerantly@awful.systems
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      1 day ago

      I have a small plastic freezer bag in my pocket, which I use turned inside-out to open the door.

      My GF has severe (no, severe) OCD, and among all the rituals that are, objectively, pointless… This is the one that I wholeheartedly understand and agree with.

    • Victor@lemmy.world
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      1 day ago

      If you wash your hands, aren’t you undoing it immediately?

      Yup, might as well stop showering too since the cleanliness from showering is also temporary. And might as well not eat anything since hunger is just gonna come back anyway.

      My recommendation is to just wash your hands and then try not to think about the rest.

      This is the real answer. Don’t even think about anything else, just wash your hands every time visiting the restroom and touching anything in there that others you don’t know have touched.

      Also wash hands every time coming from outside. Just normal sanitary behavior to prevent illness. Hands get very dirty very easily outside. More than we think.