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Unique conversations occur in public restrooms. Perhaps it is only a female phenomenon, but people say things in a restroom that you would never expect to hear.

They revel in the seeming anonymity of a public restroom. I’ve even seen women wait until they get in the bathroom to say something they weren’t willing to say in the general public.

The funny thing is, you never know who is in the next stall listening to everything you say. Conversely, you never know how silly you sound.

For example, I was in the restroom during a class break (graduate courses are long, so we get a break about halfway through) and heard an amusing commentary on the budget cuts and their effect on ASU.

Two women in adjacent stalls were talking about the University. They talked about which campus would be most likely to close (their guesses seemed pretty accurate to me) and the probable tuition increases. However, one woman was convinced that we paid tuition, so why did the University need more money from the state?

Now that I was inside my stall and she was at the sink washing her hands, I politely offered the idea that the operating budget is not covered by tuition alone. She said, “What operating budget?”

I was glad I was inside my stall — I could roll my eyes in peace. I suggested the electric bill was a starting point. She insisted that tuition could cover all of that and the qualms over the budget cuts were unnecessary and ridiculous.

She then left the restroom and I was able to chuckle. What was even funnier was that I was not the only one in that restroom who laughed.

I can assure you that the budget is not as simple as she makes it seem, but that is a different column topic.

The point is, you never know who is around. This is a frivolous example of just looking silly to nameless people in a bathroom — and perhaps that doesn’t matter. But there are bigger embarrassments in bathroom conversation.

I have heard students talking time and again about how much they hate their witch of a professor. In other restrooms, you can hear people talking about their bosses, friends and parents. Public restrooms become a cesspool of gossip.

The interesting thing is we think they are a place of safety. We think we can say anything and no one will hear it — or even if they do, they won’t know it is us.

Perhaps that is true, maybe it’s not. I happened to know the young woman in my restroom example above, but we don’t always know the person in the stall next to us.

In that way, there is a sense of anonymity that we don’t have anywhere else. We are nameless, faceless and only identifiable by a voice.

Yes, unique conversations do occur in the bathroom. And I, for one, say go for it. If nothing else, they are certainly entertaining.

Janne would love to hear about your amusing public-bathroom anecdotes. Tell her at janne.gaub@asu.edu.


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