The mens room in the store I work at is out of order. Toilet don't work, not sure the reason why. Been down for about 2 months now. At this point we are assuming they are just going to replace the thing when they renovate the store in about a month. We've been letting everyone use the women's' room, and other than a few complaints about the seat being left up everything has been fine.
Today some guy came in, was told the bathroom was in use, and instead of waiting decided to walk into the mens room, to the clearly out of order toilet (The door has OUT OF ORDER written on it in big letters in english and spanish, has a stepladder blocking the door, has no toilet paper, towels, or soap, has the lid taken off the back, the water intake pipes disconnected and on the floor, and a number of plumbing tools scattered around the bathroom) and deposited the most horrible thing I have ever seen into the bowl. The manager on duty tried to stop him but only got a 'too late I'm already in here now' response. Once he left the bathroom he claimed that since it was not locked it was fine to use. (The door was not locked because a previous customer had broken the lock trying to kick the door down about half a year back over something I'm not privy to). Naturally he was banned from the store. But now we got a toilet that won't flush and a plumber's nightmare all in one.
WTF how can people be so stupid.
This sounds like it is in the US. I refer you to
a prior post I made about the mindset of american mainstream culture. Note the parallels.
The customer believes:
1) the bathroom is for HIS use, his using it is to be expected and accounted for.
2) Denying him access to the restroom is what is not tolerable, not his abuse of facilities that are not in a condition for service.
3) The consequences of having a broken bathroom are to be exclusively applied to the people operating the establishment, not to the person needing to poop.
4) He is super special awesome, and everyone else is a chump.
The manifestations of this cultural aspect are wide and far reaching, and again, it is the perfect recipe for the tragedy of the commons. To wit, a common bathroom was made even more unfit for service, and the time needed to restore function of that commons was greatly increased by the misuse of that commons.
The solution, again as stated prior--- is to re-instill the gravity of consequences for actions, by holding people accountable for their actions, and forcing them to respect that they are not alone in their actions, needs, or wants, and need to plan accordingly.
As long as "I avoid all consequences and get everything I wanted" is an option on the table, people will rush to take it. To this guy, being banned from a store is not sufficient consequence, as he likely ONLY stopped there to shit. (He likely has no intrinsic desire to shop there. He just needed to shit, and by golly, he got what he came for, and now he is done with the place.) He needs to be charged with violating health and sanitation laws, vandalism, disrupting the peace, disorderly conduct, and if he used force against people trying to keep him out of the bathroom, assault and or battery charges. He should also be levied a bill for his damage to the bathroom. The full gravity of his action needs to come home and hit him between the eyes, fast and hard.
In the US, we are averse to this happening, as we have elected leaders that are professional and consummate abusers of the commons themselves, and they have enshrined these deleterious values at the highest levels.
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Topic: Things that made you go "WTF?" today o_O (Read 14526842 times)