February 11, 2025 • 27 mins
This week, we bravely interrogate the male practice of standing while peeing. Why do we do it? And why stand when you can sit? We speak with urologist Gerald collins to find out if there are any hidden benefits to sitting while peeing.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
I'm Manny, I'm Noah, and this is no such thing.
The show where we settle our drump arguments and yours
by actually doing the research. On today's episode, we're asking
whether men should sit while they pee. We'll find out
whether there are any benefits, medical or otherwise by talking
to a urologist who went viral for his take on this.
(00:23):
There's no no such thing, no such thing such thank touch.
Speaker 2 (00:37):
All right, so I'm watching or rewatching the greatest TV
show of all time. Curb your enthusiast. Okay, curb your enthusiasm.
Larry's dad comes over and he leaves the toilet seat up,
and Larry goes up to him and says, dad, you
got to put the toy seat down. He say, well,
you pussy whooped. You know the Cheryl's making you do that?
And he's like, no, it's for me.
Speaker 1 (00:56):
I peece sitting down.
Speaker 3 (00:57):
I was getting up to go at night sometime and
I didn't feel like putting the light on, so I
would sit down. And then I figured, you know, I
got I got very comfortable with it.
Speaker 4 (01:06):
You know what Winston Churchill said, why stand when you
can sit?
Speaker 2 (01:10):
Have you ever heard that expression?
Speaker 1 (01:11):
No?
Speaker 4 (01:11):
I never heard that expression, but yeah, I don't think
he meant the toilet.
Speaker 2 (01:14):
And then it's a plot device because later in the episode,
Cheryl leaves the seat up, he falls in a toilet,
and then he's walking around with a king So, uh, that's.
Speaker 1 (01:24):
And you you sit when you pee.
Speaker 2 (01:27):
Sometimes, Yes, especially when I'm home, not in public. If
I never sit down in pee in public. When I'm
at home, I sit down in pee a lot of
the time. Yeah, if I'm in a rush, I don't. Yeah,
But if I'm just going to pee and I got time,
I love to sit. Love the sit.
Speaker 4 (01:43):
Yeah, and you too, Yeah, I'd say it's the only
time I'm standing is if I'm I just came in,
I really need to go or something, I still have
everything on, then I'm running in there getting it done.
But otherwise I'd say it's ninety percent more. Oh, that's
how I'm sitting because same reasons. It's ld I've got
magazines in.
Speaker 1 (02:02):
There, chilling, I mean, relax phones now.
Speaker 4 (02:04):
Also, yeah, who I mean, who knows what else I
might want to get up to when I'm in there.
Speaker 2 (02:08):
Oh yeah, you know, you might want to go. You
might want to go from one see.
Speaker 4 (02:12):
My options open that's why I want to go from
one day it's also like what's what's the rush? You know,
and it feels it feels nicer. You can't go and yeah,
no aim, it's cleaner and don't need to worry about
the seat situation.
Speaker 1 (02:23):
So then how long are you in there? You go there,
you go into p and you sit down, So what
are like, how long are you in there?
Speaker 4 (02:30):
It could be a minute, it can end up being
three minutes. Ye could be fine because I can you know,
then it's like, oh, I finish this paragraph, get to
the next line, break if I need to.
Speaker 1 (02:39):
If I'm reading, I mean, I don't sit on my pee,
and I don't think I would. I feel like I'm
just wanting to be in a bathroom as little time
as possible.
Speaker 4 (02:51):
Why is that you don't like you've got a beautiful,
clean bathroom in there.
Speaker 1 (02:55):
Well, it's just I mean, it's a bathroom. If I
want to like relax or whatever, I'll I'll just go
to my couch.
Speaker 2 (03:01):
When you pop.
Speaker 1 (03:02):
Yeah you do it?
Speaker 2 (03:03):
Number two? Yeah you ever just you're done and you
just just hang out a little bit.
Speaker 4 (03:07):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (03:08):
I guess it depends on if I was reading something
like something like an article or something. I might stick
around that's it. I might maybe to get to the
end of the sentence, but I'm not just hang ok.
Speaker 2 (03:17):
Kind of quick any of the sentence that's in and out.
Speaker 1 (03:19):
Yeah, I don't know.
Speaker 2 (03:20):
You're not out in the bathroom.
Speaker 1 (03:21):
No, not really. I'm surprised to hear that it's only
a hanging out in there.
Speaker 2 (03:26):
I mean, why after a shower might just sit down,
put the lotion on. You might have read a few articles,
you know, what's your rush alone time for me?
Speaker 1 (03:36):
Yeah, it's interesting. I don't know in my head the
way you're describing it. I just feel like I would
get the relaxation or the hanging out just somewhere else
in the house.
Speaker 4 (03:44):
I meant, listen, most of my hanging out is not
in the bathroom. But it's just like, why stress myself
out by standing and then worrying about.
Speaker 1 (03:51):
Is it stressed out? That's a stand versus sitting in.
Speaker 4 (03:54):
Yeah, it's like now I need to pay I need
to pay attention to where this is going.
Speaker 1 (03:57):
Yeah, I can understand that part where like it's probably
a cleaner experience if you sit because it's going direct.
Speaker 2 (04:05):
Nowhere. Do you have a lot of lights on in
your house at night. No, so this is the perfect
reason why you should.
Speaker 4 (04:11):
You could be in the full full darkness.
Speaker 2 (04:13):
I don't turn a light on in my house when
I go at night.
Speaker 1 (04:15):
Oh, I see what you're saying.
Speaker 2 (04:16):
You just go.
Speaker 1 (04:17):
You don't need to turn it on because you're aiming,
and you're not aiming.
Speaker 2 (04:20):
You don't got to look at where it went. You
know where it went. You're sitting down.
Speaker 4 (04:25):
There's only one place for it to go, and it's going.
Speaker 1 (04:28):
This is fascinating.
Speaker 2 (04:29):
When I'm standing up, then I'm like, God, turn the
light on.
Speaker 4 (04:32):
It might mess up your whole night asleep. Yes, now
that this bright lights flashing open my eu, it might
as well just stay up. But you know, go to
the office.
Speaker 1 (04:41):
Some of what you guys are saying makes sense. One
thing I'll take issue with is that it's easier to
sit down to be it is when I'm already standing.
Speaker 2 (04:50):
No, you're thinking of ease as in in and out.
Speaker 4 (04:53):
Yeah, does it take you so so long to sit down?
That's what I don't get you.
Speaker 1 (04:57):
It doesn't like it's this, It doesn't it doesn't take
so long, but it takes longer. Like so that's all
I'm saying, I mean half a second. Yeah, yeah, but
that's technically harder.
Speaker 2 (05:07):
Than but does LEMP doesn't necessarily dictate hardness well.
Speaker 4 (05:13):
Because then you're spending time cleaning up in ways we
don't have to probably balances out. We should do a test, honestly,
start stop.
Speaker 1 (05:21):
Watching in my head. I go into the bathroom. It's
more streamlined to remain standing than like pulling my pants down,
turning around, squatting down to the toilet. How are you
like I pull my penis out the box over the top. Okay,
(05:41):
I've never I don't ever do through.
Speaker 2 (05:44):
In a public restroom.
Speaker 1 (05:45):
In a public restroom, I'm going over the top. I'm
going over the top of no matter.
Speaker 4 (05:49):
I guess I usually am just doing that. I guess.
Speaker 2 (05:55):
I do all.
Speaker 1 (05:57):
Yeah, I'm a two way player. Here's the difference. Now
we're adults. Yes, we can change, and I think it
might be worth it for me to try peeing sitting
down for a while, log exactly what am I trying
to figure out? If it's a nicer ex if you like.
Speaker 4 (06:18):
It more, yeah, that's all. Okay, just see how you feel.
If you feel like, oh you're wasting time? Are you
getting antsy. Do you actually find it comforting or are
you like just annoyed by the process?
Speaker 2 (06:27):
Okay, and I guess part of this too, right. I
didn't start doing this till I was older, you know,
because as a kid, you're told you're a man.
Speaker 4 (06:35):
Yeah, it's toxic men.
Speaker 2 (06:38):
When they pee, that's for girls.
Speaker 1 (06:42):
No one told me that. No one ever said give
the talk. That's my experience.
Speaker 2 (06:48):
Then how did you learn? How did you? Why are
you standing?
Speaker 4 (06:51):
You don't think society pressured you into this?
Speaker 2 (06:54):
Why are you if no one told you men, why
do you stand when you pee? I told you that.
Speaker 1 (07:00):
Well, look who taught you that? I don't know. I
think we should look into like the history of this.
Did men ever sit when they peed?
Speaker 2 (07:12):
You know, we all have very different background. I wonder
if our bodies are actually designed for us to be
standing while we're ping. I know we do it for
convenience sake, but I wonder if scientifically it's better it
would be better for us to sit down.
Speaker 4 (07:26):
Yeah, my guess is it's better to sit down.
Speaker 1 (07:29):
That's interesting, I think, Yeah, I don't know.
Speaker 4 (07:30):
And hygienically I bet it's better too, mm hmmm.
Speaker 1 (07:33):
And then yeah, you mentioned just a few moments ago.
The cultural aspect. I wonder if around the world there
are different rates of yes.
Speaker 4 (07:43):
Yeah, so we did. I did look up. There's a
survey from our friends that you go do we want
to guess which country has the least amount of men
who say they sit down.
Speaker 2 (07:52):
And the least amount.
Speaker 1 (07:54):
Yeah, I would guess like some toxically male like the United.
Speaker 2 (07:57):
At least amount.
Speaker 4 (07:58):
Least Yeah, Russia, also the US, it's Mexico. Oh so
six percent of men there say they sit down every
every time, a strong thirty six percent never sit down,
They would never sit down.
Speaker 2 (08:13):
To Well that's manny. Have you ever sat down to
pe on purpose.
Speaker 1 (08:18):
Not explicitly to pee?
Speaker 2 (08:19):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (08:20):
Sometimes I'll go down there thinking I need.
Speaker 2 (08:22):
Yeah, one two combination, and only one comes down. Yeah, yeah,
fair enough, now it does not that don't count.
Speaker 1 (08:26):
But I've never been like, I'm gonna sit on this
thing to just peak.
Speaker 2 (08:30):
So you've never sat down just to pee on purpose,
not that you could remember.
Speaker 1 (08:35):
Not that I can remember.
Speaker 2 (08:36):
Wow, this is gonna but you have to record the
first time.
Speaker 4 (08:39):
I can't wait to hear this.
Speaker 2 (08:41):
We need we need to be in the room.
Speaker 1 (08:43):
I'll take it video.
Speaker 4 (08:44):
Yeah, the flip side is the country with the most
men who sit down to pe.
Speaker 2 (08:50):
Gotta be scanningaving country.
Speaker 4 (08:52):
Germany, Oh, every time, everything versus ten percent never, So
that's interesting. I mean Germany.
Speaker 1 (09:00):
I wonder if bathrooms in Europe are cleaner than they
are here.
Speaker 2 (09:02):
Oh, definitely, at least like yeah, public ones probably, Yeah, probably.
Speaker 4 (09:06):
More infrastructure set up for it. They like to follow
rules and you know, be very rigid in some woods.
Speaker 2 (09:12):
Has any of us been in Germany?
Speaker 4 (09:14):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (09:15):
In Germany. Yeah, the big train station in Munich. I
was in an overnight train. I needed to take a shower,
and I heard that, uh, there was a facility in
the train station where you could take a shower. And
I'm running around trying to find it. But I'm imagining
the most disgusting thing ever. Like if you told me
in Grand Central.
Speaker 2 (09:34):
There was a shower.
Speaker 1 (09:35):
Yeah, yeah, you're getting like, you know, you're gonna be
devoid or something.
Speaker 2 (09:39):
You're gonna be dirtier at the end of the shower.
Speaker 1 (09:41):
Yeah. But I but I got to the place and
it was pretty clean.
Speaker 2 (09:44):
Yep.
Speaker 1 (09:44):
It was like four showers for men, four showers for women,
and bathrooms surrounding it. Place was pretty clean.
Speaker 2 (09:51):
It seems like it had been washed but didn't last.
Speaker 1 (09:54):
Yeah, just more uh more attentive to that stuff. Okay,
So of Germans p sitting down, I wonder if I mean,
is there are there benefits to it, like beyond you
guys feeling comfortable when you pee? What are some of the.
Speaker 4 (10:10):
Are the health benefits? Benefits?
Speaker 1 (10:12):
Let's do two things. Okay, let's figure out if men
should be sitting when they pee. And then the second
thing is, I'm going to keep a record of maybe
one week long. Yes, if I'm at my apartment, I'll
sit down to pee, Yes, and I'll just kind of
log my experience.
Speaker 2 (10:31):
I want to take some voice memos.
Speaker 1 (10:34):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (10:34):
Yeah, that's talking through your sitting down, especially the first
time you do it. I really want to hear that. Yeah,
I want to hear it in the background.
Speaker 4 (10:42):
I think you're gonna like what you find.
Speaker 1 (10:46):
All right, after the break, we'll be hearing from a
urologist about whether men should sit down when they pee.
All right, we're back. I'm Manny, I'm Noah. Last time
we were here, we talked about men sitting versus standing
(11:07):
while they pee. You both like to sit. I like
to stand, but when I was looking for an expert
who could tell us whether we should be sitting. One
name just kept coming up.
Speaker 3 (11:21):
Yeah, So it's Gerald Noah as Jerry Collins. I'm the
consultant geological surgeon. I have been for quite a few
years now. I'm from Ireland, too public gather, but I'm
based in Manchester in the UK.
Speaker 1 (11:34):
So doctor Gerald Collins is a urologist who went kind
of viral, no pun intended. There were all of these
articles with titles like You've been peeing wrong your whole life,
and they cited him talking about like the anatomical process
of peeing. But I interviewed doctor Collins, and the more
(11:55):
I talked to him, the more I realized that these
headlines were kind of misleading, which we will get to later,
but first I want to play a SoundBite from the
interview that kind of captures just how many people care
about this topic.
Speaker 3 (12:08):
I was interviewed by the Telegraph and my sort of
initial reaction was, you know, well, this is one of
those little quirky, bit of fun type questions. But it
ended up in a sort of full page spread on
the Sunday Telegraph. And then I was contacted by Babe Scotland,
and I was contacted by other people. I was even
contacted by Radio New Zealand. So clearly it caught the
(12:32):
public imagination, which things do sometimes, bizarre things do. When
I looked into a little bit, there was a lot
more to this than I initially was expecting.
Speaker 1 (12:42):
So then I was curious about where this kind of
fascination began.
Speaker 3 (12:46):
Population surveys were what started this off, really, and in
the last few years, something like forty percent of Germans
sit down to avoid, and in fact there's been some
public health initiatives there encouraging them to do so. Apparently
some public toilets in Germany have some sort of electronic
prompt requesting the mail to sit. So in the UK
(13:08):
twenty five twenty four percent, so one in four people
sit to avoid. That's quite a high. If you'd asked
me my guests or that before I knew that, I
would have said maybe ten percent something like that. And
then you look at Japan, we're seventy percent seven zero
percent to void. So it turned out that this was
a far more relevant tissue than perhaps I ear. Indeed,
(13:30):
many others appreciated.
Speaker 1 (13:32):
Seventy percent of men in Japan, I mean they weren't
even in the Yugov survey, so congrats to them on
yet another innovation around the world. It sounds like more
and more people are sitting to to void, as he
says for listeners, to void just means to pee. I
think it's like the medical way to say it.
Speaker 4 (13:51):
We're a silent majority, yeah or yeah yeah, something.
Speaker 1 (13:55):
Like silent super majority. You know. I think it is
fascinating as someone who would prefer to stand. Uh, there
is clearly a wave of sitting peers growing across around
the world, and so naturally my next question is why
why is that happening.
Speaker 3 (14:16):
To answer that question, I think there's two elements to
look at, really, and what is the target? The other
is the peer If you want so the target, let's
assume the targets are toilet bolt. I think it's to
do with this concept of you know, is there an
infection risk to you or others? Well, if you stand
and pee into a toilet bulb, what's happening. Well, what's
(14:37):
happening there is You've got a static reservoir of liquid
in the bolt. So if you direct a force fome
stream into that, you will agitate the reservoir of organisms
or bacteria, and you will generate droplets just like me speaking,
are you speaking? And those droplets will have the ability
to travel they considerable distem you know, one two meters
(15:01):
or whatever. So in theory you could rationalize that anything
within Latin August will be contaminating.
Speaker 1 (15:08):
Doctor Collins tells me that there is probably more contamination
happening when you stand to pee, but he also wants
people to ask themselves what contamination means to them. All day,
every day, we're exposing ourselves to various forms of bacterial contamination,
and it might just be the case that when we
stand to pee, that level of contamination, when compared to
(15:30):
the rest of our days, is probably only a drop
in the bucket or toilet bowl.
Speaker 3 (15:35):
Contamination that you will get from a strong flow into
a toilet bowl is negligible in my view.
Speaker 1 (15:43):
He's saying that one of the biggest reasons why more
people are sitting while they pee is essentially to avoid
this contamination that's happening in bathrooms where you're directing your
pee into the static reservoir of water in the toilet bowl,
and then that is causing germs and bacteria to be
spread about. So if you want a cleaner environment, you
(16:05):
could sit down while you pee.
Speaker 2 (16:08):
And is that because there's less distance between the stream
is as powerful?
Speaker 1 (16:13):
That's number one. Number two is that when you're sitting,
your stream is not going directly into that water. It's
going into the front of the and then it's trickling
its way down.
Speaker 4 (16:23):
It's much quieter experience. Yeah, sensitive ears.
Speaker 2 (16:28):
Now.
Speaker 1 (16:29):
He tells me that the contam the level of contamination
that happens, like he was saying at the end of
there's pretty negligible. But if you're these societies around the
world and you don't care if it's negligible, you just
want to be cleaner, then you're gonna direct your citizens
to sit down.
Speaker 4 (16:47):
That makes sense. I mean, it reminds me of you know,
he's explaining the spread of these things, and it reminds
you of those early COVID graphics two people talking and
all the particles spitting obviously effect.
Speaker 1 (17:00):
So, like we were talking about the other day, I
wanted to ask him whether there were actual health benefits, Like,
maybe the level of contamination is negligible, but are there
other reasons you would want to sit while you pee?
Speaker 3 (17:15):
Yes, definitely, it would be BPA stands for benign prostatic hyperplasia.
What happens is when you hit your forties, the prostate
starts to enlarge in the vast majority of men, and
that's due to a changing hormodal environment within the prostate,
and of those men, a significant proportion of problems because
(17:36):
of the location of the prostate.
Speaker 1 (17:38):
Basically, the prostate is a gland that wraps around the urethra,
and if you develop an enlarged prostate later in life,
it can compress on the urethra and make it more
difficult to pee. Symptoms including a weaker flow of urine
and having to go to the bathroom more often.
Speaker 3 (17:57):
And I was a bit of drawing earlier when I
was just waiting for you. I'll draw an octoppation, secretary,
because I think it's very helpful. But I'm just going to.
Speaker 1 (18:05):
Show you, okay. So at this point, doctor Collins draws
fore a diagram of the shape and trajectory of the
average urethra, and it's like inside of a cartoony human midsection.
Speaker 3 (18:22):
This is a you, Maddie. This is you lying down.
There's your bottom, there's your tubby up here.
Speaker 1 (18:27):
Okay, uh huh, it's you quite accurate depiction of me. Actually,
quick note for the listeners. Obviously this is a podcast
and you can't see the drawing, but I'll include it
in the corresponding substack for this episode on No Such
Thing Dot Show. Basically, the urethra does like a thirty
degree angle turn inside and through your pros state. So
(18:52):
if you imagine yourself peeing while standing up, the urethra
kind of goes towards your back first before it makes
that angle turned towards your front. And if you are
an older man and you have an enlarged prostate, this
condition bph that thirty degree angle becomes more like a
ninety degree angle, and it makes it much more difficult
(19:15):
to pass urine. And one way to make it easier
to pass urine and that specific context is to sit
down while up. I had a few more questions for him.
The first one was I just kind of wanted to know,
like the history men peeing while they were standing up,
(19:35):
Like why did they pee while they were standing up?
Why didn't they pee while they were sitting down like
way back in the day.
Speaker 2 (19:41):
Who was the first man to stand up?
Speaker 1 (19:43):
Who was the first brave soul or who was the
first brave soul to sit. Yeah, that's probably.
Speaker 2 (19:48):
The more accurate. Yeah, that's true.
Speaker 3 (19:50):
I think this is an evolutionary thing. It came to
be the norm because firstly men could right, so they
were able to pee standing up. So if you're a hunter,
godser and you're out stalking an elk for whatever you're stalking,
or a buffalo and you need a pee, well, if
(20:11):
you were able to sort that out without particularly having
to move too much, then you can carry on with
your quest. So clearly being able to pass urine standing
up is a big advantage for them, no question about it.
So I would say, evan, it evolved to become the norm.
Speaker 1 (20:30):
So doctor Collins made sure to tell me that that's
just kind of his take, like he's a urologist and
not necessarily a historian. But I think it makes sense.
Speaker 2 (20:41):
It makes sense, especially you've got to be more on
your toe back in the day.
Speaker 4 (20:47):
So just you're certainly not worried about contamination.
Speaker 2 (20:50):
Yeah, you don't even know what is just in your
ready position at all times, it makes sense to be
standing versus like sitting down where you know you're a
little less agile.
Speaker 1 (21:02):
Finally, I asked him one final question I asked him
if he, as a urologist, recommends that men sit down
while they pe.
Speaker 3 (21:15):
Yeah, No, I wouldn't recommend it in general. If someone
is doing it, okay, it doesn't bother me, but I
don't think they need to do so.
Speaker 1 (21:21):
I was kind of surprised to hear this, right, like,
he's basically saying there is no medical benefit to sitting
while up unless you have BPH and enlarged prostate. And
all the initial articles that I came across when I
was researching this at first took his words and kind
of contorted them to mean that you should be sitting
(21:43):
when you pee, And as you just heard, he simply
does not recommend that.
Speaker 2 (21:49):
I remember when these articles were coming out, I similarly
was like, oh, wow, have I been peeing wrong my
whole life? And it's just sort of like, no, I
guess if I have an enlarge prostate, maybe I should
sit my ass down.
Speaker 1 (22:00):
Yeah, otherwise will happen to all of us someday.
Speaker 2 (22:04):
Choose your own adventure.
Speaker 1 (22:05):
Now, that doesn't tell you anything about whether you should
prefer to sit or say still done. Yeah, if you
prefer it because it's more comfortable, you should absolutely continue
to do so, and obviously a lot of the world
is moving in that direction.
Speaker 2 (22:21):
What I wanted to hear from this conversation is there
anything bad about me sitting down?
Speaker 4 (22:26):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (22:26):
Yeah, And it sounds like his answer is not.
Speaker 4 (22:31):
All right, mannie, how about you tell us about your experiment.
Speaker 1 (22:34):
I sat while I peed for a week for a week.
Speaker 2 (22:38):
Wow, you know.
Speaker 1 (22:39):
As much as I could while I was at home.
Speaker 2 (22:41):
Yeah, and we're talking home piece.
Speaker 1 (22:43):
This was also during my trip to Atlanta. So like
when I'm in the hotel, I would sit, but outside
of that, I would stand. Generally, my experience was that
I don't know, like I almost didn't know what to think.
I was like, all right, this is uh, this is nice.
I guess if you want to do it, maybe if
(23:03):
I like let some candles in there or something like,
al right.
Speaker 4 (23:06):
Well, all right, let's take take us through a void session.
Speaker 1 (23:12):
This is Manny. I am in my bathroom, I am
needing to void, and I'm gonna do it. Uh. Sitting
down definitely feels a little bit awkward at first, knowing
that I don't have to uh defecate. I am here
(23:35):
to urinate, and I am in a seated position, and
here we go. Uh, you know, much quieter experience, obviously,
but the noise level of a typical urination doesn't really
bother me. I have just finished urinating, and I will
kind of just remain on the toilet here to hang out.
(23:59):
I guess I'll be on my out, you know, I'll
take a look at my phone no texts, snow notifications
that are super urgent, and uh yeah, I'll be honest,
I'm kind of fighting the urge not to get on
out of here.
Speaker 4 (24:17):
You're not taking advantage of this.
Speaker 1 (24:18):
I wanted to kind of be in the moment. There
were times when I would look at my phone or whatever. Oka,
but it was hard to fight that urge not to
just leave after I was oh yeah, but I guess
we just are going into the bathroom with different states
of mind.
Speaker 2 (24:36):
Yeah, it was. It's it's interesting because in life I
don't see you as a person who rushes through life.
Speaker 4 (24:43):
Well, you know, you know, you're not like a slow.
Speaker 2 (24:45):
Person, you don't. I don't think you have the traditional
Ohio like yo, hurry up. Yeah, but you're also not
someone who you know, has like a New York attitude
about things. I think you're pretty good with the flow
you're pretty relaxedly back guy. So it's inter that when
you get in the bathroom, you're on New York time, like, hey,
I got.
Speaker 1 (25:03):
To get one thing that's sitting added to my experiences.
Was thinking about this in general, and I think I
realized that I'm using the bathroom. Anything I'm doing in
the bathroom is I kind of see as a chore.
And so I thought about it as like, Okay, when
I'm washing the dishes, you know, I want to get
(25:24):
that done as soon as possible.
Speaker 2 (25:25):
You view using the bathroom as washing the dishes, like
on the same.
Speaker 1 (25:28):
Level, I think it's just like a thing I have
to do.
Speaker 4 (25:32):
There we go again that I'm to spend forty seconds voiding.
Speaker 1 (25:36):
Yeah, it's the thing that I have to do to
move on. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (25:41):
Wow, that's just If I could opt out of washing dishes,
just press the button, never have to wash the dish again.
We'll do it tomorrow.
Speaker 1 (25:48):
I probably would opt out of peeing if I never had.
Speaker 2 (25:50):
An that's crazy, I would not. I think it's such
a nice break to your day. It's like a it's
like forced alone quiet time.
Speaker 4 (25:59):
Yeah, you know, I think I do appreciate the solitude
of it. Yes, And that's part of why I like
the sitting. You know, you do get so used to
just always having a podcast on or music or something
where it's nice to sometimes be like whether I'm at
home or even just like I'm gonna go do a
chores like running errand if it's a quick thing, like yeah,
maybe I don't need my headphones on.
Speaker 1 (26:21):
Sitting while up in the bathroom ends up just being
a good vehicle for to get Yeah.
Speaker 4 (26:25):
That just like doing it like a shower.
Speaker 2 (26:27):
You know, yeah, yeah, yeah, well no music or anything.
Speaker 1 (26:30):
Yeah, yeah, I do a lot about very long shower.
Speaker 4 (26:34):
A pee is in some ways of a mini shower.
Speaker 1 (26:40):
We don't need to go on, but I think we're
gonna end the episode right there.
Speaker 2 (26:47):
All the girls standing and the life for the bathroom,
all the girls standing.
Speaker 1 (26:52):
In the line. This was no such thing. Produced by
Manny Noah and Devin. The theme song is by me Man.
Thank you to our guest doctor Gerald Collins. This question
was submitted by a listener, So if you have a
question that you want me and the Voice to get
to the bottom of, please shoot us an email at
Manny Noah deevinat gmail dot com. And I want you
(27:16):
to also do the following two things. Please subscribe to
our substack at no such thing Dot show, and leave
us five stars on whatever app you're listening to this on.
See you next week.
I'm Manny, I'm Noah, and this is no such thing.
The show where we settle our drump arguments and yours
by actually doing the research. On today's episode, we're asking
whether men should sit while they pee. We'll find out
whether there are any benefits, medical or otherwise by talking
to a urologist who went viral for his take on this.
(00:23):
There's no no such thing, no such thing such thank touch.
Speaker 2 (00:37):
All right, so I'm watching or rewatching the greatest TV
show of all time. Curb your enthusiast. Okay, curb your enthusiasm.
Larry's dad comes over and he leaves the toilet seat up,
and Larry goes up to him and says, dad, you
got to put the toy seat down. He say, well,
you pussy whooped. You know the Cheryl's making you do that?
And he's like, no, it's for me.
Speaker 1 (00:56):
I peece sitting down.
Speaker 3 (00:57):
I was getting up to go at night sometime and
I didn't feel like putting the light on, so I
would sit down. And then I figured, you know, I
got I got very comfortable with it.
Speaker 4 (01:06):
You know what Winston Churchill said, why stand when you
can sit?
Speaker 2 (01:10):
Have you ever heard that expression?
Speaker 1 (01:11):
No?
Speaker 4 (01:11):
I never heard that expression, but yeah, I don't think
he meant the toilet.
Speaker 2 (01:14):
And then it's a plot device because later in the episode,
Cheryl leaves the seat up, he falls in a toilet,
and then he's walking around with a king So, uh, that's.
Speaker 1 (01:24):
And you you sit when you pee.
Speaker 2 (01:27):
Sometimes, Yes, especially when I'm home, not in public. If
I never sit down in pee in public. When I'm
at home, I sit down in pee a lot of
the time. Yeah, if I'm in a rush, I don't. Yeah,
But if I'm just going to pee and I got time,
I love to sit. Love the sit.
Speaker 4 (01:43):
Yeah, and you too, Yeah, I'd say it's the only
time I'm standing is if I'm I just came in,
I really need to go or something, I still have
everything on, then I'm running in there getting it done.
But otherwise I'd say it's ninety percent more. Oh, that's
how I'm sitting because same reasons. It's ld I've got
magazines in.
Speaker 1 (02:02):
There, chilling, I mean, relax phones now.
Speaker 4 (02:04):
Also, yeah, who I mean, who knows what else I
might want to get up to when I'm in there.
Speaker 2 (02:08):
Oh yeah, you know, you might want to go. You
might want to go from one see.
Speaker 4 (02:12):
My options open that's why I want to go from
one day it's also like what's what's the rush? You know,
and it feels it feels nicer. You can't go and yeah,
no aim, it's cleaner and don't need to worry about
the seat situation.
Speaker 1 (02:23):
So then how long are you in there? You go there,
you go into p and you sit down, So what
are like, how long are you in there?
Speaker 4 (02:30):
It could be a minute, it can end up being
three minutes. Ye could be fine because I can you know,
then it's like, oh, I finish this paragraph, get to
the next line, break if I need to.
Speaker 1 (02:39):
If I'm reading, I mean, I don't sit on my pee,
and I don't think I would. I feel like I'm
just wanting to be in a bathroom as little time
as possible.
Speaker 4 (02:51):
Why is that you don't like you've got a beautiful,
clean bathroom in there.
Speaker 1 (02:55):
Well, it's just I mean, it's a bathroom. If I
want to like relax or whatever, I'll I'll just go
to my couch.
Speaker 2 (03:01):
When you pop.
Speaker 1 (03:02):
Yeah you do it?
Speaker 2 (03:03):
Number two? Yeah you ever just you're done and you
just just hang out a little bit.
Speaker 4 (03:07):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (03:08):
I guess it depends on if I was reading something
like something like an article or something. I might stick
around that's it. I might maybe to get to the
end of the sentence, but I'm not just hang ok.
Speaker 2 (03:17):
Kind of quick any of the sentence that's in and out.
Speaker 1 (03:19):
Yeah, I don't know.
Speaker 2 (03:20):
You're not out in the bathroom.
Speaker 1 (03:21):
No, not really. I'm surprised to hear that it's only
a hanging out in there.
Speaker 2 (03:26):
I mean, why after a shower might just sit down,
put the lotion on. You might have read a few articles,
you know, what's your rush alone time for me?
Speaker 1 (03:36):
Yeah, it's interesting. I don't know in my head the
way you're describing it. I just feel like I would
get the relaxation or the hanging out just somewhere else
in the house.
Speaker 4 (03:44):
I meant, listen, most of my hanging out is not
in the bathroom. But it's just like, why stress myself
out by standing and then worrying about.
Speaker 1 (03:51):
Is it stressed out? That's a stand versus sitting in.
Speaker 4 (03:54):
Yeah, it's like now I need to pay I need
to pay attention to where this is going.
Speaker 1 (03:57):
Yeah, I can understand that part where like it's probably
a cleaner experience if you sit because it's going direct.
Speaker 2 (04:05):
Nowhere. Do you have a lot of lights on in
your house at night. No, so this is the perfect
reason why you should.
Speaker 4 (04:11):
You could be in the full full darkness.
Speaker 2 (04:13):
I don't turn a light on in my house when
I go at night.
Speaker 1 (04:15):
Oh, I see what you're saying.
Speaker 2 (04:16):
You just go.
Speaker 1 (04:17):
You don't need to turn it on because you're aiming,
and you're not aiming.
Speaker 2 (04:20):
You don't got to look at where it went. You
know where it went. You're sitting down.
Speaker 4 (04:25):
There's only one place for it to go, and it's going.
Speaker 1 (04:28):
This is fascinating.
Speaker 2 (04:29):
When I'm standing up, then I'm like, God, turn the
light on.
Speaker 4 (04:32):
It might mess up your whole night asleep. Yes, now
that this bright lights flashing open my eu, it might
as well just stay up. But you know, go to
the office.
Speaker 1 (04:41):
Some of what you guys are saying makes sense. One
thing I'll take issue with is that it's easier to
sit down to be it is when I'm already standing.
Speaker 2 (04:50):
No, you're thinking of ease as in in and out.
Speaker 4 (04:53):
Yeah, does it take you so so long to sit down?
That's what I don't get you.
Speaker 1 (04:57):
It doesn't like it's this, It doesn't it doesn't take
so long, but it takes longer. Like so that's all
I'm saying, I mean half a second. Yeah, yeah, but
that's technically harder.
Speaker 2 (05:07):
Than but does LEMP doesn't necessarily dictate hardness well.
Speaker 4 (05:13):
Because then you're spending time cleaning up in ways we
don't have to probably balances out. We should do a test, honestly,
start stop.
Speaker 1 (05:21):
Watching in my head. I go into the bathroom. It's
more streamlined to remain standing than like pulling my pants down,
turning around, squatting down to the toilet. How are you
like I pull my penis out the box over the top. Okay,
(05:41):
I've never I don't ever do through.
Speaker 2 (05:44):
In a public restroom.
Speaker 1 (05:45):
In a public restroom, I'm going over the top. I'm
going over the top of no matter.
Speaker 4 (05:49):
I guess I usually am just doing that. I guess.
Speaker 2 (05:55):
I do all.
Speaker 1 (05:57):
Yeah, I'm a two way player. Here's the difference. Now
we're adults. Yes, we can change, and I think it
might be worth it for me to try peeing sitting
down for a while, log exactly what am I trying
to figure out? If it's a nicer ex if you like.
Speaker 4 (06:18):
It more, yeah, that's all. Okay, just see how you feel.
If you feel like, oh you're wasting time? Are you
getting antsy. Do you actually find it comforting or are
you like just annoyed by the process?
Speaker 2 (06:27):
Okay, and I guess part of this too, right. I
didn't start doing this till I was older, you know,
because as a kid, you're told you're a man.
Speaker 4 (06:35):
Yeah, it's toxic men.
Speaker 2 (06:38):
When they pee, that's for girls.
Speaker 1 (06:42):
No one told me that. No one ever said give
the talk. That's my experience.
Speaker 2 (06:48):
Then how did you learn? How did you? Why are
you standing?
Speaker 4 (06:51):
You don't think society pressured you into this?
Speaker 2 (06:54):
Why are you if no one told you men, why
do you stand when you pee? I told you that.
Speaker 1 (07:00):
Well, look who taught you that? I don't know. I
think we should look into like the history of this.
Did men ever sit when they peed?
Speaker 2 (07:12):
You know, we all have very different background. I wonder
if our bodies are actually designed for us to be
standing while we're ping. I know we do it for
convenience sake, but I wonder if scientifically it's better it
would be better for us to sit down.
Speaker 4 (07:26):
Yeah, my guess is it's better to sit down.
Speaker 1 (07:29):
That's interesting, I think, Yeah, I don't know.
Speaker 4 (07:30):
And hygienically I bet it's better too, mm hmmm.
Speaker 1 (07:33):
And then yeah, you mentioned just a few moments ago.
The cultural aspect. I wonder if around the world there
are different rates of yes.
Speaker 4 (07:43):
Yeah, so we did. I did look up. There's a
survey from our friends that you go do we want
to guess which country has the least amount of men
who say they sit down.
Speaker 2 (07:52):
And the least amount.
Speaker 1 (07:54):
Yeah, I would guess like some toxically male like the United.
Speaker 2 (07:57):
At least amount.
Speaker 4 (07:58):
Least Yeah, Russia, also the US, it's Mexico. Oh so
six percent of men there say they sit down every
every time, a strong thirty six percent never sit down,
They would never sit down.
Speaker 2 (08:13):
To Well that's manny. Have you ever sat down to
pe on purpose.
Speaker 1 (08:18):
Not explicitly to pee?
Speaker 2 (08:19):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (08:20):
Sometimes I'll go down there thinking I need.
Speaker 2 (08:22):
Yeah, one two combination, and only one comes down. Yeah, yeah,
fair enough, now it does not that don't count.
Speaker 1 (08:26):
But I've never been like, I'm gonna sit on this
thing to just peak.
Speaker 2 (08:30):
So you've never sat down just to pee on purpose,
not that you could remember.
Speaker 1 (08:35):
Not that I can remember.
Speaker 2 (08:36):
Wow, this is gonna but you have to record the
first time.
Speaker 4 (08:39):
I can't wait to hear this.
Speaker 2 (08:41):
We need we need to be in the room.
Speaker 1 (08:43):
I'll take it video.
Speaker 4 (08:44):
Yeah, the flip side is the country with the most
men who sit down to pe.
Speaker 2 (08:50):
Gotta be scanningaving country.
Speaker 4 (08:52):
Germany, Oh, every time, everything versus ten percent never, So
that's interesting. I mean Germany.
Speaker 1 (09:00):
I wonder if bathrooms in Europe are cleaner than they
are here.
Speaker 2 (09:02):
Oh, definitely, at least like yeah, public ones probably, Yeah, probably.
Speaker 4 (09:06):
More infrastructure set up for it. They like to follow
rules and you know, be very rigid in some woods.
Speaker 2 (09:12):
Has any of us been in Germany?
Speaker 4 (09:14):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (09:15):
In Germany. Yeah, the big train station in Munich. I
was in an overnight train. I needed to take a shower,
and I heard that, uh, there was a facility in
the train station where you could take a shower. And
I'm running around trying to find it. But I'm imagining
the most disgusting thing ever. Like if you told me
in Grand Central.
Speaker 2 (09:34):
There was a shower.
Speaker 1 (09:35):
Yeah, yeah, you're getting like, you know, you're gonna be
devoid or something.
Speaker 2 (09:39):
You're gonna be dirtier at the end of the shower.
Speaker 1 (09:41):
Yeah. But I but I got to the place and
it was pretty clean.
Speaker 2 (09:44):
Yep.
Speaker 1 (09:44):
It was like four showers for men, four showers for women,
and bathrooms surrounding it. Place was pretty clean.
Speaker 2 (09:51):
It seems like it had been washed but didn't last.
Speaker 1 (09:54):
Yeah, just more uh more attentive to that stuff. Okay,
So of Germans p sitting down, I wonder if I mean,
is there are there benefits to it, like beyond you
guys feeling comfortable when you pee? What are some of the.
Speaker 4 (10:10):
Are the health benefits? Benefits?
Speaker 1 (10:12):
Let's do two things. Okay, let's figure out if men
should be sitting when they pee. And then the second
thing is, I'm going to keep a record of maybe
one week long. Yes, if I'm at my apartment, I'll
sit down to pee, Yes, and I'll just kind of
log my experience.
Speaker 2 (10:31):
I want to take some voice memos.
Speaker 1 (10:34):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (10:34):
Yeah, that's talking through your sitting down, especially the first
time you do it. I really want to hear that. Yeah,
I want to hear it in the background.
Speaker 4 (10:42):
I think you're gonna like what you find.
Speaker 1 (10:46):
All right, after the break, we'll be hearing from a
urologist about whether men should sit down when they pee.
All right, we're back. I'm Manny, I'm Noah. Last time
we were here, we talked about men sitting versus standing
(11:07):
while they pee. You both like to sit. I like
to stand, but when I was looking for an expert
who could tell us whether we should be sitting. One
name just kept coming up.
Speaker 3 (11:21):
Yeah, So it's Gerald Noah as Jerry Collins. I'm the
consultant geological surgeon. I have been for quite a few
years now. I'm from Ireland, too public gather, but I'm
based in Manchester in the UK.
Speaker 1 (11:34):
So doctor Gerald Collins is a urologist who went kind
of viral, no pun intended. There were all of these
articles with titles like You've been peeing wrong your whole life,
and they cited him talking about like the anatomical process
of peeing. But I interviewed doctor Collins, and the more
(11:55):
I talked to him, the more I realized that these
headlines were kind of misleading, which we will get to later,
but first I want to play a SoundBite from the
interview that kind of captures just how many people care
about this topic.
Speaker 3 (12:08):
I was interviewed by the Telegraph and my sort of
initial reaction was, you know, well, this is one of
those little quirky, bit of fun type questions. But it
ended up in a sort of full page spread on
the Sunday Telegraph. And then I was contacted by Babe Scotland,
and I was contacted by other people. I was even
contacted by Radio New Zealand. So clearly it caught the
(12:32):
public imagination, which things do sometimes, bizarre things do. When
I looked into a little bit, there was a lot
more to this than I initially was expecting.
Speaker 1 (12:42):
So then I was curious about where this kind of
fascination began.
Speaker 3 (12:46):
Population surveys were what started this off, really, and in
the last few years, something like forty percent of Germans
sit down to avoid, and in fact there's been some
public health initiatives there encouraging them to do so. Apparently
some public toilets in Germany have some sort of electronic
prompt requesting the mail to sit. So in the UK
(13:08):
twenty five twenty four percent, so one in four people
sit to avoid. That's quite a high. If you'd asked
me my guests or that before I knew that, I
would have said maybe ten percent something like that. And
then you look at Japan, we're seventy percent seven zero
percent to void. So it turned out that this was
a far more relevant tissue than perhaps I ear. Indeed,
(13:30):
many others appreciated.
Speaker 1 (13:32):
Seventy percent of men in Japan, I mean they weren't
even in the Yugov survey, so congrats to them on
yet another innovation around the world. It sounds like more
and more people are sitting to to void, as he
says for listeners, to void just means to pee. I
think it's like the medical way to say it.
Speaker 4 (13:51):
We're a silent majority, yeah or yeah yeah, something.
Speaker 1 (13:55):
Like silent super majority. You know. I think it is
fascinating as someone who would prefer to stand. Uh, there
is clearly a wave of sitting peers growing across around
the world, and so naturally my next question is why
why is that happening.
Speaker 3 (14:16):
To answer that question, I think there's two elements to
look at, really, and what is the target? The other
is the peer If you want so the target, let's
assume the targets are toilet bolt. I think it's to
do with this concept of you know, is there an
infection risk to you or others? Well, if you stand
and pee into a toilet bulb, what's happening. Well, what's
(14:37):
happening there is You've got a static reservoir of liquid
in the bolt. So if you direct a force fome
stream into that, you will agitate the reservoir of organisms
or bacteria, and you will generate droplets just like me speaking,
are you speaking? And those droplets will have the ability
to travel they considerable distem you know, one two meters
(15:01):
or whatever. So in theory you could rationalize that anything
within Latin August will be contaminating.
Speaker 1 (15:08):
Doctor Collins tells me that there is probably more contamination
happening when you stand to pee, but he also wants
people to ask themselves what contamination means to them. All day,
every day, we're exposing ourselves to various forms of bacterial contamination,
and it might just be the case that when we
stand to pee, that level of contamination, when compared to
(15:30):
the rest of our days, is probably only a drop
in the bucket or toilet bowl.
Speaker 3 (15:35):
Contamination that you will get from a strong flow into
a toilet bowl is negligible in my view.
Speaker 1 (15:43):
He's saying that one of the biggest reasons why more
people are sitting while they pee is essentially to avoid
this contamination that's happening in bathrooms where you're directing your
pee into the static reservoir of water in the toilet bowl,
and then that is causing germs and bacteria to be
spread about. So if you want a cleaner environment, you
(16:05):
could sit down while you pee.
Speaker 2 (16:08):
And is that because there's less distance between the stream
is as powerful?
Speaker 1 (16:13):
That's number one. Number two is that when you're sitting,
your stream is not going directly into that water. It's
going into the front of the and then it's trickling
its way down.
Speaker 4 (16:23):
It's much quieter experience. Yeah, sensitive ears.
Speaker 2 (16:28):
Now.
Speaker 1 (16:29):
He tells me that the contam the level of contamination
that happens, like he was saying at the end of
there's pretty negligible. But if you're these societies around the
world and you don't care if it's negligible, you just
want to be cleaner, then you're gonna direct your citizens
to sit down.
Speaker 4 (16:47):
That makes sense. I mean, it reminds me of you know,
he's explaining the spread of these things, and it reminds
you of those early COVID graphics two people talking and
all the particles spitting obviously effect.
Speaker 1 (17:00):
So, like we were talking about the other day, I
wanted to ask him whether there were actual health benefits, Like,
maybe the level of contamination is negligible, but are there
other reasons you would want to sit while you pee?
Speaker 3 (17:15):
Yes, definitely, it would be BPA stands for benign prostatic hyperplasia.
What happens is when you hit your forties, the prostate
starts to enlarge in the vast majority of men, and
that's due to a changing hormodal environment within the prostate,
and of those men, a significant proportion of problems because
(17:36):
of the location of the prostate.
Speaker 1 (17:38):
Basically, the prostate is a gland that wraps around the urethra,
and if you develop an enlarged prostate later in life,
it can compress on the urethra and make it more
difficult to pee. Symptoms including a weaker flow of urine
and having to go to the bathroom more often.
Speaker 3 (17:57):
And I was a bit of drawing earlier when I
was just waiting for you. I'll draw an octoppation, secretary,
because I think it's very helpful. But I'm just going to.
Speaker 1 (18:05):
Show you, okay. So at this point, doctor Collins draws
fore a diagram of the shape and trajectory of the
average urethra, and it's like inside of a cartoony human midsection.
Speaker 3 (18:22):
This is a you, Maddie. This is you lying down.
There's your bottom, there's your tubby up here.
Speaker 1 (18:27):
Okay, uh huh, it's you quite accurate depiction of me. Actually,
quick note for the listeners. Obviously this is a podcast
and you can't see the drawing, but I'll include it
in the corresponding substack for this episode on No Such
Thing Dot Show. Basically, the urethra does like a thirty
degree angle turn inside and through your pros state. So
(18:52):
if you imagine yourself peeing while standing up, the urethra
kind of goes towards your back first before it makes
that angle turned towards your front. And if you are
an older man and you have an enlarged prostate, this
condition bph that thirty degree angle becomes more like a
ninety degree angle, and it makes it much more difficult
(19:15):
to pass urine. And one way to make it easier
to pass urine and that specific context is to sit
down while up. I had a few more questions for him.
The first one was I just kind of wanted to know,
like the history men peeing while they were standing up,
(19:35):
Like why did they pee while they were standing up?
Why didn't they pee while they were sitting down like
way back in the day.
Speaker 2 (19:41):
Who was the first man to stand up?
Speaker 1 (19:43):
Who was the first brave soul or who was the
first brave soul to sit. Yeah, that's probably.
Speaker 2 (19:48):
The more accurate. Yeah, that's true.
Speaker 3 (19:50):
I think this is an evolutionary thing. It came to
be the norm because firstly men could right, so they
were able to pee standing up. So if you're a hunter,
godser and you're out stalking an elk for whatever you're stalking,
or a buffalo and you need a pee, well, if
(20:11):
you were able to sort that out without particularly having
to move too much, then you can carry on with
your quest. So clearly being able to pass urine standing
up is a big advantage for them, no question about it.
So I would say, evan, it evolved to become the norm.
Speaker 1 (20:30):
So doctor Collins made sure to tell me that that's
just kind of his take, like he's a urologist and
not necessarily a historian. But I think it makes sense.
Speaker 2 (20:41):
It makes sense, especially you've got to be more on
your toe back in the day.
Speaker 4 (20:47):
So just you're certainly not worried about contamination.
Speaker 2 (20:50):
Yeah, you don't even know what is just in your
ready position at all times, it makes sense to be
standing versus like sitting down where you know you're a
little less agile.
Speaker 1 (21:02):
Finally, I asked him one final question I asked him
if he, as a urologist, recommends that men sit down
while they pe.
Speaker 3 (21:15):
Yeah, No, I wouldn't recommend it in general. If someone
is doing it, okay, it doesn't bother me, but I
don't think they need to do so.
Speaker 1 (21:21):
I was kind of surprised to hear this, right, like,
he's basically saying there is no medical benefit to sitting
while up unless you have BPH and enlarged prostate. And
all the initial articles that I came across when I
was researching this at first took his words and kind
of contorted them to mean that you should be sitting
(21:43):
when you pee, And as you just heard, he simply
does not recommend that.
Speaker 2 (21:49):
I remember when these articles were coming out, I similarly
was like, oh, wow, have I been peeing wrong my
whole life? And it's just sort of like, no, I
guess if I have an enlarge prostate, maybe I should
sit my ass down.
Speaker 1 (22:00):
Yeah, otherwise will happen to all of us someday.
Speaker 2 (22:04):
Choose your own adventure.
Speaker 1 (22:05):
Now, that doesn't tell you anything about whether you should
prefer to sit or say still done. Yeah, if you
prefer it because it's more comfortable, you should absolutely continue
to do so, and obviously a lot of the world
is moving in that direction.
Speaker 2 (22:21):
What I wanted to hear from this conversation is there
anything bad about me sitting down?
Speaker 4 (22:26):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (22:26):
Yeah, And it sounds like his answer is not.
Speaker 4 (22:31):
All right, mannie, how about you tell us about your experiment.
Speaker 1 (22:34):
I sat while I peed for a week for a week.
Speaker 2 (22:38):
Wow, you know.
Speaker 1 (22:39):
As much as I could while I was at home.
Speaker 2 (22:41):
Yeah, and we're talking home piece.
Speaker 1 (22:43):
This was also during my trip to Atlanta. So like
when I'm in the hotel, I would sit, but outside
of that, I would stand. Generally, my experience was that
I don't know, like I almost didn't know what to think.
I was like, all right, this is uh, this is nice.
I guess if you want to do it, maybe if
(23:03):
I like let some candles in there or something like,
al right.
Speaker 4 (23:06):
Well, all right, let's take take us through a void session.
Speaker 1 (23:12):
This is Manny. I am in my bathroom, I am
needing to void, and I'm gonna do it. Uh. Sitting
down definitely feels a little bit awkward at first, knowing
that I don't have to uh defecate. I am here
(23:35):
to urinate, and I am in a seated position, and
here we go. Uh, you know, much quieter experience, obviously,
but the noise level of a typical urination doesn't really
bother me. I have just finished urinating, and I will
kind of just remain on the toilet here to hang out.
(23:59):
I guess I'll be on my out, you know, I'll
take a look at my phone no texts, snow notifications
that are super urgent, and uh yeah, I'll be honest,
I'm kind of fighting the urge not to get on
out of here.
Speaker 4 (24:17):
You're not taking advantage of this.
Speaker 1 (24:18):
I wanted to kind of be in the moment. There
were times when I would look at my phone or whatever. Oka,
but it was hard to fight that urge not to
just leave after I was oh yeah, but I guess
we just are going into the bathroom with different states
of mind.
Speaker 2 (24:36):
Yeah, it was. It's it's interesting because in life I
don't see you as a person who rushes through life.
Speaker 4 (24:43):
Well, you know, you know, you're not like a slow.
Speaker 2 (24:45):
Person, you don't. I don't think you have the traditional
Ohio like yo, hurry up. Yeah, but you're also not
someone who you know, has like a New York attitude
about things. I think you're pretty good with the flow
you're pretty relaxedly back guy. So it's inter that when
you get in the bathroom, you're on New York time, like, hey,
I got.
Speaker 1 (25:03):
To get one thing that's sitting added to my experiences.
Was thinking about this in general, and I think I
realized that I'm using the bathroom. Anything I'm doing in
the bathroom is I kind of see as a chore.
And so I thought about it as like, Okay, when
I'm washing the dishes, you know, I want to get
(25:24):
that done as soon as possible.
Speaker 2 (25:25):
You view using the bathroom as washing the dishes, like
on the same.
Speaker 1 (25:28):
Level, I think it's just like a thing I have
to do.
Speaker 4 (25:32):
There we go again that I'm to spend forty seconds voiding.
Speaker 1 (25:36):
Yeah, it's the thing that I have to do to
move on. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (25:41):
Wow, that's just If I could opt out of washing dishes,
just press the button, never have to wash the dish again.
We'll do it tomorrow.
Speaker 1 (25:48):
I probably would opt out of peeing if I never had.
Speaker 2 (25:50):
An that's crazy, I would not. I think it's such
a nice break to your day. It's like a it's
like forced alone quiet time.
Speaker 4 (25:59):
Yeah, you know, I think I do appreciate the solitude
of it. Yes, And that's part of why I like
the sitting. You know, you do get so used to
just always having a podcast on or music or something
where it's nice to sometimes be like whether I'm at
home or even just like I'm gonna go do a
chores like running errand if it's a quick thing, like yeah,
maybe I don't need my headphones on.
Speaker 1 (26:21):
Sitting while up in the bathroom ends up just being
a good vehicle for to get Yeah.
Speaker 4 (26:25):
That just like doing it like a shower.
Speaker 2 (26:27):
You know, yeah, yeah, yeah, well no music or anything.
Speaker 1 (26:30):
Yeah, yeah, I do a lot about very long shower.
Speaker 4 (26:34):
A pee is in some ways of a mini shower.
Speaker 1 (26:40):
We don't need to go on, but I think we're
gonna end the episode right there.
Speaker 2 (26:47):
All the girls standing and the life for the bathroom,
all the girls standing.
Speaker 1 (26:52):
In the line. This was no such thing. Produced by
Manny Noah and Devin. The theme song is by me Man.
Thank you to our guest doctor Gerald Collins. This question
was submitted by a listener, So if you have a
question that you want me and the Voice to get
to the bottom of, please shoot us an email at
Manny Noah deevinat gmail dot com. And I want you
(27:16):
to also do the following two things. Please subscribe to
our substack at no such thing Dot show, and leave
us five stars on whatever app you're listening to this on.
See you next week.
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