I don’t know about you, but, if I don’t shower at least once a day I feel icky. It’s usually twice a day. Which makes me a climate heretic, especially since bathing a lot is something knew. I’m betting that the NY Times has rules about people coming to work unbathed
See Fewer People. Take Fewer Showers.
Robin Harper, an administrative assistant at a preschool on Martha’s Vineyard, grew up showering every day.
“It’s what you did,†she said. But when the coronavirus pandemic forced her indoors and away from the general public, she started showering once a week.
The new practice felt environmentally virtuous, practical and freeing. And it has stuck.
“Don’t get me wrong,†said Ms. Harper, 43, who has returned to work. “I like showers. But it’s one thing off my plate. I’m a mom. I work full-time, and it’s one less thing I have to do.â€
A shower can take a couple of minutes, right? Sure, we all probably take longer, luxuriating under the water. I can be in and out in 2-3 minutes. Within one song (of course, some of the songs, especially metal ones, can take 4-7 minutes).
The pandemic upended the use of zippered pants and changed people’s eating and drinking habits. There are now indications that it has caused some Americans to become more spartan when it comes to ablutions.
Parents have complained that their teenage children are forgoing daily showers. After the British media reported on a YouGov survey that showed 17 percent of Britons had abandoned daily showers during the pandemic, many people on Twitter said they had done the same.
After the pandemic forced her into lockdown, Ms. Whaley, 49, said she began thinking about why she was showering every day.
“Do I need to? Do I want to?†she said. “The act of taking a shower became less a matter of function and more of a matter of doing something for myself that I enjoyed.â€
I prefer being clean. Even during lockdown.
Daily showers are a fairly new phenomenon, said Donnachadh McCarthy, an environmentalist and writer in London who grew up taking weekly baths.
“We had a bath once a week and we washed under at the sink the rest of the week — under our armpits and our privates — and that was it,†Mr. McCarthy, 61, said.
As he grew older, he showered every day. But after a visit to the Amazon jungle in 1992 revealed the ravages of overdevelopment, Mr. McCarthy said he began reconsidering how his daily habits were affecting the environment and his own body. (followed by paragraphs about this being a rather new phenomena)
An eight-minute shower uses up to 17 gallons of water, according to the Water Research Fund. Running water for even five minutes uses as much energy as running a 60-watt light bulb for 14 hours, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. And frequent washing means going through more plastic bottles and using more soap, which is often made with petroleum.
And here we go
The individual choice to stop showering or bathing daily is a critical one to make at a time when environmentalists are calling on countries to take more action against climate change, Mr. McCarthy, the environmentalist, said.
Still, Professor Armstrong said, it would take a huge number of people changing their bathing habits to make a difference in carbon emissions. To make a real impact, local and federal governments have to invest in infrastructure that makes showering and water use in general less harmful for the environment.
In other words, they would have to pass laws and rules to restrict bathing.
Read: NY Times Wants You To Shower Less To Help Solve The Climate Emergency (scam) »