Name: Toilet scrolling.
Age: At least a decade and a half.
Appearance: One of the most dangerous things you can do.
This is either about excessive toilet paper use or … No, it’s about people using their phones as they sit on the toilet.
Gross. Oh, don’t pretend you don’t do it. Everyone looks at their phone on the toilet. What else are you going to do? Sit there and consider the cold and unending expanse of the universe?
Good point. Anyway, it isn’t good for you.
Why? Because you can give yourself backache by bending over and you’ve used your pulled-down underwear as a kind of makeshift phone holster? Is this something that you do? If it is, we should have a serious discussion.
No. I’ve never done that. Anyway, it’s bad for you in other ways. Obviously there is the hygiene issue. Keeping your phone in your hands while you pee is a recipe for bacteria. The average phone screen, it is said, is dirtier than the average public toilet seat.
That’s no good. Don’t sweat it too much. Everything is dirty in a bathroom. Five years ago, a scientist warned people about “toilet bloom”, which is the cloud of invisible germs that explodes out of your toilet whenever you flush. Long story short, if you keep your toothbrush in the bathroom when you flush the toilet, there’s a chance you’re rubbing fecal particles against your teeth.
So I can keep using my phone on the loo. No, don’t! It’ll give you haemorrhoids.
Will it? Potentially. A gastroenterologist in San Francisco, Dr Saurabh Sethi, has claimed that doing this increases the amount of time you spend on the toilet. This leads to “increased strain on your rectum and anus”, which can lead to piles, anal fissures and even rectal prolapse.
How did you hear about this? By watching Dr Sethi’s TikTok video.
Right. And where were you at the time? I see where this is going. I was sitting on the toilet.
And what happened? Let’s just say I am now a leading shareholder in Preparation H, the piles ointment.
Listen, I’m busy. Is it really so bad to watch YouTube on my phone while I hide from my family? There are risks, obviously. But you have to ask yourself one question. Which is worse: the theoretical risk of haemorrhoids or the very real risk of being nagged about mowing the lawn?
I’ll take my chances on the toilet. Very smart.
Do say: “Using your phone on the toilet is bad for you.”
Don’t say: “Instead, why not try ruining your health by reading a book on the toilet, like the old days?”
