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Editor's note
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Dear employee, it has come to our attention that you’ve been visiting the toilet very frequently lately. Please report to HR immediately to discuss options for ablutions management.
This might seem an unlikely way to begin an email, but unfortunately, it’s a reality for many workers around the world. In the quest for optimal productivity, some employers monitor how much time their staff spend in the water closet. The phenomenon plumbed new lows recently when a manufacturer unveiled a design for a toilet that slopes downwards, making it too uncomfortable to sit on for longer than five minutes.
This is obviously a miserable approach to workplace morale, but we learnt this week that it’s not even effective as a tactic to get people to work more productively.
So people must be left to linger in shared loos. They are an important space for humans – and not just because of the purpose for which they were originally intended. As anyone who has ever read the wonderful poem To the Woman Crying Uncontrollably in the Next Stall knows, they are social environments where unusual bonds are formed. That’s particularly true for ladies’ loos, as a recent study of toilet graffiti revealed. Instead of crass jokes, an academic hunting for bathroom scrawlings found cries for help and messages of support written all over the cubicles.
The UK has now left the European Union, as of 11pm last night. If you’re wondering why nothing feels that different this morning, it’s because nothing is different. All parties are now in a transition period while they work out what their future relationship will be. A helpful timeline should shed some light on what happens over the next few months. Researchers have also been looking into what the general public most wants out of trade
negotiations, and it’s quite enlightening.
Also this week, we’ve been looking at how the coronavirus outbreak can be contained and why the UK government was left with little choice but to sign a deal with Huawei.
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Laura Hood
Politics Editor, Assistant Editor
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Don’t take too long.
Shutterstock
Madeleine Gabriel, Nesta
Tilting toilets are the latest suggestion to limit time spent on the loo at work.
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The graffiti in the men’s toilets tends to be more competitive while in the women’s it is more supportive.
Kostsov/Shutterstock
Mabel Victoria, Edinburgh Napier University
From crude drawing to advice and support, the scrawlings on toilet walls reveal differing communication patterns between the sexes
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This is just the beginning of the story.
PA/Gareth Fuller
Simon Usherwood, University of Surrey
It’s rapidly becoming a truism to say that Brexit isn’t done. But what does that actually mean?
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Remain voters overwhelmingly prioritise a deal with the EU.
Amani A / Shutterstock.com
Daniel Keith, University of York; Liisa Talving, University of Tartu; Sofia Vasilopoulou, University of York
How the public ranks different post-Brexit trade partners and which sections of the economy they prioritise.
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Body temperature being checked at the exit of a railway station in Fuyang, Anhui province, China, January 29 2020.
AN Ming/EPA
Fei Chen, University of Liverpool
China’s strategy to contain the coronavirus just might work because of the way cities and infrastructure have been developed.
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Nick Atkinson, Nottingham Trent University
The UK's official climate advisor recommends up to 50,000 hectares of new woodland each year by 2050.
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C Raina MacIntyre, UNSW; Abrar Ahmad Chughtai, UNSW
People panic-buying face masks to protect themselves from coronavirus risk running down stocks should we really need them.
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Anne P. DePrince, University of Denver; Joan M. Cook, Yale University
As women began to come forward with experiences of rape and abuse, backlash came forward too. The notion of 'false memory' developed to explain away assault. Here's why that notion itself is untrue.
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Barry Richards, Bournemouth University
Different types of rule-breaking leaders can appeal to transgressive parts of ourselves.
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Greig Paul, University of Strathclyde
After Theresa May passed the buck, her successor has put pragmatism first.
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Emma Hart, University of St Andrews
The US reaction to the UK's digital tax proposals is like 1765 all over again.
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Featured events
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Room SLB/118, Spring Lane Building, Campus West, York, York, YO10 5DD, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland — University of York
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Bowland Auditorium, Berrick Saul Building, Campus West, York, York, YO10 5DD, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland — University of York
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Room RCH/037, Ron Cooke Hub, Campus East, York, York, YO10 5GE, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland — University of York
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Room SLB/118, Spring Lane Building, Campus West, York, York, YO10 5DD, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland — University of York
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