Toilet seat

A Bemis Manufacturing Company toilet seat for a flush toilet.

A toilet seat is a hinged unit consisting of seat and lid which is bolted onto a toilet bowl for a flush toilet. A toilet seat consists of the seat itself, which may be contoured for the user to sit on, and the lid, which covers the toilet when it is not in use.

If the toilet is located in a home bathroom, when the lid is down it can serve as a place to sit while one is cutting toenails, drying ones feet after a bath or shower, etc.

The seat is lifted during a male's standing urination, or when cleaning the toilet.

Etiquette

While males are used to raising the seat, females are not. Females do not typically raise the seat for anything other than cleaning. A toilet seat tab can be used to alleviate this problem by reminding males to put it down for females and makes it cleaner and easier to lift/lower the seat.

Another line of reasoning holds that the appearance of the toilet, and by extension the bathroom, is best when the toilet lid is down. In some cultures, this is the best rule of conduct because then both male and female must equally handle the lid and/or the seat in order to use the toilet for any reason; while it not only appears more aesthetic it also makes way for a level of equality between the sexes: the male is not alone in having to lift the seat and/or the lid before using the toilet because with the lid always down, both male and female will have to lift the lid in order to achieve access. Culturally, this more aesthetically pleasing to their users.^{[citation needed]}

The toilet seat lid can be placed down prior to flushing to reduce the spread of bacteria through the air onto other items in the room. This reduces the chances of other articles in the room (e.g., toothbrushes) becoming contaminated by said bacteria.

Styles

They are manufactured in a range of different styles and colors and they may come matching the style of the toilet itself. They may be built to fit the shape of the toilet bowl; two examples of this being the elongated bowl and the regular bowl. The price of toilet seats varies quite considerably.

Some metal toilets, such as those in many jails and prisons, have built-in toilet seats that do not lift, so that the inmate cannot fashion it into a weapon or escape tool.

Some are made of various types of fancy wooden materials, like oak or walnut, and others are made soft for added comfort. At various times, printed seats, with multi-colored designs, such as floral or newsprint, have been fashionable.

Open front toilet seats

In the United States, Uniform Plumbing Code Section 409.2.2 requires an open front seat: "All water closet seats, except those within dwelling units or for private use, shall be of the open front type."

One school of thought believes the gap in the open front reduces the amount of urine that lands on the seat if it is not lifted, as most of the urine will land in the gap. Another thought is that the gap exists so that the genitalia of one user cannot contact the seat and therefore possibly spread disease to a subsequent user if their genitals contact the same area.^{[citation needed]} A third, and more progressive school of thought, concludes that the "U" Shape of public toilet seats can be attributed to ergonomical concerns of seated users.

Toilet seats found in homes and homelike settings generally have fully circular seats with no gap (closed front).^{[citation needed]}

Commercial use

A black toilet seat in a public washroom.

In the United States and Canada, the toilet seats commonly seen in public washrooms are designed differently in order to ensure better sanitation. They are usually made with a gap in the front-center and no cover, which reduces the amount of spatter and eases the job of cleaning for janitorial staff. They can be either white or black, with frequency of one color versus the other varying by region and sometimes regulated by the jurisdiction's laws.

Despite these safety features, the toilet may be contaminated with fecal particles, urine, semen, and other related germs.

Outside the United States and Canada, most toilet seats in washrooms appear just like those found in private homes in the country.^{[citation needed]}

Outhouses and portapotties

The toilet seats in the portapotties tend to be black U-shaped-open-front with a cover. The toilet seats in outhouses however tend to be white U-shaped-open-front with a cover.

Modern design, electronic integration and function

The 21st century has seen a new wave of toilet seats introduced, for both style and technology. High tech toilet seats sometimes include a large number of features, including a bidet, a blow drier, and a heated seat.

That particular technology is most common in Japan, where it is colloquially called the Washlet.

Humor

The toilet seat functions as a comic staple for sight gags relating to toilet humor. The most common is someone staggering out of a bathroom after an explosion with a toilet seat around his neck. In the television show Dead Like Me, George Lass, the main character, is killed when a zero-G toilet seat from space station Mir re-enters the atmosphere.

Manufacturers

Canada

• Crane Plumbing Corporation

Japan

• Toto Ltd. (Washlet)

United States

• American Standard
• Bemis
• Beneke
• Centoco
• Church
• Eljer
• Gerber
• Kohler
• Mayfair
• Murray
• Olsonite
• Sperzel
• (Standard)
• Westport

U.S. Navy's "$600 Toilet Seat"

The P-3C Orion antisubmarine aircraft went into service in 1962. Twenty-five years later it was determined that the toilet shroud, the cover that fits over the toilet, needed replacement. Since the airplane was out of production this would require new tooling to produce. These on-board toilets required a uniquely shaped, molded fiberglass shroud that had to satisfy specifications for vibration resistance, weight, and durability. The molds had to be specially made, as it had been decades since their original production. The price reflected the design work and the cost of the equipment to manufacture them. Lockheed Corp. charged $34,560 for 54 toilet covers, or $640 each.

President Reagan held a televised news conference in 1987, where he held up one of these shrouds and stated: "We didn't buy any $600 toilet seat. We bought a $600 molded plastic cover for the entire toilet system." A Pentagon spokesman, Glenn Flood stated, "The original price we were charged was $640, not just for a toilet seat, but for the large molded plastic assembly covering the entire seat, tank and full toilet assembly. The seat itself cost $9 and some cents.… The supplier charged too much, and we had the amount corrected." The president of Lockheed at the time, Lawrence Kitchen, adjusted to the price to $100 each and returned $29,165. "This action is intended to put to rest an artificial issue," Kitchen stated.

See also

• Toilet seat cover

Further reading

• Choi, Jay Pil (November 2002), "Up or Down? A Male Economist’s Manifesto on the Toilet Seat Etiquette", Economic Inquiry (online in advance of print), doi:10.1111/j.1465-7295.2009.00277.x, https://www.msu.edu/~choijay/etiquette.pdf 
• Siddiqi, Hammad (12 October 2006), "The social norm of leaving the toilet seat down: A game theoretic analysis", Economics Bulletin 28 (13): A0, http://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/856/ 
• Nadler, Amos (1 October 2010), "Considerate Economist on Proper Bathroom Etiquette", The Considerate Economist, http://considerateeconomist.blogspot.com/2010/10/considerate-economist-on-proper.html 

External links

• An examination of the toilet seat up vs down scenario by Hammad Siddiqi
• Isotope Comics in San Francisco - home of the Comics Rockstar Toilet Seat Museum
• The Troublesome Toilet Seat: Up or Down? Three Schemes