Shutterstock
There are plenty of benefits to living in the age of technology, but I’d argue one of the best upsides is that we no longer have to worry about what to do to distract ourselves while going to the bathroom. In the dark days of the past, people resorted to reading the ingredients on shampoo bottles and suffering through articles in Reader’s Digest to pass the time, but we’ve thankfully evolved as a society, and the world is a better place because of it.
Each person has their own routine when it comes to occupying themselves— I personally prefer to refresh Twitter way too many times on the off chance North Korea finally lives up to its word while I’m doing my business, but that’s just one of the endless options available to anyone who doesn’t have a crippling fear of dropping their phone into the toilet. I normally wouldn’t judge anyone for how they decide to spend their time, but I’ve just become aware of a trend I simply can’t get behind.
Netflix recently conducted a study of more than 37,000 users from around the world, and if their results are to be believed, 12% of people have admitted to watching Netflix in a public restroom. As The Wrap notes, this means 13 million people have made the conscious decision to pop in their headphones and spend more time in a public bathroom than absolutely necessary, which is far too high of a number as far as I’m concerned.
In fairness, 37% of people have admitted to watching Netflix at work, so there’s a chance a sizeable chunk of those 13 million were merely people who want to maximize the amount they’re paid to poop— a strategy I can’t help but respect.
Netflix released a graphic containing some of the other information gleaned from the 67% of people who have copped to watching the platform in public.
After thinking about things a bit more, I feel like I might have come off as a bit too judgmental. At the end of the day, I don’t really care what you do in public as long as you keep your fucking headphones plugged in.