Harvey Molotch
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- October 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780691163581
- eISBN:
- 9781400852338
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Princeton University Press
- DOI:
- 10.23943/princeton/9780691163581.003.0002
- Subject:
- Political Science, Security Studies
This chapter takes up what might at first appear an unlikely setting for examining security dynamics: the public restroom. There are lessons to be taken from this venue, so often ignored in serious ...
More
This chapter takes up what might at first appear an unlikely setting for examining security dynamics: the public restroom. There are lessons to be taken from this venue, so often ignored in serious scholarship and indeed the usual basis only for jokes. Here we can see anxieties in play and all sorts of unsavory mechanisms, both at the micro and macro level, that come in response. The toilet allows us to see the combination of factors that repress—the usual culprits of class, race, and gender discrimination—but also soulful anxieties that come with the more basic human territory. Some degree of capitalist plot is happening, but that is only part of the story—a larger lesson to be considered across other less intimate realms, whether market-based or not. Whatever the combination of sources, the chapter points the way toward a safer and more pleasant toilet and one with the promise of ecological reform.Less
This chapter takes up what might at first appear an unlikely setting for examining security dynamics: the public restroom. There are lessons to be taken from this venue, so often ignored in serious scholarship and indeed the usual basis only for jokes. Here we can see anxieties in play and all sorts of unsavory mechanisms, both at the micro and macro level, that come in response. The toilet allows us to see the combination of factors that repress—the usual culprits of class, race, and gender discrimination—but also soulful anxieties that come with the more basic human territory. Some degree of capitalist plot is happening, but that is only part of the story—a larger lesson to be considered across other less intimate realms, whether market-based or not. Whatever the combination of sources, the chapter points the way toward a safer and more pleasant toilet and one with the promise of ecological reform.
Harvey Molotch
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- October 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780691163581
- eISBN:
- 9781400852338
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Princeton University Press
- DOI:
- 10.23943/princeton/9780691163581.001.0001
- Subject:
- Political Science, Security Studies
The inspections we put up with at airport gates and the endless warnings we get at train stations, on buses, and all the rest are the way we encounter the vast apparatus of U.S. security. Like the ...
More
The inspections we put up with at airport gates and the endless warnings we get at train stations, on buses, and all the rest are the way we encounter the vast apparatus of U.S. security. Like the wars fought in its name, these measures are supposed to make us safer in a post-9/11 world. But do they? This book explains how these regimes of command-and-control not only annoy and intimidate but are counterproductive. The book takes the reader through the sites, the gizmos, and the politics to urge greater trust in basic citizen capacities—along with smarter design of public spaces. The book criticizes a range of security structures and protocols: airport security that requires body searches while generating long lines of queuing people; New Orleans water projects that precipitated the Hurricane Katrina flood, and the militarized disaster response that further endangered residents; even gender-segregated public restrooms. The book recommends simple improvements, from better structural design and signage to assist evacuations to customer-service procedures that help employees to spot trouble. More so, it argues for a shift away from command and control toward a security philosophy that empowers ordinary people to handle crises. The result is a far-reaching re-examination of the culture of public fear.Less
The inspections we put up with at airport gates and the endless warnings we get at train stations, on buses, and all the rest are the way we encounter the vast apparatus of U.S. security. Like the wars fought in its name, these measures are supposed to make us safer in a post-9/11 world. But do they? This book explains how these regimes of command-and-control not only annoy and intimidate but are counterproductive. The book takes the reader through the sites, the gizmos, and the politics to urge greater trust in basic citizen capacities—along with smarter design of public spaces. The book criticizes a range of security structures and protocols: airport security that requires body searches while generating long lines of queuing people; New Orleans water projects that precipitated the Hurricane Katrina flood, and the militarized disaster response that further endangered residents; even gender-segregated public restrooms. The book recommends simple improvements, from better structural design and signage to assist evacuations to customer-service procedures that help employees to spot trouble. More so, it argues for a shift away from command and control toward a security philosophy that empowers ordinary people to handle crises. The result is a far-reaching re-examination of the culture of public fear.
