Jim Bunny Rogers Rabbits www.sunlive.co.nz

Pucker up the pelvic floor muscles, cos this is all about peeing. And the powder room powerhouse called S.S.S.S which could change the landscape of bathrooms or restrooms as we know them.

It's also about the growing phenomenon of sitzpinklers who unashamedly sitzpinkle.

A wonderful German word and delightfully onomatopoeiac. A sitzpinkler is a man who sits down to pee.

Once upon a time, a Kiwi bloke would have been deeply offended to have been labelled a sitzpinkler. It would have been a real attack on his masculinity.

'I bet he sits down to pee...” Scoff, scoff, chuckle, fall about!

Imagine Colin Meads or Richie McCaw excusing themselves for a slash and then hearing a gentle tinkle, tinkle and the unravelling of three-ply from the second cubicle. It wouldn't have happened. Kiwi blokes don't sitzpinkle…or do they?

'S.S.S.S?” asked The Doe.

'Signing over Sovereignty of the Stalls to the Sisters. It's a flourishing political movement of one. Just me at the moment.

'Let me explain.”

Equal but inequitable

Across the land, at bars, restaurants, sporting venues, cinemas, theatres, airports, you name it, there are equal numbers of men's and women's toilets. Equal but inequitable – because the needs of women are quite different of course.

They spend longer in toilets – about twice as long apparently, 90 seconds for women to 40 seconds for men. Nothing to do with preening but everything to do with wardrobe constraints and biological functions. Do we need to explain?

The upshot for women is queues – long, leg-crossing, muscle-contracting, face-scrunching, cold sweat-inducing, incident-promoting queues. More numbers – 60 per cent of women have to queue for a pee at a public facility, while it's just 11 per cent for men.

I can't remember ever having to queue.

Most of the time I have had a pee, a pie and a pint and am back in my seat for the
second half by the time some women in the queue have even got through the door towards the loo.

So… and it's a big so, they need more dunnies, many, MANY more.

It's calculated they need more than twice as many as men. And until that need is factored into plans for future ablution facilities, why don't men just throw open the ‘Men's' doors?

Sign over access and control of the under-utilised cubicles in men's loos
to the ladies? Cos we don't need most of them most of the time. Simple as that.

S.S.S.S in action.

A mate winced, sputtered and shifted uncomfortably from one leg to the other at the thought. 'But we still have to use the urinal…and….????” And what?

They want to go to the loo, they have an urge; they need a cubicle.

They won't be stopping to gaze upon a gallery of todgers. They just won't. All this on the back of a Stuff story that reported the brazen behaviour of a woman who, confronted with a queue and an urge, simply crashed the men's dunny. Love her style.

Another blow for female emancipation in the dunny. Move over guys. Eyes front.

A stander or a sitter?

It was then I tested my mate about ‘sitzpinkling' – men sitting while peeing.

Was he a stander or a sitter? He was outraged – I was assaulting his manhood. There was much harrumphing.

He didn't want to talk about it. He stands, women sit, it's always been that way, end of matter. Anecdotally he's one of the majority – all men I spoke to were unequivocal. All were standers. But Lionel Messi isn't – he's a sitter. Does one soccer player, albeit a good one, make a difference?

And does ‘sitzpinking' matter? Maybe it does, because it can be healthier. The Guardian newspaper reported German research found sitting has a more ‘favourable urodynamic profile' allowing the bladder to empty faster and more completely.

For some men with lower urinary tract symptoms caused by an enlarged prostate, the ‘sitting position is preferable to the standing'. Fascinating, mind-numbing stuff.

Collateral damage

And what about the collateral damage that comes with a standing slash? The mate claims sniper-like precision with his aim.

Bunkum, cried a colleague. She's lived with three males in the house for years. 'A woman just has to lift the toilet seat to see the carnage men leave.

'Then there's peripheral damage on the floor, my bathroom scales, the walls.”

Yukky pups. Rub their noses.

Science also disproves my ‘sniper' mate.

Apparently the stream breaks up into droplets at 15cm, the droplets then crash into one another causing even smaller droplets to fly off every which way. His ‘sniper-like precision' is a nonsense. Swab the floor and see.

Forty per cent of German men are sitters, the French, Swedes and Danes all about 20 per cent and believe it or not, 25 per cent of Australian men.

Although they'd deny it. Red-blooded, best in the world at everything ‘Ocker' blokes sitting down to pee? They would go on national TV, cry and deny it.

Anyhow it all points to a change in habits and attitudes.

Perhaps single-sex toilets and urinals are obsolete? Perhaps we should be building masses of uni-sex cubicles. No queues, no mess, no discomfort, better health, happy women. Or is that pee-ing into the wind?

I must away and wash my hands.

Your thoughts? Email: hunter@thesun.co.nz