You should do this anyway to minimize particle spray upon flushing
this post was submitted on 11 Aug 2026
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Once saw an experiment using reactive dye and a toilet, they flushed it with the lid up and down. When down it sprayed out the sides, when up it literally covered the whole room.
Especially toothbrushes!!
Poop is everywhere!
https://mythresults.com/episode12
Fecal coliform were indeed found on all the test brushes, including the control ones. However, none were of a level high enough to be dangerous, and experts confirm that such bacteria are impossible to completely avoid.
I mean... impossible to avoid entirely, but still potentially good to close the lid to be on the side of cleanliness, especially when it is so trivially easy to simply close the lid to significantly reduce exposure.
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Both seats should always be shut before flushing. The lid is there for a reason. Guys that keep the seats up have pees and shit all over their bathrooms, including their toothbrushes. I hope this horifies many of you. It really should.
iirc, Mythbusters confirmed that this doesn't matter, at least in regards to shit particulates being over everything.
However, as an individual who has a bedroom right next to the bathroom, I can personally say the smell is a night and day difference between the lid being up or down before flushing.
Between the toothbrushes and the attempt to create a sterile salsa to find out if double dipping matters, Mythbusters taught me that it's a filthy bacteria's world, and we're just living in it.
Maybe it doesn't matter to Mythbusters, but it matters to me.
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And even if that weren't the case, having the lid down prevents stuff from falling in. Lids down when not in use.
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everyone should put the seat fully down and flush, everytime, everyone.
I put the seat down before I shit.
It's literally cleaner / more hygienic to close the toilet completely before flushing
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Malicious compliance? No, this is just basic decency
I put the lid down to prevent shit particles from spreading
that's what it's for. Didn't learn that until quite recently.
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There is only one correct way. Lid closed when not in use and before flush. The sole exception was at my old house the spare bathroom was configured to allow the birds to perch above the toilet to poop but at the current one they are training to use garbage bins with a fig branch above to have more poop spots since only the pigeon would fly through the whole house to get to the toilet and the rest only if they were already nearby.
I know this is off topic a bit but... Tell me more about your birds! A pet pigeon you say? I hear they're fun to train and not too messy by pet bird standards.
Birds lore drop time I guess:
Pigeons are way smarter than people typically give them credit for but they are kinda dumb in weird ways. If you don't train them they will shit everywhere and they shed a lot of feathers and certain ones stick to everything and none of the parrot feathers seem to have that property. The runny poop is caused by some sort of microbe or something that she got treated for and then she drops nugs instead.
They don't seem to pay as much attention to their feet as parrots do. I had a box fan with the furnace filters on it in a cube shape blowing upward and she would just stand on it with the blades buzzing against her toenails so I switched to triangle layout blowing to the side.
Air filters are needed for any birds beyond maybe one budgie or finch but bigger or dustier birds justify one on their own. Pigeon is almost par with the notorious african grey in dustiness.
Pigeons are also super clingy and needy and always want to be with their favourite person at any expense. She will fly up and stomp by the door if I have to close the birds in their room. When she's out its constantly trying to preen my face and eyeballs unlike cockatiels and most other parrots that preen my hair. The eye poke isnt malicious but it's still awful.
Pigeons can also fully memorize the layout of a house and will establish a schedule. Mine would wake up and eat, fly around a bunch until I wake up, stick to me for as long as possible before and after work, fly all the way to the top floor toilet to poop, when my mom gets home she flies downstairs to get fed the same food but it tastes better from mom and all the birds agree, then flies back after eating and watching whatever garbage shows my parents like, then demands scritches for the remainer of the day.
I use a shop vac for the feathers and the poop during retraining for the new poop stations. I'm going to be trying out robo vac with mop if the other birds don't figure it out fairly soon. Hopefully they do because its been a lot of extra cleaning since I moved.
I've had as many as 9 birds at one time. Apart from my elderly cockatiel that came from an egg his parents secretly laid in my bookshelf decades ago, they are all shelter and rescue birds usually middle age or older. My daily schedule includes administering each of their medications which usually means blunt tipped syringe and like 0.3 to 0.8ml of up to 3 meds per bird, and recently even eyedrops for my cockatiel. A pigeon will be interfering the whole time guaranteed.
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Always close the toilet lid when you aren’t using it, and before you flush it. Leaving the seat open is disgusting.
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Wait, closing both is malicious compliance?
I generally believe if your anatomy requires the toilet seat in a certain position, it should be incumbent upon you to ensure it's in the right spot before you use it. 50% (ish) of people usually need it up, and 50% usually need it down, why should girls get to dictate this and complain if I don't preemptively put it down for them? Suck it up, buttercup. Put on (or I guess take off, in this case) your big girl panties and make it work.
That being said, I've just always closed the whole thing before I flush anyway, so now both of us are going to need to raise at least one layer of it before we can use it again. Closed lid reduces splashing the poop particles all over the place, looks nicer and cleaner, hides any racing stripes you haven't managed to pee off yet, etc. Just seems like the right way to go. Nothing malicious about it.
Edit: Jesus fuck, how many stupid gotcha replies are y'all gonna post here?! Yes, I am very clear on the fact that there isn't exactly a 50.000000:50.000000 split of males to females in the world. Yes, I am very clear that it is in fact possible, and sometimes preferred, for men to sit to pee, and that, having done it more than a few times myself, they also occasionally need to sit down to poop. None of that was anywhere near my point.
My point is that if you want or need the toilet seat in a particular position, that's on you, bucko. It's not my job to stage the toilet to your preference, regardless of what is or isn't going on in your undercarriage. I leave it 100% closed, seat and lid, every time, before I flush. What you do with it after that is on you.
~50% of people are capable of using it while standing, that doesn't mean all want to. I've heard a fair number of men rag on men who won't sit on their own toilet and splash piss everywhere, since it just makes a mess you have to clean up. So the math is actually tipped more in favor of sitters, who make up a non-zero proportion of people who are able to pee while standing, plus everyone who's obligated to pee while sitting.
I think it's weird to care about lifting the lid, but leaving it up shows you left it open while it flushed and that's kinda gross to a lot of people.
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We do this anyway. The lid literally exists for basic hygeine purposes.
Be amazed at how less you have to clean the toilet and surrounding area by closing the lid, jeez.
Some people leave their bio-waste disposals open? How revolting.
I have become a sitdown pee-r. The slashback you cant see is kinda insane
Side effect is that i have to actually use my toilet brush now because the brown water ring doesnt get washed away 9x a day anymore
The hell does your toilet have two seats instead of 1 seat and a lid for?
1 seat for adults, 1 seat for toddlers and the lid
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I would be ecstatic if my SO did this. Our cats are prone to playing with the water.
I support, it makes it fair for everyone! Everyone puts down seats, everyone puts up seats. Yay.
Embrace peeing sitting. It'll change your life.
Given that every supposed dude I've ever known who did that later came out as a trans woman, I think the changing of your life is already in the cards when you make that call.
Eh, I knew a straight cis-guy who peed sitting down. But he was legally blind, so it made sense.
Both my teenage sons do, I’m not sure what I did to deserve such fortunes in life.
Related - that's kinda when peeing sitting shines - peeing half-asleep with lights off. All you gotta do is manage to locate the seat with your ass cheeks. Then just sit there, no need to aim, pay attention, have the light on so you can see (if you can't echolocate), but even if you can echolocate mistakes are common and yelling isn't far behind. You just sit there and it happens without getting proper awake.
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