A question of ethics and politeness

By David Verveer

I know that the subject I need to discuss with you is nearly taboo and certainly not considered suitable for a conservation piece, but in heaven name, without thoroughly arguing it out, will we ever know if we sin against the norms, when we answer and talk on the mobile while visiting the lavatory.

Don't give me now immediately your gut feelings (pun not intended) and tell me that this subject is too vulgar for discussion, I need to remind you that everybody has to go sometime, and the caller doesn't know where you are precisely at the moment of the call. It might be important, perhaps a cry for help, or a call from your long lost friend, who knows. In reality, you can not ignore it, if you have a mobile, you have to answer the call, irrelevant where you are and what you do.

But, and this is of course a very theoretical question, the lavatory call is from her majesty the queen, (don't give the meek excuse uttered by my wife, who said, why in would the queen "ausgerechnet du/" of all people phone you, the You, sounded insulting, suggesting that I was not worthy a phone-call from her royal highness), I have to admit that until now, she has never phoned me, but who knows? If she would have called me, and I would have answered the phone, while sitting down and doing things which one does (even royalty) at such sites, would my words be considered blaspheme or due to the fact that the caller does not realize my actions at that moment, this can be thought of one of those situations which are silently accepted and tolerated. I remember the legend that a person who was knighted only a few minutes before, lifted in public the dress of a lady, to see her garter, and when the audience snickered, he said in French (sounds much better in that language) "dishonored are thou, who thinks wrong of this" Oni soit qui mal y pense.

In my young days, when I was instructed the basic rules of ethics, we did not have a phone at home, certainly not one with sufficient long cord to reach the lavatory, thus behavior with phones was not included in the curriculum of basic behavior. I remember that my brother would take the news paper section with the comics to read while on the W.C., which we thought was rather un-polished, but it seems that this was not the reason to ruin his position in society

You might ask me now, what is wrong with you, that are problems to discuss on cyber net, what about the Israel Palestinian struggle, what about the World financial crisis, and what about the Global heating? Are those not more important subjects than answering or not answering the phone on the WC? It might be that you are correct, but on the other hand, if we feel embarrassed to deal with our daily problems, why attempting to deal with subjects we can not and will not solve.

In pre-defense against angry comments of readers, who might think I did injustice to her majesty the queen and the protocol, I never told you, which queen I am referring to and in which country she rules.