AIBU: handsoap?

[Dottdoo]

What's the view?

Is it unreasonable to switch to a bar of soap instead of pump dispensing handwash in bathrooms and kitchen? I made the switch in our ensuite and it's lasted yonks. Plus no plastic to throw away and storing bars of soap is easier. I'm converted.

But I can't help thinking would guests be thinking 'ewww no hand-wash in the bathroom only a bar of soap, this is disgusting?'

Plus is a bar of soap as hygienic for washing hands in the kitchen?

YABU - ewwww gross, save the planet but do it with clean hands at least and without weirding out visitors
YANBU - it's soap - does the same job, do it! I might do it now too! Or/ I already do this.

I use bar soap for all the reasons mentioned but leave handwash out for a regular visitor who doesn't think bar soap is hygienic. Although she would have grown up with it in the 70s

For those who are anti-bar soap because it either dries out in the guest room or goes all squidgy, buy a good antibac soap such as Dettol and cut a bar into three or six smaller soaps. That way chucking them out when they offend you doesn't seem that wasteful.

I remember Imperial Leather making my skin so dry it would squeak. There are bars with moisturiser in now though.

@WeirdlyKind it doesn’t matter to me but I thought it might matter to the kind of people that think bar soap is dirty

Well I went to a friend's house the other day, used their bathroom, noticed they had bar soap, though "good for you, I might switch too", washed my hands and thought nothing more of it!

Give me a bar of soap over pretty handwash any day - my hands never feel properly clean after washing with liquid soap however hard or long I wash them for!

@Blossomtoes and @snippysocks

The pp is correct is saying soap washes the germs off, it doesn't kill them necessarily. However, if you use the soap correctly, you'll wash off any new bacteria transferred from your bar soap.

I use liquid soap as my children are bad at using bar soap properly.

We have both. The liquid soap was bought about three years ago, and is still almost full, so I guess most people we know prefer bar soap.

My mother also has both, but in her case the bar soap lasts much longer than the liquid. It's possible I'm the only person using Mum's bar soap.

I have a refillable JosephJoseph liquid soap dispenser in the kitchen- the type that you press with the back of your hand, and it dispenses into your palm. I love it as it seems very hygenic.

I always hated bar soap just because the perfect soap dish does not exist.

Liquid soap really shouldn’t be generating much waste. We buy a large bottle of concentrated soap and just refill the containers at each sink over and over. I suspect the one large bottle I buy a year adds up to about the wrappers on all the bars of soap we would buy.

Liquid soap is more hygienic and and creates less waste overall provided you're using it properly. The good thing is that it doesn't come wrapped in cellophane or whatever they use to wrap soap bars in, that's terrible for the planet.

I am not averse to using soap bars in my own home but dislike using them in someone else's house or, even worse, in a public toilet (uncommon but happens at smaller touristy places). The trouble is, you don't know where the soap has been. There are people who use the same bar of soap for washing hands as they do for cleaning themselves when they've had a bath. I don't want to use something that's been used to clean someone's arsehole to clean my own hands.

PS am I the only one for whom the term "soapbar" immediately conjures up the old GLC song?

Burned a new hole in my tracksuit today,
Smoking soap bar without an ashtray,
Red-hot nylon dripping on my skin,
I ripped the fucker off, and threw it in the bin,
Soap bar's cheap, and so's my clothes,
They've gotta be cause of all the fucking holes,
It tastes like shit and it makes you cough,
And it's the fucking rubber in it that gets you off.

I don't want to use something that's been used to clean someone's arsehole to clean my own hands

Why would you even think of this? I've never heard of nor ever have rubbed a bar of soap on my arsehole.

@deadlanguage

Bar soap is less gross than liquid soap! When you use liquid soap you’ve got the pump that you touched with dirty hands but with a bar of soap you just touch the soap itself which is inherently clean.

But why does it matter if you touch a dirty pump when you're about to wash your hands?

If I use a shared/used soap bar, I find myself washing the bar first so it sheds the top, maybe germy layer, then washing my hands, then giving the bar a rinse so it's clean for the next person, then rinsing the soap off my hands again.

It's ok if it's clean but manky shared soap in a dish is rank.

@Myturnatlast

I have both so people can make their own choice

That's fair as I guess The hand wash will Last longer

The absolute nicest bar soap is Savon de Marseille. Various different places sell it - I have bought from indie shops and from eBay. Loads of different natural scents and smells amazing. Comes loose so no packaging (sellers usually pop in a paper bag). You can also get huge cube blocks of it.

Bar soap also great for washing in the shower - I feel way fresher.

I use a bar of soap underneath my bottom bedsheets to avoid night cramp....

@Rosehugger

If I use a shared/used soap bar, I find myself washing the bar first so it sheds the top, maybe germy layer, then washing my hands, then giving the bar a rinse so it's clean for the next person, then rinsing the soap off my hands again.

It's ok if it's clean but manky shared soap in a dish is rank.

Nothing like a cracked, brown edged bar of soap in a public toilet in the 80s

...misses whole point of thread

@NarcissasMumintheDoghouse

Soap gets rid of stuff, it doesn't kill germs. A bar of soap can retain live bacteria.

Better not Google about all the billions of bacteria you have living on / in you then.

I always wondered who on earth the adverts about GERMS ON YOUR LAUNDRY or GERMS IN YOUR CARPET were shouting their messages to, now I know.

Nothing like a cracked, brown edged bar of soap in a public toilet in the 80s

Yes. Entirely responsible for the liquid soap trend!

I wonder how people coped with just a bar of soap before liquid soap was invented?. You know like my Grand Parents who lived well in to their eighties.

Pretty sure there is evidence that the surface of proper soap is very inhospitable to bacteria.much more so than the inert plastic pump dispenser 🙄 It's alkaline. Obviously something like Dove doesn't count as that is a detergent bar.
I make soap, so I'm not buying liquid ever again whatever the family think. May mean slightly more cleaning of the sink, but really not a massive deal. I haven't bought soap for three years now and my skin is the best it has ever been and being farming folk, we wash our hands alot.
I'm sat here wondering how some people make the leap that a bar of soap in someone's hand basin will have touched any sphincters at any point. Is that how you wash your arsehole in your house? 😏

I've had the same thoughts OP!
I bought a 6-pack of bar soap way back at the start of lockdown 1 & only running out now.
I've kept liquid soap in the kitchen/ downstairs loo though, as I'm concerned visitors would think the bars of soap are yuk! I know it's silly

@Powaqa

I use a bar of soap underneath my bottom bedsheets to avoid night cramp....

What's this?? Please explain @Powaqa

@GoogleWhacked - there is a home remedy that says putting a bar of soap at the bottom of your bed will stop you from getting night cramps.
I suffered terribly until I did this and now I don't.

I know a lot of people who say it works but there are some who have said it didnt work for them - I'm just grateful I no longer get them.

You do have to replace the soap every couple of months