this post was submitted on 18 Dec 2024
823 points (96.7% liked)
memes
10666 readers
2616 users here now
Community rules
1. Be civil
No trolling, bigotry or other insulting / annoying behaviour
2. No politics
This is non-politics community. For political memes please go to [email protected]
3. No recent reposts
Check for reposts when posting a meme, you can only repost after 1 month
4. No bots
No bots without the express approval of the mods or the admins
5. No Spam/Ads
No advertisements or spam. This is an instance rule and the only way to live.
Sister communities
- [email protected] : Star Trek memes, chat and shitposts
- [email protected] : Lemmy Shitposts, anything and everything goes.
- [email protected] : Linux themed memes
- [email protected] : for those who love comic stories.
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
The fuck? No...?
The US is clownish and backwards in a lot of ways but this is not one of them.
Then what are those for compared to just a sink?
They are public drinking fountains. These aren't meant to be put in homes or private spaces.
America is absolutely filled with these things. They are everywhere. Public drinking access, no cups required, at an overwhelming number of public institutions. One of the extremely rare W's of American public use infrastructure.
On the few occasions I've been to Europe, I've honestly been quite frustrated at the lack of them. I can't just roll up to a place and have a quick drink, I'm apparently just expected to carry it with me on my person when I leave my place of stay, or buy a disposable bottle of something from a shop. Even if there are public faucet taps available, I guess I'm expected to be carrying a drinking vessel already, or stick my face under the faucet and slurp awkwardly from the falling stream?
I'm just baffled public drinking fountains don't seem to be common elsewhere, to the point that there are several people in this thread questioning what they even are. I would consider them basic infrastructure for any civilized society.
For conveniently drinking out of them and filling water bottles in public buildings like schools and hospitals. They're really common in NA, what part of the world are you in?
Germany, we do have a few fountains (but they are really uncommon and would have more in common with a normal tab and sink then the american fountains I've seen). I'd usually just fill up my bottle from a sink at a bathroom when I'm on the go.
By googling it, it seems these will filter out some forever chemicals that are a problem pretty much everywhere. It will also cool the water, which might be beneficial if your tap water is a bit on the warmer side (which mine is and it's infuriating, I want to drink near-freezing water)
Note: I'm not American and don't have one of these, just googling.