PARIS − The rumors are true: going to the bathroom in France can be confusing − and political.
The French toilet, as many American tourists have found out, isn't always in the same room as the bathroom. The W.C. à la turque − a squat toilet, a porcelain hole in the floor, essentially − still haunts French highway rest areas up and down the country. In a certain light, bidets resemble indoor birdbaths.
Now, in a new twist on French bathroom etiquette, some Parisians are talking about openly defecating in the city's famous Seine River after President Emmanuel Macron and Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo announced they will take a dip in the waterway to prove it's safe for some swimming events at the 2024 Paris Olympic Games.
Plans for a mass-pooping event have been circulating online for weeks.
Parisians are upset not just at the astronomical sums France has spent cleaning up the river, rumored to be north of $1 billion. They are also angry at the strain the Games, which kick off next month, could put on public transportation, the security risks and, more generally, at Macron for allowing the rise of the far-right National Rally party in France.
Macron's decision to call a snap parliamentary election, beginning Sunday with a second round on July 7, in response to recent far-right gains in European Union elections has further provoked some Parisians.
"I'm glad the Games are happening. I'm a big sports fan. It's been a hundred years since Paris hosted the last one," said Leo Lallier, 27, who works in real estate, as he rushed back to work Wednesday by crossing the Pont Alexandre III, a 19th century arch bridge that spans the Seine with sweeping views of the Eiffel Tower.
"But there are some downsides to the Olympics," said Lallier. "Many roads around here are blocked. It causes difficulties for taxis and Uber drivers," he said, adding, "there's absolutely no way I'd swim in the Seine."
As of Wednesday, neither had the president nor the mayor.
In fact they had vowed to dive in on June 23, but backed out at the last minute, citing "political reasons," a likely nod to the upcoming election that has many in France on edge. For the first time since World War II, France's far-right is on the verge of winning political power, though Macron's role as president is not at risk unless he chooses to resign − which he says he won't do.
"This snap election and the shortened campaign has raised tensions and divisions in the country to unprecedented levels," said Cécile Alduy, a professor of French Studies at Stanford University and a scholar at the Center for Political Life at Sciences Po, a university in Paris.
More:France's Macron gambles on snap election as far-right gains ground in EU Parliament vote
The pledge by Macron and Hidalgo to prove the river's cleanliness sparked an online campaign, with a website and hashtag, which is technically now out of date but not necessarily out of tune with the times: #JeChieDansLaSeineLe23Juin. This translates to, "I s*** in the Seine on June 23."
The website, which is still up, has a strap-line that reads: "Because after putting us in s*** it's up to them to bathe in our s***." The website also displays a tool where users can enter how far they live from central Paris to calculate when and where, they would have needed to defecate in the Seine, which originates several hundred miles away near Dijon, for the waste to have ended up in central Paris at noon on June 23.
The campaign's creator has remained anonymous. However, according to French media he or she is a computer programmer angry not just at the the Seine's cleaning bill but at Marcon's failure to address inequality, poverty and simmering community tensions.
"The problem is that all the resources that have been invested have not been to resolve all the social problems we have at the moment," the programmer told Actu Paris. "We have the feeling of being abandoned. We see where their priority was."
Macron had promised a new kind of consensual politics when he became president in 2017. The Olympics were meant to turn a corner on years that saw France's so-called "Yellow Vest" movement paralyze the country with strikes over slipping standards of living and fuel taxes. France was rocked last summer by violent demonstrations over police brutality and looting.
Clean, or clean enough?
Still, in one sign that the Macron and Hidalgo swim may still take place, USA TODAY spotted two separate water-testers taking samples on Wednesday.
One was Lionel Cheylus, 47, who works for Surfrider Europe, a U.S.-based environmental nonprofit.
Cheylus was scooping up samples from France's most famous river with a long rod with a small beaker on the end.
More:French president Emmanuel Macron confident Olympics' opening ceremony will be secure
His tests showed the Seine's water quality was improving after the big-ticket cleanup − but still wasn't safe. All the boats on the river whose waste systems were not connected to any kind of disposal network were now attached. So too were houses and apartments on the river. A new waste water treatment plant was built.
But Cheylus said the new systems were only recently beginning to take effect and, perhaps more worrying, he said, the authorities were only testing for two type of bacteria: E. coli and enterococci. Samples collected on June 10 showed E. coli concentrations above the safe limit.
"European regulations say that's all that needs to be monitored. Just those two bacteria. Nothing about pharmaceutical pollution. Nothing about industrial pollution or chemical pollution," he told USA TODAY. "This means that when you say, 'Yes, this water is swimmable,' it only means those two bacteria" have been judged to be at safe levels for athletes.
More:Seine river water pollution levels still well above limits one month before Paris Olympics
A senior International Olympic Committee executive said earlier this month that there were "no reasons to doubt" Olympic races involving the Seine will go ahead as scheduled. “We are confident that we will swim in the Seine this summer,” IOC official Christophe Dubi said June 13 in an online briefing.
"The Seine can be very dirty in many different ways," added Cheylus.
"I've never seen anyone ever swim in it."
"Maybe a drunk once in a while."
