When did we become too dainty to clean our toilets?

Some of these plastic products make me extra crazy when they are just completely unnecessary to our daily lives. This next one falls into that category. There's NO reason for this product to even exist. For it to be so horrifically disposable just makes it even worse.

Those little Scrubbing Bubble guys are just so cute! I've always thought so. But they've been pedalling some Earth-dangerous stuff lately. They seem to be more about plastic than cleaning these days. Here's the stuff straight from the Bubble's mouth, as it were:

" Scrubbing Bubbles® Toilet Cleaning Gel makes it easy to keep your toilet bowl clean and fresh. Simply use the Toilet Cleaning Gel dispenser to stamp a gel disc onto the inside of your toilet bowl. The discreet gel disc sits just under the rim. There's no need to touch the disc or the bowl with your hand, making Toilet Cleaning Gel more hygienic than traditional clip-on bowl cleaners.


The gel disc gradually dissolves with each flush, allowing a controlled release of clean and fresh fragrance. Each disc lasts up to one week and leaves no residue behind. Your toilet bowl will remain clean and fresh — with practically zero effort.

- One disposable, easy-to-use dispenser
- One gel holder (gel holder contains six gel discs)
- Continuously cleans and freshens with every flush
- Each disc lasts up to one week
- Leaves no residue behind
- More hygienic than traditional clip-on bowl cleaners
- Safe for septic systems "

Wow. Where to start? "Discreet". Really? It's a toilet. Why are we attempting discretion in a toilet bowl? "No need to touch" ANYTHING!! Don't touch your toilet!!! You might DIE!!! Or at least be really icky! After all, your BUTT was just on that thing. Ewwwwwww. Please tell me why we should be afraid to have to TOUCH our toilet? "More hygienic than traditional clip-on bowl cleaners": Ah. Now I get it. They are trying to replace that plastic thing you put in there with a different plastic thing that you don't have to touch. Because you know the men in your family always aimed for that clip-on. Don't touch it. It's icky. "Zero effort"... really? Is an occasional scrub of the toilet really such hard work? No wonder we have an obesity problem in this country... we can't even expend the effort to brush out a toilet.

Let's break down the physicalities of this product: each gel gob (also a lovely aiming point for men!) lasts ONE week. Maybe less, if you are a frequent-flusher (truly beyond my help and probably not reading this anyway!). 6 applications in each plastic dispenser. These dispensers are NOT refillable. You must purchase a new one every time. So... buy a new one every 6 weeks, 52 weeks in a year... so the average household with one bathroom will need to buy 8-9 of these a year. Now think about how many households might have more than one bathroom. Make that closer to 20/year or more. For one family. Multiply that by how many households Dow WISHES were using these things... mind-blowing, is it not?

All this, because we cannnot dare touch our toilets. You know, I'm pretty OK with my toilet. I'm not grossed out by it, or afraid of it. I don't DRINK out of it... but do you really want to know someone who does? I don't love cleaning behind it, but you know... We gotta do stuff we don't love to do. I still have a toilet brush. Archaic, I know. But it works. A little baking soda can do wonders for cleaning the bowl, while keeping the brush clean. Pour some white vinegar in before you go to bed. That'll disinfect it nicely. In between brushings, a tablet of fizzy denture cleaner will freshen it right up. After all, dentures have to be almost as germy as a toilet, right? If those tablets can deal with a mouth, they can handle your toilet. 

So... this product is not only wasteful, it is completely unnecessary. We do not need it. Reject it. Feel free to glare at people purchasing it, or who have it in their homes. You have the Good Green Witch's permission.