Underwear changing habits amongst Germans

Hiya
This rather worrying survey says that only 62% of German men and only 80% of German women change their underwear daily.
But how does this compare in a (non-scientific) international comparison?
So, how often do you change your undies?
Katrina

Thanks for that horrible thought first thing on Monday Katrina! Mondaze are bad enough without having to think of some minger being too lazy to change their own smalls. Yuckerama

well what if you, say, did some sport at 7 p.m., showered and put on fresh underwear, then at midnight you went to bed, removed underwear for pajamas. would it be okay to wear the underwear you had on the previous night for only 5 hours for the whole next day?

depends on what you got up to between 7 and midnight, doesn't it!

Why would it worry anyone how frequently Germans change their underwear? The last thing I want to think about or worry about is what's going on below anyones outerwear, not least a Germans...

LeftWing

i agree with leftwing on this one. i mean i never had any problems with ppl who smell cuz they wear crusty undies... they smell cuz they don't wear deo! BO happens to be a very recognizable scent.

just found this version in English

gasp!


lovely!
me at LEAST once a day.
euhw...fortnight!!! his undercrackers must be stuck to his undercarriage by then!

Socks and undewear daily.

Possibly at a different pace if I am out sharking like.

The same rule applies to socks and underwear:

Once it hits the ground it doesn't go back on the body.

Always in the morning and then if I get changed before going out then all clean pants and socks again.
Unless I am wearing clean jeans then it has to be Commando!

isn't commando uncomfortable?
you'd need to wear loose trousers wouldn't you...? don't bits and bobs get trapped and twisted?

@Moonboot
I dont think so IMHO feels better than wearing pants with Jeans

Sometimes tighter is better. Allegedly.

I didnt think you were that kind of boy!

hope they're not tight drainpipe tight jeans then!
that'd be a camel foot bonanza...talking of camel's foot...

You have to be careful commando with jeans. Your chopper might get caught in the zipper. Personally, used to wear a sarong at uni when I was out of clean underrods.

A German seriously told me that it is not common that Germans take daily showers (IPSE DIXIT), so I presume that it is also not common that they change their underwear...
He also told me that people think that daily showers can damage their skin!

They clean everything else, but they don't clean themselves. I personally shower twice a day.

I really don't get it. You shower, dry yourself, feel all nice and clean and then you put on your dirty undies again. Gross!

Nope. when my rods are dirty I throw them in the wash.

Maybe you should ask a dermatologist about it. This IS not good for your skin. Once a day should be enough unless there is a special reason for showering twice (e.g. sports).

Maybe I shouldn't waste my money on a dermatologist because my skin is fine. I don't need to look for reasons to be sick like a lot of Germans. I like being clean, is there something wrong with that?

Depends. Howard Hughes liked being clean and wore Kleenex boxes on his feet.

It ain't just the hypochondriac nature of the Germans (and the unlimited sick pay of course) but alot of its to to with the screwed up medical profession over here. Doctors have to compete for your business (and refer you to their mates aswell of course, for "specialist" treatment)

How is this different than anywhere else, these days?

I think with underwear that you should err on the side of changing your underwear too often rather than too rarely. I don't believe that it doesn't smell. Women will not be able to deny this fact - I mean there are bodily excretions there, enough said. Men probably have a little less of that, but most men don't use toilet paper, so basically they are just sitting in their own p**s. eww. double eww.

If you look at the age of the people not changing their underwear you will notice that they are the generation that grew up after WWII.. when they were growing up they did not take showers and change clothes everyday because of the high cost of electricity/water/clothes etc...life is much better in Germany now but for the older folks, habits are hard to change. Ask my mom... she had to deal with my Father who grew up with that mentality..

In Switzerland, for one, you don't need to go to a GP first - you can go directly to a specialist of your choice.

Germans clean the street and the windows but not themselves. Kid I was teaching last week had thick grease in his hair - mother mentioned something about having to bath him like it was a special occasion! They think water damages their skin. Don't know what they do nowadays, but up to a few years ago it was normal for them to change the bed once a month. Yuck! Lots of American and British expats had problems here with landlords for using too much water. Germans could never work out what we did with it.

I have to disagree with this. I shall refrain from going into details, but I have to state that I know for a fact that many young Germans neglect their personal hygiene as well.

Think this is a bit of an over-generalization.
Kinda running along the 'I know one German who does this, so they ALL do' theme.

I think it's like anywhere, there are clean hygienic folk in Germany and there are dirty bastards too.

No. Nothing wrong with it. Here a some links (sorry, only in German but I'm sure you could also find some English articles)

http://www.3sat.de/3sat.php?http://www.3sa...cstuecke/78163/
http://www.medizinauskunft.de/artikel/wohl...iel_hygiene.php

@Marty

Well the article does also say that one should at least wash once a day. It basically warns against the excessive usage of soaps and detergents. It also says that washing once a day using little soap does not harm the skin in any way. It doesn't say anything about changing the underwear regularly..

did you not read the stats at the beginning of the thread?

It's a bit strange though that the heading should read "Are you a stinky German?" when most people posting and taking part in the poll are not German at all...

these generalisations are awful.

There are lies, damn lies and statistics!

sure did.
but 62% or 80% hardly means ALL Germans now does it.

So is the smell..

hmm...well while it would not be factually correct to say that 100% of Germans ming, we have TT proof that 100% of the French do: French - What have they ever given us?

i heard this also but believed it was in specific reference to a type or brand of soap though? wasnt there one geezer a while back had some glittering modelling career and only ever washed with water and never used soap. seemed to get all the women if i remember rightly too.


is this why Burns wears kleenex boxes in the simpsons episode where he owns a casino? i didnt get that reference till now.

When I walked into my local Netto the other day, it smelled like the locker room of a homless football team.
It was utterly nauseating.

What if we all know one (or two or three) Germans who don't wash daily? It seems like we all know at least one.
When does something stop being a generalisation and start turning into something quite true actually?
Personally, I can count on one hand the number of Germans who I know for an absolute fact don't wash daily.
I'm sure the same goes for most of you.
There is no doubt in my mind that at least 50% of Germans do not wash on a daily basis.
That's not a generalisation any more - that's when it turns into a concrete majority.

(People who wash themselves often with soap damage the natural protection mechanisms of the skin)

First of all, define often. Second, most people use Duschgel (shower gel), which if I'm correct doesn't usually contain soap, similar to most face washes.

Actually, there is something to be said for not using soap, at least on some parts of your body. I used to have a lot of issues with the skin on my face (swinging back and forth between dryness and peeling and oiliness and pimples, sometimes both at once) and tried a host of special soaps, creams, lotions, herbal treatments, etc., even going to a dermatologist and trying some prescription stuff. Finally I said "fuck this!" and stopped using any of it. Now I only wash my face with water (I think it is important to note that I almost never wear make-up; hence no products at all on my face) and my skin has finally cleared up. I've been doing the only water routine for about three years now.

I have loads of German friends, my boyfriend is German so I know all his family, and guess what NONE of them smell...that doesn't mean to say that all Germans don't smell though...I'm not that small minded to say just cuz I know quite a few clean Germans that they are ALL clean...okay maybe you went into Netto and it was stinky...can you assume ALL the people in Netto were smelly, and can you assume all the smelly people were Germans (remember Munich is only 75% German, 25% are non-German)

so you believe that 50% of Germans do not wash daily...then you go on to say it is a majority...how can 50% be a majority anyway??? 51% would be but 50% is not!

I don't personally know any Germans who smell either. But that may be because I generally don't associate with people who reek a mile away..Maybe it's just me
You may be right about who was causing the stink in Netto - I suppose it could have been anyone. But now that I think about it, there was an unusually high amount of extremely ancient people there that day...who knows. I dunno about you, but in my experience many elderly people (in any country) don't exactly smell like roses.
And yes, 51% is a majority - my bad!

@Marty

If I listened to the doctors and the rest of the prophets of doom in the media especially I would never wager going out of the house which would be sealed off from all the terrible germs outside. IOW, I wouldn't have a frigging life. So, no, I am not going to a dermatologist simply because I don't believe washing myself twice a day with soap and water is bad for me. He'd be hard pressed to find any proof on me

Why must women wear underwear? They've got nothing to support!

Jeans chafe in all the wrong places is one reason.