The Toilet Seat Paradox

I've had this thought several times: the way we regard public toilets makes no sense. Either they're sanitary or they're not. If they're sanitary, we should use the same approach we use when, say, we go to a friend's house and use her toilet; that is, we should assume that the seat, by virtue of being OUTSIDE the bowl, is just as likely to transmit fecal matter and communicable diseases as a park bench (and if you wear mini skirts, you know that the analogy is not that far-fetched).

Or (more likely) we should assume that that the toilet seat is NOT sanitary and take the appropriate precautions. I myself prefer this path, and elect to "hover" and wipe down afterwards. I wouldn't want to sit in my own waste, so why would I even admit the possibility of sitting in someone else's waste? As a hoverer, I know that as long as there is at least one other hoverer out there, my ass is in peril.

(Not to worry: when I go to your house I don't hover.)

The one approach that doesn't make sense is to line the rim of the bowl with a little sheet of tissue paper, and then sit your bare ass down with confidence. If there were any bit of waste matter on that seat, that wimpy tissue paper would do you no good at all; and this I learned the hard way. I recognize that there are some circumstances where it's more advantageous to sit than it is to hover, but for God's sake, when that's the case you should make a veritable pillow of toilet paper over the seat. Something that would actually be a reasonable barrier between you and public poo.