"While Americans can be culturally squeamish about touching these areas, proponents of bidets argue that water is a naturally better cleaning agent than dry paper.
Toilet paper has been perfumed, decorated in color, sterilized and made antiseptic," says the website of American Bidet, a domestic bidet dealer, but, nevertheless, it is still dry paper and only a step better in evolutionary improvement than the pages of the mail order catalogue or the barbaric plantain leaf. Although people generally still apply toilet paper after using the bidet, they say they use a lot less. They also point out that people wash their hands after using a bidet just as they would after using toilet paper.