In the farmhouse I grew up in, we did not have indoor plumbing. We finally got a cold water tap, and eventually a hot water tap, and that water ran off to the garden area, but the comode was a bucket in a curtained off area in a small closet. It was chemical, using a pine oil of sorts, which we dumped down the outside toilet. I think the dry composting toilet would have been better. We used the outside from spring till freeze though. I usually held it until I got to the barn in winter. Heck I had to shovel the cows, one more dump was nothing more.
A better solution than the compost heap is a methane digester. They are relatively easy/simple designs. Any small community, or farm for that matter, could/should have one. The waste, human and animal, is put into the digester and the methane gas (what stinks...) is harvested for cooking fuel or to run generators or what ever, depending on the number/size of the digester and source of fuel. The digested matter does not have the smell of the ripe, the bugs have been killed in the digestion (or so I'm led to beleive) and make an enriched fertilizer.
And YES there would be a job of collection. Smelly and people would look down on them probably, but one of the most important functions in the community. There's mention of 'surviving from disease.. cholera, plague, etc... THAT is were the disease comes from, directly or indirectly. Cholera is transmitted from feces of the sick becaues of unsanitary conditions. The heaps attract flies, the primary culprit for MANY diseases. (A good reason for free range chickens on the farm is they scratch the manure pile and help keep the fly situation down by eating maggots.)
As stated it will be LEADERSHIP that helps the masses survive, and often a big stick for the noncompliant. "Well Joe, you don't want to follow a simple rule of sanitation eh? You have garbage detail for 30 days." Judge Judy 2001 The Big Town
Grae
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