23.05.08

 

Prior to the 1970’s and the Politically correct brigade, every one would assume the bin man deals with the rubbish. That’s right bin MAN.

 

Ask any child or indeed adult today who comes around in big trucks to collect rubbish they wouldn’t say a ‘refuse collector’ (the accurate post 1970’s term ) you’d be met with the reply bin MAN.

Whilst families rely on and await the bin man on a weekly basis with recycling becoming more of an necessity it appears all over the country there are unheard of bin women behind the scenes sorting the rubbish in the majority of households.

70% of municipal waste employees on the payroll are men.

While women have a greater understanding of recycling and waste management within the home, men still collect and take up most the employment within the refuse collection industry.

Andrew Hobbs owns a private rubbish collection company in Swindon called A load of rubbish says: “ I’d say 90% of the pay roll for me is men. That’s not on purpose I just don’t get many women apply for job. We don’t so recycling collection tho we just collect large amounts of waste for example if someone’s house is being re-furnished or something. I suppose you still have to be quite physically strong to lift a lot of the rubbish that comes our way. Plus the large trucks that have to be driven are often more of a problem for the women as some I have considered for the job in previous years did not want to drive them so a number of factors really. I don’t think it’s a job that either sex can do better then the other, but rubbish collection does tend to be dominated by men.”

But does society changing the name of the binman to a refuse collector really make any difference to the ideology and associations that we make with our rubbish collection employees?

Or as 70% of them are in fact men is this just another example of Political Correctness gone mad?

Elizabeth Taylor a researcher and Lecturer at the University of Reading and a well versed academic on ideology and language says: