It seems so obvious that it shouldn't need to be said but literally everything in the world that isn't part of the natural environment has to some degree been the result of deliberate choices by humans. Always somewhere in the built environment, is the evidence of choices and decisions made by a human, to make a thing look the way that it does.
I know that should be obvious but it still amazes me how very little effort that some people put into those design choices. Among my pet peeves which matters so very much because it is of no consequence at all, are the diamond signs that people put in the rear window of their car which read "Baby In Car". These are made all the more terrible when you realise that the original sign read "Baby On Board", which has a nice alliterative ring to it because of the repetition of the B sound. The signs "Baby In Car" or even "Child In Car" which I have also seen in people's rear windows are neither alliterative nor funny; which is doubly confusing as for someone to put such a sign in their rear window, also required a deliberate choice. I do not understand what kind of logic would drive someone to make that particular choice.
This brings me to the following sign which I have seen many garbage bins at railway stations, which I think is glorious because whoever made the sign also made some very deliberate choices; one of which I am amused by because I really don't understand what's going on.
Three of these things (the chip packet, yoghurt/pudding pot, and plastic bag) are entirely rational and reasonable things to put on a rubbish sign. These empty bits of packaging belong in the garbage bin. This is well done.
There picture of the soiled nappy is, I think, excellent. I do not have children and so have never had the experience of changing an emergency nappy in public; so while I don't immediately empathise with the experience through having shared it, I can very much imagine an accompanying sense of terror which would come after wondering what to do with the package of excreta.
It's probably obvious that a soiled nappy belongs in the garbage bin but if there is one thing that I have learned, it is that you can not underestimate the mindlessness of people and so the act of placing the obvious on a sign, is reasonable to me.
The one outrider on this sign is the picture of the pie with one bite taken out of it. This element of the design of this sign, is in my not very well paid opinion, utter genius.
Readers to this blog come from many places around the world but putting a picture of a pie on a sign for a garbage bin, would probably only be thought of in three countries: the United Kingdom, New Zealand, and Australia. I know that the United States has a strong pie culture but in context, this can only be a meat pie. General Motors ran the advertising jingle "Football, Meat Pies, Kangaroos, and Holden Cars" on radio and television for many years; which is directly equivalent to "Football, Baseball, Apple Pies, and Chevrolet". Given that this is a sign which is on garbage bins in Australia, I don't know if whoever made this could have come up with a more Australian Australian thing.
The other reason why I think that this is a work of genius is because the immediate story is just so inexplicable.
This is a meat pie with one bite taken out of it. What I want to know is, what was wrong with that pie? To be fair I have eaten some pretty ordinary pies but I do not ever recall being so repulsed by one that after one bite, my thoughts were that I should throw it in the garbage bin. I can not think of a pie so terrible that after just one bite, I would think about banishing it to the depths of gehenna. For a pie to make me throw it away after just one bite, would have meant that it was so incredibly awful that it would have had to generate an immediate visceral response. In fact, it would probably have to generate the same kinds of emotion in me, as having that soiled nappy does for that parent.
That's why this sign works so excellently. If in this brave new world we are crediting the recall to memory of five things as the work of presidential genius, then Chip Packet, Yoghurt Pot, Plastic Bag, Soiled Nappy, and Meat Pie With One Bite Taken Out Of It, has burned itself into my memory.
The purpose of a sign is to communicate something in a hurry. The purpose of advertising is to communicate something in a hurry that stays with someone and will hopefully persuade them to buy whatever it is that is being sold. This sign, if it wasn't immediately obvious, is communicating that this is the garbage bin and that garbage belongs in it. For me at least (and quite possibly at most) it sold me a story with no rational explanation that I can think of.
Just like a sign which used to be on the M4 to Penrith for Museum Of Fire which had a graphic of a fire truck that was itself on fire, or the little graphic which was in the manual for the Sony PlayStation which had an angry kid pouring water into the device and a cross next to it, or the defaced signs which used to be on Sydney Trains which when altered read "Please eat a disabled or elderly person if required" and "At night, rave near the guard, naked with a blue light", this sign with the pie with one bite taken out of it, will live for a long time in my memory. That meant it worked.
Addenda:
Dogs shall be carried? But what if I don't have one? Do I need to go and get one?
There's some strong 'wahey' energy here.
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