Overly Optimistic Recyclers

Credit: David Sipress/Cartoonstock

I wasn't going through my neighbours' recycling bins. I didn't need to. Most of the contraband items were shamelessly protruding for all the neighbourhood to see. If you are going to put an old vacuum cleaner and a Dutch oven into the recycling bin, surely you would at least try to close the lid. The vacuum cleaner stick was poking far enough out that I had to move my own bin half a metre away to avoid a collision on uplift.

To be fair, I did have to open the lid to see the Dutch oven, but I only did that because I was going to remove the vacuum cleaner. It wouldn't have been right to leave it where it was when I knew perfectly well the recycling truck driver wouldn't want it. I figured I'd just put it back on the neighbour's doorstep so she could figure out how to properly dispose of it after recycling day.

There were plenty of far more sensible things she could have done with it. She could have pretended it still worked and put it on eBay. She could have taken it to a hard rubbish disposal facility (a.k.a. the tip). She could even have pulled it apart and turned it into some kind of surrealist, new-age, jungle gym for her guinea pigs. Knowing that particular neighbour, she would most likely have just left it on the nature strip till next recycling day, but I'll never know for sure. I couldn't get the vacuum cleaner out.

I did try but it was securely held in place by the giant cast iron pot that had been wedged into the bottom of the bin between some baking trays, a strainer, something that was possibly a spice rack, and the cardboard boxes that all her new cookware items came in. If there were any recyclable jars, cans, or hard plastics in there, they were well and truly hidden under the collateral damage of her most recent trip to Kmart.

Now, I could have turned the bin over and poured everything out to free the recyclable items from the junk, but it would have made a considerable racket and then I would have had to explain to my neighbour why her bin was upside down and the contents scattered all over the sidewalk.

I should have done that. Nothing makes a lesson stick better than when it is accompanied by a bit of public humiliation but, alas, her kitchen-overhaul disposal unit (the thing the rest of us use for recycling) remained intact. Unfortunately, I am far too polite and adverse to confrontation to do anything more assertive than write an anonymous blog post.

Also, I was a bit worried she might get me back for shaming her by launching a recycling counter-offensive, wherein my yellow bin would become the innocent victim of her soft plastics. That obviously would have turned into a full-scale war, and I'd prefer to avoid that with the woman next door.

I thought about just leaving a note, but I didn't have a whiteboard marker on me. It really was a shame that I didn't have a whiteboard marker as I did have a whiteboard. 

Why was there a whiteboard on the nature strip, you ask?

That would be because the couple living in one of the townhouses further down had placed one across the rim of their recycling bin and then put the lid on top. This meant that not only had they put a very large non-recyclable item across their own recycle bin, but they had ensured that there was no longer anywhere for the people living on either side of them to put their bins.

I intentionally didn't move that as I was hoping the exasperated council workers would ignore their entire bin as punishment for stupidity.

I now regret that decision.

Sticking out between the lid of their bin and the whiteboard was a bunch of fake flowers. Maybe they thought their local recycling collector would be sufficiently won over by the sight of some plastic tulips and not make a fuss about the whiteboard. Obviously, that didn't work. The whiteboard was still on the nature strip the following morning, but the rest of the bin had been emptied… meaning the fake flowers went to the recycling centre. (Accompanied by a vacuum cleaner and bin full of kitchenware.)

What do my neighbours think is going to happen to the hard rubbish and household junk they throw into a recycle bin? They certainly wouldn't be so thick as to imagine it would be recycled, would they?

Possibly. If they've never googled "what goes into a recycling bin" they may just be operating under the misconception that anything containing plastic or metal is recyclable. That was certainly the case when my old housemate added a rangehood to our yellow bin. More likely, my neighbours are doing what I like to call overly optimistic recycling. That is, instead of figuring out if something should go into the red bin, the yellow bin, the green bin, or somewhere else entirely, an overly optimistic recycler just puts the item in the bin that they think might lead to the most positive outcome.

This is in contrast to an appalling apathetic recycler that just picks the biggest bin, the closest bin or the bin that is not already full.*

For now, let's assume they just want the very best outcome for their fake flowers and old vacuum cleaners so they send them off to the recycling plant in the hope that the kind people there will be thrilled with their lovely, non-recyclable gifts and find them a good home. Or perhaps they think these items include enough plastic that they can just go in with the soft drink bottles and nobody will notice.

What is more likely to happen is that these annoying items will be manually removed by exasperated employees who spend most of their day turning on and off the machines in order to unclog all the plastic bags, shredded paper, power cables and haberdashery people have "gifted them", whilst they simultaneously lose all faith in the future of humanity. I doubt they refer to people that throw vacuum cleaners into the yellow bins as overly optimistic recyclers. I have a good idea of what they do call them, but it is not very polite, so I won't repeat it.

Is it really so difficult to figure out what goes into a recycling bin? I'm happy for you to stop reading this right now and look up the recycling rules on your local council website, if you’re not sure. In fact, I would very much encourage you to. It will likely be an enlightening read. Alternatively, you can just google "what goes into a recycling bin" along with your state or city. As most city councils are aware that matching rubbish items with bins is a skill beyond most of their residents, you will likely get a very straightforward, easy-to-read set of instructions like this: https://www.whichbin.sa.gov.au/a-z-items.

In fact, I'll make it easy and put some links at the bottom of this page. Once you've looked at them, if you are still confused, ask some children. They are generally much better at managing the sorting of rubbish into three bins than adults.

The Quiet Environmentalist

Further Reading

For Australians there are some links below. If you are not Australian - or if you live in some ridiculously remote part of Australia where your state/territory recycling rules don’t apply - you will need to google your own council’s rules. Once you’ve done that, I would recommend sending the link to all of your family members so as to avoid tedious arguments, general frustration and the need to re-sort your own recycling bin every week.

TAS: Reuse, recycle and dispose A-Z - City of Hobart, Tasmania Australia (hobartcity.com.au)

VIC: Recycling at home | Sustainability Victoria

ACT: Home - Recyclopaedia (act.gov.au)

NSW: Household recycling (nsw.gov.au)

QLD: Recycling | Parents and families | Queensland Government (www.qld.gov.au)

NT: Recycling & Waste Guide | City of Darwin | Darwin Council, Northern Territory

WA: Home – Recycle Right

SA: Recycling from A-Z | Which Bin SA

And for specific household items that don't belong in yellow bins: Planet Ark - Planet Ark Recycling Near You

*The fact that the half the residents on my street manage to fill an entire red bin on a weekly basis and need to use the yellow bin for rubbish overflow is a matter too egregious to simply comment on here. Rest assured that appallingly apathetic recyclers will be addressed (i.e., admonished and publicly shamed) in a future blog post.

Published 03 Sep 2023