Basic Trope: There's trash everywhere because whoever's in charge of getting rid of it can't or won't do their job.
- Straight: The city is covered in trash because the garbage collectors are on strike.
- Exaggerated: Every single garbage collector in the world goes on strike.
- Downplayed: The trash in Alice and Bob's house accumulates because their Bratty Half-Pint son Chris won't take the garbage out, and they refuse to take it out for him to teach him a lesson.
- Justified: Garbage collectors often don't get paid very much, and low pay often leads to strikes.
- Inverted:
- Subverted: The city is in squalor and a visitor wonders if the garbage collectors are on strike, but they aren't.
- Double Subverted: They instead can't pick up the trash due to logistical issues.
- Enforced: "We need An Aesop about the importance of sanitation workers!"
- Lampshaded: "Hurry up and give those garbagemen a raise so they'll stop striking!"
- Invoked:
- Exploited:
- Defied: The trash collectors' bosses pay them well so they won't go on strike.
- Discussed: "What would happen if the trash collectors went on strike?"
- Conversed: "This show did an episode where the garbage collectors went on strike. I hope that doesn't happen in real life!"
- Implied: Trash is everywhere, but it's never stated why.
- Deconstructed:
- Reconstructed:
- Played for Laughs: Chris refuses to take the trash out, so trash piles up in his house, and Alice and Bob keep insisting that he'll eventually learn without intervention, even as they're literally swimming in trash.
- Played for Drama: This leads to people getting sick from the trash.
- Played for Horror: The reason the trash can't be collected is because the trash collectors were killed by zombies and no one's brave enough to replace them.
Back to Why We Need Garbagemen.
