There’s a lot of Aussie slang words that I love. You know the classics – maccas, arvo, servo, iso, barbie, mozzie, devo, etc. We love a lazy little shortening of an already easy to pronounce word. And yet, I refuse to believe the Oxford English Dictionary’s claim that Aussies say ‘placcy’ instead of plastic.
I have honestly never heard anyone say ‘placcy bag’ in my life, and I worked in predominantly white Aussie retail for five years, during the peak of the plastic bag ban. If anyone would have come across the word placcy, it’s fkn ME, the checkout girl.
OED Word of the Day: placcy, adj. In Australian English: plastic. Frequently in ‘placcy bag’.https://t.co/ULgvub0IHG
— The OED (@OED) August 1, 2021
And yet, this term remains elusive – enough that I’m convinced someone just straight up lied to the Oxford English Dictionary. Which is pretty classic Aussie larrikin behaviour anyway, and way more believable than anyone actually saying ‘placcy.’
Upon investigation (and by investigation I mean I asked the PEDESTRIAN.TV Slack channel and all of my friends), the placcy bag is just… not a thing? Like, at all. No one that I know has even heard anyone else say it, and you’d think there wouldn’t be this many degrees of separation between us Aussie 20-something-year-olds and whoever the fuck actually uses placcy.
This whole situation has the same vibe as when one person does something weird on TikTok and then everyone panics like ‘WHY IS THIS A TIKTOK TREND.’ Maybe it’s not, Mark, maybe it’s just that one person.
It seems that I am not alone in my scepticism of the word – almost every reply to the Oxford English Dictionary’s tweet is Australians denying that the term ‘placcy’ is something we actually use.
nope
— thomas violence (@thomas_violence) August 1, 2021
Never heard of it. Sorry, not a thing.
— Paul Karp (@Paul_Karp) August 1, 2021
No one has ever said this.
— Brendan (@macleanbrendan) August 1, 2021
There’s a couple of people in those replies claiming that they’ve heard the word placcy, but I’m gonna need more than that to believe that this whole thing isn’t a conspiracy to try and make ‘placcy’ a thing.
A minority of people (who may not exist) saying ‘placcy’ doesn’t mean it should be considered Aussie slang by the actual Oxford English Dictionary! Sorry you were lied to! It’s not a thing! Bye!
