Clean up, Aisle 5: A column person gets schooled by reader for "bag boy" reference

It’s a jungle out there.

Consider this. There I was, being uncharacteristically inoffensive, writing a column about a Delray Beach woman with a pet peeve about people who wheel shopping carts from the store, then abandon them in the lots rather than returning the carts to the store or a corral in the lot.

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In the column, I summarized a part of her argument this way:

It’s not fair that the bag boys and store clerks be tasked with rounding up carts that could be easily returned by shoppers, she said.

The online version of the column was topped by a photo of an adult female employee of Publix returning a train of shopping carts to the store.

That elicited this note from a reader:

“I find it quite ironic that you would use the term 'bag boys' in your article, while the big picture on top is of a grown woman collecting carts!” the reader wrote.

“Please, it isn’t 1950 anymore. Maybe think about the sexist terms you use next time.”

I did write “bag boys and store clerks.” But, nevertheless, I get the point of the email.

So much for imagining I was being inoffensive.

Say goodbye to the bag boys

I guess I never thought of the term “bag boy” as sexist before. It’s just what they’ve been called forever.

I’ve often told people I aspire to be a “senior citizen bag boy” one day — a job description that on its face seems impossible.

But the reader makes a good point. And as someone in the words business, I will certainly concede that words matter. And clinging to old habits isn’t a good excuse.

I grew up at a time when some Catholic boys became “altar boys.” Now, they become “altar servers,” because some girls are doing it too.

I checked with the Publix job application portal, and it lists the job as “front service clerk or bagger” and adds that it’s open to applicants as young as 14 years old.

Using the word “bagger” is a safe harbor, a way around using sex or age identifiers that might be problematic.

For instance, if you call an adult woman bagging groceries a “bag woman,” it harkens an image of a homeless woman pushing a shopping cart of her belongings under a bridge overpass. Avoid that.

And “bagman” has its own unfortunate connection. A bagman is the guy who collects the money in a criminal enterprise, not a guy who makes sure the eggs don’t get smashed.

Learning to be more personable

I guess, when in doubt, leave the gender out. That’s how “weathermen” became “meteorologists.”

And theoretically, if you work in a hotel lobby and hold the door open for guests, you probably shouldn’t be called a “doorman” anymore, either. You’re a “door person.”

Even though, to me, a “door person” sounds like a descriptor that defines a preference, not a job, as in, “Some people like exiting through a window but I’m a door person.”

As someone born in the 1950s, I feel like I’m constantly trying to catch up. I still talk about “dialing a phone number” even though rotary phones are long gone.

But the youngsters among us aren’t making things any easier.

A few years ago, I had corrected a college journalism student for using a plural pronoun as a reference to one person.

“You’ve got to say ‘he’ or ‘she,’” I said. “Not ‘they.’”

Singular pronouns under attack

I expected the student to accept the correction but instead the response was, “What if that person just presents as a man or a woman but actually identifies as the other sex?”

The rest of the class agreed: Just call everybody “they,” even if it’s grammatically incorrect. It’s safer that way: Better to slight singular pronouns than people.

I objected at the time. But now I realize that this is my only defense, the only way I can level a counterattack at the reader who accused me of being sexist for using “bag boy.”

The reader’s email says the photo above my column is of a “grown woman.” But maybe I should point out that this person in the photo might just look like a grown woman, but actually identify differently. And therefore, the acceptable term is “grown person.”

“Clean up your own act,” I could have added for a little extra mustard at my accuser. “It isn’t 2010 anymore.”

Frank Cerabino is a columnist at the Palm Beach Post, part of the USA TODAY Florida Network. You can reach him at fcerabino@gannett.com. Help support our journalism. Subscribe today.

This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: Calling Publix clerks "bag boys" is sexist, columnist told by reader