Talk:Knacker

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Knacker has a slang use, as in "Don't knacker it" meaning, don't break it, or more commonly, "He's knackered" meaning very tired. The origin of the term is the trade of rendering meat that is unfit for human consumption, a task performed by the knacker. For example, when dray horses were too tired to work any more they could be taken to the 'knacker's yard.' The term is still used in Britain today, e.g. in the Slaughterhouses Act 1974, the Meat (Sterilisation and Staining) Regulations 1982 and the Food Act 1984. According to these, a 'knacker's yard' is 'any premises used in connection with the business of slaughtering, flaying or cutting up animals whose flesh is not intended for human consumption'.

Knacker is also slang, at least in the UK, for policeman. Private Eye in particular has made Inspector Knacker of the Yard famous, although I am unware of the derivation of this. The Private Eye entry briefly mentions this.

[edit] Irish traveler

The root of the Irish traveler 'knacker' may be like the English 'knocker', a traveller who knocks on doors to sell wares or offer service.

[edit] Edit

I took the liberty of adding some very basic references about the use of Knackered to describe tiredness in general, not generally sexually related. This is a very common use of the word at least as far as Ireland is concerned.

AOC

Sorry mate, was just trying to help ;{ - Antóine O'Connor 17:39, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] More info about actual knackering

Right, this is an encyclopedia, not merely a dictionary. A couple of notes about other uses of the term are not actively harmful, but the fact that the article consists almost entirely of those leaves the reader unhelped, if the reader was looking for an encyclopedia article on the subject of knackering.

Shouldn't there be information here about the process itself, the relevant markets (i.e., what the results are used for), what kinds of animals are usually knackered, the history of the trade, whether its place in the economy has faded in recent years or continues to thrive, and so on and so forth? In other words, shouldn't there be an encyclopedia article? That's the sort of thing I was hoping to find when I looked up this article, and instead I found little beyond a basic definition. --Jonadab, 2006 Jul 03

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