When somebody tells you, “Everything I eat comes from dumpsters,” you make a mental note not to go to his house for brunch on Sunday. Meet the Freegans, who do their meal shopping behind, the grocery, not inside it.
Supposedly the “movement” is growing; they even have a Website.
Ashwyn Falkingham, a Freegan, searches through supermarket bins for food in London May 23, 2006. Freegans forage through bins for food to avoid being wasteful and to challenge the consumerist attitude. Picture taken May 23, 2006. To match feature Britain-Freegans REUTERS/Luke MacGregor
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I say hats off to the freegans, since they are reusing or reclaiming what someone else has thrown away. Then again, there are some freegans who choose this as a lifestyle (and have enough money to buy their own food), while there are 1000s in the UK, and millions worldwide who are forced by circumstances to scavinge from waste site to get food or scratch a living.
- Posted by butterayOnly sick one time in 20+ years? I call BullS**t, he’s living out of the germ rich dumpster environments…. there’s no way he’s “only gotten sick once” I’d bet $$ on he’s lived his entire “freegan” life with the runs and an upset stomach. I say to each his own, but he doesn’t have to lie about it to try and recruit people, thats just sad.
- Posted by DanielIt’s surely not veganism as we understand it (consuming NO items derived from or through animal exploitation and abuse, since they take anything and everything out of the scraps of others, which surely is NOT a vegan stream, since THEY - “the generalized other” - doesn’t care about the rights of animals and the moral obligation not to harm others, regardless of species).
It’s also unwise, and if the purest command of veganism shares the medical code of “first, do no harm” (primum, non nocere), one may easily be harming oneself.
It’s a good start, I think, in trying to come to terms with the humungous amount of wastefulness industrial productivity makes likely, perhaps unavoidably inevitable. However, it seeks a merely personal solution for the practitioners, not a global solution.
While it seems consistent with the effort to not contribute individually to the further exploitation and abuse, and the consequent suffering (and death) of those suffering beings, is it wise, and does it include oneself inside the circle of those whose suffering we seek to alleviate, as it should? I’m not so sure.
Indeed, lots of “good stuff” is discarded, and much of that seems “recoverable”, as (vegan) groups like “Food Not Bombs” have taught their volunteers and their “client populations” (the homeless, the impoverished elderly, the unemployable unemployed, and the otherwise needy (desperately and otherwise), as well as the merely frugal and others out for a free (albeit vegan) meal.
I’m not persuaded, though I have long admired the writings of Adam Weissman on other topics (and still do). Go, Adam!
- Posted by Maynard S. ClarkQuick comment to Daniel, I was the one who said I had an upset stomach once from bin food, and that is in about two and a half years - not twenty (I am only 21 after all). Food doesn’t have more (or worse) bacteria just because it is in a bin.
Also, to Manyard, I understand what you are saying about freeganism being a personal solution for the practitioners, but I certainly see it as more than that. The concept is that by not paying for food, one is not providing the incentives to continue with harmful practices to make money. This should be effective, as the primary motivation for most of the world’s harmuful and destructive practices is individual and corporate greed. Dumpster diving is a bit like the ‘first stage’ of freeganism, obviously the long term solution would by necessity eliminate the wasted food.
- Posted by Ashwyn