It’s true that I bitch a lot and find fault in others, but I’m into accountability… and this post by Marc from a zillion years ago.

http://punkassblog.com/2006/06/18/infighting-keeps-us-honest/

i don’t know. i’m sympathetic. it is true that they aren’t shunning capitalism so much as leeching off of it. but then again, what AM I DOING to make the world a better place? what are ANY of us doing besides bitching and finding fault in others?

Actually, if you’d read my comment, you’d have seen that I did point that out.

‘Ms. nelson may be self righteous, but what’s the alternative?’

Oh, lordy. I’m not saying that she shouldn’t be a full time activist, it would just be nice if she acknowledged that she was using her privilege to do her activism rather than assert that she was doing her activism in spite of it.

I will never call myself a freegan after that article. While it’s true that I get food/fun/stuff out of dumpsters [and have even been known to make out in dumpsters], I don’t see it as a solution, as the NYT folx seem to, but as a supplement to the the low-impact life I try to lead.

And yes, I have to work for a living.

(As a trivial aside, one of them did tell me that some supermarkets (Tesco) will pour white emulsion over their rubbish rather than let people steal and use it.)

I mean, yes, Ms. nelson may be self righteous, but what’s the alternative? “How dare you exercise your class privilege by being a full time activist!!!!! You’re not revolutionary–Go back to the corporate wor;d and screw homeless people and beat up on unions!!!! Unless you can destroy capitalism single handedly, go work for Bush!!!”

“But New York City in particular — the financial capital of the world’s richest country — has emerged as a hub of freegan activity, thanks largely to Mr. Weissman’s zeal for the cause and the considerable free time he has to devote to it. (He doesn’t work and lives at home in Teaneck, N.J., with his father and elderly grandparents.)”

I mean, the guy who is running the site lives with his parents who no doubt put clothes on his back and a roof over his head in addition to paying for him to surf the web for free stuff and operate that site. The point being, he’s still contributing to corprate blah blah blah by using the effin’ computer and interweb. He probably spends the rest of his free time in front of their TV and then justifies it b/c they were watching Wheel of Fortune anyway!

Kyso called them out on the impossibility of ‘absenting oneself from capitalism,’ but I’d like to take that a little further. These people see dumpstering as a revolutionary act in and of itself. How, I don’t know. It provides NO challenge to capitalism. It is, in fact, parasitic on capitalism. Their way of life could not exist without capitalism. Rather than focusing their energies on creating the infrastructure of a new society, they’re content to louse off of the current one and think they’re making some great contribution.

I’m sick of this poverty chic shit coming from kids who don’t work and live with their parents. Not everyone has that option, Mr. Weissman. And I was maddened beyond belief with Madeline Nelson, who ‘gave up’ her middle class life, bought a house and does pro-bono paralegal work for activists. Not everyone can stop working and buy a house to devote themselves to full-time activism. These words actually escape her mouth: ‘It’s always hard to give up class privilege.’ YOU, MS. NELSON, ARE FLAGRANTLY EXERCISING YOUR CLASS PRIVILEGE BY LEADING THE EXISTENCE YOU DO.

My friends and I dumpster because we usually can’t afford food, clothes and whatever other treasures we find. Poor and homeless people were dumpstering long before privileged white kids. Dumpstering, like shoplifting, is a survival skill. It is not revolutionary.

I personally don’t think capitalism is particularly moral or immoral, but our current version emphasizes waste and I don’t think it’s wrong of them to chose to live like this, or use this method to draw the rest of our attention to the problem. I also don’t think it’s a massive sin to actually give in occasionally and buy basic things like baking soda. Obviously the act of purchasing something isn’t wrong, it’s just the waste. If you use a $500 TV, then it is not a waste and there’s really no ethical dilemma there. If you buy a $1,000 TV and throw the old yet working $500 TV in the trash rather than give it away or recycle it, then that’s waste bordering on crime, and it’s that sort of waste that allows these guys to live like that.

If I lived in a neighborhood that was famous among dumpster divers as being a place where perfectly good shit was being thrown away, I’d re-evaluate my consumption habits a bit if only to get rid of kids going through my trash.