Summary Of On Dumpster Diving
Response to Dumpster Diving I first read the essay, “On Dumpster Diving” by Lars Eighner on New England Journal of Public Policy. The first lines of the essay amazed me, for I have never heard about a person going dumpster diving or scavenging. Eighner’s “On Dumpster Diving” is a part of his latest work, “Travels with Lizbeth” (1993), which is based off of his homelessness travels with his dog (Lizbeth).
Eighner tells us the meaning and beginning of the word “Dumpster Diver”: he tells us about his survival ways through detailed regulations and rules. Dumpster is a symbol of trash getting loaded onto garbage trucks. Dumpster diving is a meaning for people who voluntarily go into dumpsters to find valuable items such as food and cans. Lars writes that traveling throughout country as a homeless person really opened his eyes to the fact that all dumpsters with wasted items are the supermarkets for the poor, and that it is not only a source of survival, but it also has massive amounts of untouched food.
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After reading this essay, I asked myself, “What the aim was of Eighner’s rules of survival?” As the essay went on, I slowly picked up Lars’s concept. His essay describes the wasteful nature of American society and suggests that it is the result of acquisitive values but also arrogance and lack of understanding things. People wastefully throw out food that is deemed still edible: “Students throw out many good things including food...the item was thrown out through carelessness, ignorance, or wastefulness.” Lars says that he found “boom boxes, candles, bedding, toilet paper, medicine, books, a typewriter, a virgin male love doll, change sometimes amounting to a lot of money” in dumpsters. I think that the purpose of this essay is to show the wastefulness of people in general; there are thousands of people suffering and dying from poverty. However, exactly that garbage helps him to survive at difficult
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1181 Words | 5 PagesIn the text "On Dumpster Diving," Lars Eighner gives us an inside depth of what it's like being homeless and having to dumpster dive for living. Lars Eighner shows how dumpster diving has become a full-time job because it's the only way he can survive. Eighner claims that dumpster diving requires a lot of effort, he made some rules that would help others in the same situation become more efficient and find supplies that are useful for their survival. Dumpster diving has helped Eighner realize that materialistic things aren't necessary and that you should live off necessity. Eighner used to invest on materials that weren't necessary, but dumpster diving has helped him find value in his life and it helped him realize that people need must be grateful for what they have.
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