On "On Dumpster Diving"
On its surface “On Dumpster Diving” is just that; it is on Dumpster diving. The quality and quantity of what you can find in a Dumpster would easily lead you to conclusions about wastefulness and consumption. Eighner, however, says he would “prefer to live the comfortable consumer life, perhaps-and only perhaps-as a slightly less wasteful consumer, owing to what [he has] learned as a scavenger.” To scavengers, or Dumpster divers, whatever you want to call them, waste is necessary for survival. Nature is full of waste. So perhaps excess is waste only when it unnecessarily ceases to be useful. I think to Eighner, material possession is valuable only when you find it useful, and it becomes waste only when you find it useless.
Eighner uses both emotional and ethical appeals to frame the inductive lessons he learned from Dumpster diving; he brings his reader to his “two rather deep lessons” by sharing his experiences and observations. The entertaining anecdotes-like Lizbeth, his dog, dancing and eating fire ants, or the three big glasses of Pat O’Brien’s Hurricane mix he drank before realizing someone had mixed in rum-give his examples of life on the street believability and bring the reader into those moments. His outrage at the idea that he would offer his companion any food he had doubts about and his “reservations about going through individual garbage cans” are examples of how Eighner establishes credibility and creates a common ground with his readers. The use of ethos and pathos in the essay enable the reader to consider Eighner’s logic; without the ability to relate and connect with his experiences, we would not give his purpose in writing any credence; there is more on that in my conclusion.
So who are Eighner‘s two lessons for? The textbook says that “’Dumpster diving’ is part of the language of Freegansim” -which according to Wikipedia is “an anti-consumerist lifestyle”; as much as I think Freegans would agree with much of what Eighner is saying, young adults are his main audience, especially students. College students are referenced several times in this article: as a good source for discarded food at certain times of the year, and for the things they throw away like lackluster papers, excellent magazines and books, and the half finished needle work of sorority girls. The emphasis on the pizza anecdote would best relate to those who have worked in fast food or enjoy the occasional slice. The candy, the booze, the need not “to paint too romantic a picture” all speak to those of us moving from childhood and joining “the rat-race millions”. Eighner wants to share with us the perspective he gained while homeless before we learn too well how to consume, possess and waste.
Quite bohemian, new age, and I think more dualist that Eighner would like to admit, his thesis is two- fold and clearly stated towards the end of his essay as “two rather deep lessons”: first, that one only needs enough to use, the unnecessary becomes waste, and second, that material things are short lived and of little importance to what matters in life. Whether it is a college student disposing of perfectly good peanut butter or a can scrounger stirring a pair of good shoes to ruin at the bottom of a Dumpster, discarding something that remains useful to you or someone else is waste; garbage is only waste when it remains useful and unused, or when it could have been of use to someone else but instead is ruined. In North America we have more than we need all around us. We live in a world of excess and disposable material things.
Eighner’s two lessons echo the backlash to consumerism I have heard most of my life. The knowledge that there is too much waste, and the idea of dualism are not new. If “On Dumpster Diving” was a call to Freeganism , Eighner did show you can survive off what others discard, but why would you want to? Eighner himself admits the dangers and consequences of such a life. In the end, beyond his two rather general insights into materialism, all I was left with was a few helpful hints about how to live off what modern society leaves behind. Maybe it was the last line that ruins this essay for me and revokes any credibility he had previously earned; as one of the “rat-race millions” between Eighner and the very wealthy, the idea that he feels sorry for me and the rest of us, who are “looking for they know not what”, is arrogant at best.
Do you identify with Eighner? Do you see stuff as transient? Do you hold pity for the “rat-race millions who nightly scavenge the cable channels looking for they know not what”?
What about Dumpster divers, they are scavengers too. Do they know what they are looking for? Does anyone really?
Eighner uses both emotional and ethical appeals to frame the inductive lessons he learned from Dumpster diving; he brings his reader to his “two rather deep lessons” by sharing his experiences and observations. The entertaining anecdotes-like Lizbeth, his dog, dancing and eating fire ants, or the three big glasses of Pat O’Brien’s Hurricane mix he drank before realizing someone had mixed in rum-give his examples of life on the street believability and bring the reader into those moments. His outrage at the idea that he would offer his companion any food he had doubts about and his “reservations about going through individual garbage cans” are examples of how Eighner establishes credibility and creates a common ground with his readers. The use of ethos and pathos in the essay enable the reader to consider Eighner’s logic; without the ability to relate and connect with his experiences, we would not give his purpose in writing any credence; there is more on that in my conclusion.
So who are Eighner‘s two lessons for? The textbook says that “’Dumpster diving’ is part of the language of Freegansim” -which according to Wikipedia is “an anti-consumerist lifestyle”; as much as I think Freegans would agree with much of what Eighner is saying, young adults are his main audience, especially students. College students are referenced several times in this article: as a good source for discarded food at certain times of the year, and for the things they throw away like lackluster papers, excellent magazines and books, and the half finished needle work of sorority girls. The emphasis on the pizza anecdote would best relate to those who have worked in fast food or enjoy the occasional slice. The candy, the booze, the need not “to paint too romantic a picture” all speak to those of us moving from childhood and joining “the rat-race millions”. Eighner wants to share with us the perspective he gained while homeless before we learn too well how to consume, possess and waste.
Quite bohemian, new age, and I think more dualist that Eighner would like to admit, his thesis is two- fold and clearly stated towards the end of his essay as “two rather deep lessons”: first, that one only needs enough to use, the unnecessary becomes waste, and second, that material things are short lived and of little importance to what matters in life. Whether it is a college student disposing of perfectly good peanut butter or a can scrounger stirring a pair of good shoes to ruin at the bottom of a Dumpster, discarding something that remains useful to you or someone else is waste; garbage is only waste when it remains useful and unused, or when it could have been of use to someone else but instead is ruined. In North America we have more than we need all around us. We live in a world of excess and disposable material things.
Eighner’s two lessons echo the backlash to consumerism I have heard most of my life. The knowledge that there is too much waste, and the idea of dualism are not new. If “On Dumpster Diving” was a call to Freeganism , Eighner did show you can survive off what others discard, but why would you want to? Eighner himself admits the dangers and consequences of such a life. In the end, beyond his two rather general insights into materialism, all I was left with was a few helpful hints about how to live off what modern society leaves behind. Maybe it was the last line that ruins this essay for me and revokes any credibility he had previously earned; as one of the “rat-race millions” between Eighner and the very wealthy, the idea that he feels sorry for me and the rest of us, who are “looking for they know not what”, is arrogant at best.
Do you identify with Eighner? Do you see stuff as transient? Do you hold pity for the “rat-race millions who nightly scavenge the cable channels looking for they know not what”?
What about Dumpster divers, they are scavengers too. Do they know what they are looking for? Does anyone really?