How Much Food Can You Find In A Dumpster? (Vegan Gains)

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NonZeroSum
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How Much Food Can You Find In A Dumpster? (Vegan Gains)

Post by NonZeroSum »

How Much Food Can You Find In A Dumpster?
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S9rwJmzVDE8

Richard's getting a lot of hate for their dumpster diving video, I get that he has a lot of trolls following him around from his antics, but I wish someone did a properly researched info-graphic educational video on how effective freegan soup kitchens are, freegan groups and the best opportunities, as well as how to petition companies to reduce food waste and tips for reduce waste at home. Also the campaigns which successfully got countries to change their regulations encouraging better shelf labeling and actually forcing companies to give food away to charity the day before it reaches expiration date. VG missed a big opportunity by just vlogging their experience and triggering a bunch of people who had concerns that weren't mentioned.
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Re: How Much Food Can You Find In A Dumpster? (Vegan Gains)

Post by brimstoneSalad »

NonZeroSum wrote: Tue Jul 11, 2017 11:25 pm VG missed a big opportunity by just vlogging their experience and triggering a bunch of people who had concerns that weren't mentioned.
It was imperfect, but I've gained quite a bit of respect for him for doing it at all. He also seemed to recognize that drinking freegan milk was OK in ethical terms.
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Re: How Much Food Can You Find In A Dumpster? (Vegan Gains)

Post by avocadobreath »

i used to dumpster dive quite a bit when i lived in the city, or eat food that my friends had dumpstered. dont know if i would do it now, but at the time it was fun and made us feel cool and rebellious, haha. sometimes we would find incredible things like entire cases of maple syrup or olive oil. sometimes things were not even expired, like in the case of olive oil one bottle was broken so the other bottles got a bit greasy. just had to wash them off and we had olive oil for months. some friends would eat dumpstered meat/fish/dairy, which i thought was absolutely disgusting and this was years before i even considered veganism. they never got sick but i almost barfed just watching them eat it. i would never eat anything that wasn't in a sealed package, trader joes was the best because even their produce is sealed. the worst was having to go underneath bags of meat to get to the good stuff. nasty. there is a pretty big dumpstering community/demand in LA now and i backed out of it because i dont care about fighting for scraps and would rather someone who needs it more get it. it was a good experience, though.

i have heard of freegan groups, food not bombs, things like that getting shut down or otherwise harassed by police for giving out dumpstered food. such an awful waste.
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Re: How Much Food Can You Find In A Dumpster? (Vegan Gains)

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avocadobreath wrote: Sun Jul 16, 2017 6:47 pm i used to dumpster dive quite a bit when i lived in the city, or eat food that my friends had dumpstered. dont know if i would do it now, but at the time it was fun and made us feel cool and rebellious, haha. sometimes we would find incredible things like entire cases of maple syrup or olive oil. sometimes things were not even expired, like in the case of olive oil one bottle was broken so the other bottles got a bit greasy. just had to wash them off and we had olive oil for months. some friends would eat dumpstered meat/fish/dairy, which i thought was absolutely disgusting and this was years before i even considered veganism. they never got sick but i almost barfed just watching them eat it. i would never eat anything that wasn't in a sealed package, trader joes was the best because even their produce is sealed. the worst was having to go underneath bags of meat to get to the good stuff. nasty. there is a pretty big dumpstering community/demand in LA now and i backed out of it because i dont care about fighting for scraps and would rather someone who needs it more get it. it was a good experience, though.

i have heard of freegan groups, food not bombs, things like that getting shut down or otherwise harassed by police for giving out dumpstered food. such an awful waste.
Really cool to have your perspectives. I hitched and cycle toured for years from protest site to squat, picking up the best unpicked dumpstered food from suburb to suburb, outside the big city centres where homeless rely on it. When we did collect from the city for some benefit or social centre project we wheat-pasted posters of the event on the bin and nearby and gave out free bin keys.

The problem of middle to upper class kids cleaning house, going in the day when they can be seen and making a mess for staff to clean up is a real one, if you were writing a wiki to give the best advice to warn against that drop out culture, a how to on best projects to take advantage of unnecessary waste and simultaneously advocate for commercial practices and policy that end food waste, how would you put it best? :P

Freeganism (wiki) [Working progress]
http://philosophicalvegan.com/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=3327
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Re: How Much Food Can You Find In A Dumpster? (Vegan Gains)

Post by avocadobreath »

NonZeroSum wrote: Sun Jul 16, 2017 7:27 pm Really cool to have your perspectives. I hitched and cycle toured for years from protest site to squat, picking up the best unpicked dumpstered food from suburb to suburb, outside the big city centres where homeless rely on it. When we did collect from the city for some benefit or social centre project we wheat-pasted posters of the event on the bin and nearby and gave out free bin keys.

The problem of middle to upper class kids cleaning house, going in the day when they can be seen and making a mess for staff to clean up is a real one, if you were writing a wiki to give the best advice to warn against that drop out culture, a how to on best projects to take advantage of unnecessary waste and simultaneously advocate for commercial practices and policy that end food waste, how would you put it best? :P

Freeganism (wiki) [Working progress]
http://philosophicalvegan.com/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=3327
Sounds like fun :) yeah people leaving messes and generally being assholes is a big problem. the people who have to clean up are the minimum wage workers who certainly don't deserve it, and have nothing to do with the decision making process that ends up with the wasted food. It turns people who should be allies into enemies because they will of course be happy to lock a dumpster with a padlock if it means they don't have to pick up nasty trash and scraps off the pavement when they show up to work at 7am!! If people are clean and courteous, it might actually inspire store managers to talk to higher ups and create a less wasteful solution....we can hope, right? haha. I would just say follow the golden rule, if you don't want to clean up after yourself you have no business being out there in the first place. But of course no one who would make a mess would listen to my advice in the first place :roll:
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Re: How Much Food Can You Find In A Dumpster? (Vegan Gains)

Post by knot »

Anyone saw Bearing's response to VG's video? Is he wrong?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QHbXSvXd0B4
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Re: How Much Food Can You Find In A Dumpster? (Vegan Gains)

Post by NonZeroSum »

brimstoneSalad wrote: Wed Jul 12, 2017 3:28 am
NonZeroSum wrote: Tue Jul 11, 2017 11:25 pm VG missed a big opportunity by just vlogging their experience and triggering a bunch of people who had concerns that weren't mentioned.
It was imperfect, but I've gained quite a bit of respect for him for doing it at all. He also seemed to recognize that drinking freegan milk was OK in ethical terms.
knot wrote: Mon Jul 17, 2017 3:43 pm Anyone saw Bearing's response to VG's video? Is he wrong?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QHbXSvXd0B4
Yea Bearing is wrong because his fundamental objection is 'Eww,' not a good argument, but Vegan Gains is also wrong for not doing a good job and as I predicted triggering a bunch more people than necessary. But if the standard is just being willing to make a video documenting this then A star I guess, like him wanting to film his grandad's death, it draws people to the channel who have never herd of veganism in a really negative way, but how many he manages to convert after that is unclear.
  • So yea Richard was told the dates wrong on some bread by his mate, and neglected to check it for himself.
  • They could have all worn better protection gear.
  • They shouldn't have said all the best stuff is at the bottom, it's not, the best stuff is in double wrapped plastic bags at the top.
  • Rich shouldn't have exclaimed 'ooo (unpackaged) apples!'
  • They shouldn't have shown that other guy picking unpackaged greens out of one bin.
  • He could have not brought it directly back into his kitchen without leaving it dunked in water to kill aerobic bacteria then re-packaging.
  • They could have made a video about a bigger haul, as it was their time and effort cancelled out a good nights sleep and someone making money at a good job the next day.
  • They should have mentioned to search for any recently recalled food items.
  • They should have also advocated for all the lesser intermediary actions people mentioned in the comments, recorded them talking to people at food markets and small shops asking them to put aside the food in clean bags at the end of the day to pick up at a designated time.
__________
Radiation Network wrote:. . .each item that was tossed was deemed unfit for human consumption on a case by case decision.
Not even close to being true, Radiation Network makes it sound like the staff are hygiene experts studiously going from shelf to shelf with high tech equipment, it's the food production, labeling and shelfing system that needs a massive overhaul, if they order too much and it's not worth stocking they throw it out early, if a freezer breaks they throw everything out early, if one product in a batch breaks they throw it out on delivery.
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Re: How Much Food Can You Find In A Dumpster? (Vegan Gains)

Post by brimstoneSalad »

Some good criticism! If you're still on Unnatural Vegan's Patreon, you should send her a message to recommend making a video about this (you could link her here and she might include some quotes from the thread).
She's talked about waste reduction before, maybe she'll make a response, then Vegan Gains will certainly see it and maybe make a followup.
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Re: How Much Food Can You Find In A Dumpster? (Vegan Gains)

Post by NonZeroSum »

brimstoneSalad wrote: Mon Jul 17, 2017 11:32 pm Some good criticism! If you're still on Unnatural Vegan's Patreon, you should send her a message to recommend making a video about this (you could link her here and she might include some quotes from the thread).
She's talked about waste reduction before, maybe she'll make a response, then Vegan Gains will certainly see it and maybe make a followup.
Would love them to do an infographic video breaking down all the merits and criticism, think they have a lot on their plate atm tho with planned vids, it's a lot of sifting through freegan naturalistic fallacies and unfortunately dangerous health and safety on advice articles to build the wiki page, so I imagine it'd be the same writing a script for a YouTube video. If I can give the rational bare bones to research and campaigns, maybe I can be a door to that world.

Soon as I'm finished I will, any suggestions with effective activism would be more than welcome again.

Edit: Ochay took your advice, can't hurt to see if there's something already in the works.

Some more vids:

Food Waste & Freeganism (Part 2: What is a freegan and why does it matter?)
www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZzH6UEOz2Bs

Denmark’s Food Waste Vigilante - BBC News
https://youtu.be/KlFNp88T2cA

War On Waste: Dumpster Diving Granny
https://youtu.be/YllfZblk8iE

Police Arrest 7 People For Serving Food To The Homeless In Public Park
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ml-xSF4O8b8

5 Days Of Freeganism From Dumpster Diving To Clothing Swaps | Try Living With Lucie | Refinery29
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T-AKVleMNDE

Vitamin dive
https://youtu.be/rPaMkFD6Lkw

Cat food dives:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JQJJZrj1A2M
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nRlRjGKDAfg

Dog food and toys dives:
https://youtu.be/aUXXgaV_aYA?t=49s
https://youtu.be/Zv2clMXOf-U
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Re: How Much Food Can You Find In A Dumpster? (Vegan Gains)

Post by NonZeroSum »

The first of UV's videos on food waste and the second half of this one can probably be termed moving towards zero waste not freeganism, but it's all good listening. An introduction as to how it relates to veganism and use of the term. Freeganism started out as anti-consumerist ethic sees stealing as hurting the bottom line of all companies, creating irregular demand and no profit, as well as taking free animal products from strangers as some kind of gift economy that is commendable, so it is something we have to fight for the definition over, or use freegan-vegan instead.

Still be useful as I said in the beginning to get an educational video out there on how these networks of self-supporting freegans can reduce the need to consume on things like cat food, can organize to efficiently feed people on the cheap in the street and advocate for change in industry practices and the law through documenting, media and petitioning industry, councils and politicians.

_________________


Food Waste & Freeganism (Part 2: What is a freegan and why does it matter?)
https://youtu.be/ZzH6UEOz2Bs

Published on Sep 1, 2016
As I and others have said, vegan is not the moral baseline. There’s always more that we can do (or stop doing) to make the world a better place. I've talked about agricultural efficiency a bit in the past, but another major issue in our food supply (and one that we can do a lot about) is waste.

Part 1 on food waste: https://youtu.be/PEP0A93pYIk

Freeganism in a nutshell - https://youtu.be/ZzH6UEOz2Bs?t=23s
Fake freegans - https://youtu.be/ZzH6UEOz2Bs?t=3m1s
An intermediate to freeganism - https://youtu.be/ZzH6UEOz2Bs?t=4m5s
Conclusion: 4 tips for avoiding waste - https://youtu.be/ZzH6UEOz2Bs?t=5m27s


__________


Hey guys, this is part two of my 2 part series talking about food waste and now freeganism. So if you want to see the one on food waste you can check that out right here [1] and then come back and watch this one or don't.


Freeganism in a nutshell
- https://youtu.be/ZzH6UEOz2Bs?t=23s


Freegans are rescuers of sorts, only instead of rescuing people or animals they rescue food from being wasted, they get it from dumpsters, dumpster diving, often dumpsters behind grocery stores or bakeries, frequently still in the package and they eat that instead of buying food.

Given the harmfulness of food waste in terms of the environment that I talked about in the last video, this rather strange lifestyle freeganism is really commendable, it may even be morally superior to veganism in terms of immediate consequences on the world that we live in. As long as freegans aren't like cutting locks and vandalizing private property.

There's also no denying that such a lifestyle, freeganism, is less socially sustainable, obviously not everyone can live on waste so we do need vegan food products made for the market and people willing to buy them.

Freeganism is not an example that we can all follow, but it is something that some of the more adventurous of us can try, it also may be a good recommendation for people who are not quite ready to give up meat, obviously assuming they are willing to dig through garbage to get their fix which I'm willing to bet they're not.

*If dumpster diving, please be safe. Never choose rotten food and always wash and cook anything you do choose thoroughly before eating.

Speaking of meat, some freegans specifically ‘Meagans,’ those Freegans who are willing to eat freegan meat, they get a lot of hate in the vegan community, they're called fake vegans because they're eating meat, but again given the impact of waste on the environment, again check out part one, is this at all merited?

Again freegans are not buying the meat, they are not contributing in any way to demand, they are not stealing it off the shelves or buying it off the shelves, they are getting it from the dumpster, saving it from landfills, the grocery store is not going to replace this by buying more.

More animals are not being bred to suffer and die for the Meagan's meat:

“. . .some people will not give up eating meat. If freegans tell them there is a way that they can continue consuming animal products without economically supporting factory farming, they just might go for it.

Of course, it’s a good idea to keep educating on the benefits of healthy and ethical eating, because we don’t want a situation where, when less meat is available from the dumpsters, people go back to buying it from stores.

And many people won’t go freegan, but WILL go vegan. Through a combination of freegan and vegan outreach strategies, animal rights and social justice activists can hit the industry from several directions at once.”


Fake freegans
- https://youtu.be/ZzH6UEOz2Bs?t=3m1s


Unfortunately not all freegans do it right, there are freegans who steal food, which the store does replace, there are also freegans who get their friends and families to buy food for them, that is not freeganism.

The concept is not rocket science, but it seems that people really don't understand the difference between food that had to be replaced because you stole it or food that someone else would have eaten, so food you know like at a food bank or at a party or something and food that was legitimately going to be wasted, so food off of a vacated table at like a mall food court or again straight from a dumpster or trash can.

I think it's human bias and a very deep desire to eat things, certain things, certain animal products and whatnot that keeps people from thinking clearly and it makes it more difficult for people new to freeganism to figure out actually how to do it correctly.

So if you are going to go freegan, or meagan or whatever, again that's great, just please be mindful that you are doing it correctly.


An intermediate to freeganism
- https://youtu.be/ZzH6UEOz2Bs?t=4m5s


There is something between freeganism at the one end and buying only the freshest products at the other, something that it's fairly easy to do that will reduce waste, that doesn't require you to dumpster dive or creepily hang around food courts waiting for people to leave something even slightly edible behind on their table, I don't know, is that how freeganism works, I'm not a freegan, but that's the image that I get in my head, it doesn't sound very pleasant, anyway the tip is, don't buy the freshest produce.

Obviously I'm not suggesting to buy rotten or mouldy food, please do not do that, but you know pick things that are slightly bruised or maybe a little bit old or just ugly, things that people are very likely not going to buy, this will keep the store from throwing them out, you may even be able to get a discount on these items, be sure to talk to your produce manager to see.

Some stores like Kroger, they even have a little section where they have the less pretty, little bit older stuff for sale and that's really cool it's a practice that we should really try to reward, the same goes for packaged products as well.

Bread is a really good example, instead of doing what most of us to which is sifting through the bread trying to find the one with the latest sale by date, go for the one with the soonest sale by date, the one that most people are not going to buy.


Conclusion: 4 tips for avoiding waste
- https://youtu.be/ZzH6UEOz2Bs?t=5m27s


And now to summarize all of the tips from the last video and this one:

To avoid waste:

#1: Focus on staple foods (dry beans, nuts, whole grains, etc.)

So number one, eat mainly efficient, non-perishable staples like dry beans and whole grain products that you can prepare and eat within a couple of days. This virtually eliminates retail waste and waste during long-term storage in your kitchen number.

#2: For perishables, plan ahead and store correctly.

Number two, for prepared dishes and perishables like produce, buy or make only what you can eat before it goes bad, store carefully and keep of them eating leftovers and surveying your produce regularly and eating things before they go bad.

#3: For perishables, buy reduced for quick sale items.

Number three, when you do shop for produce and other perishables, try to buy the reduced for quick sell stuff and eat or prepare them quickly and remember that thorough cooking it usually sterilizes the food and resets the clock so to speak for spoilage, this can also be useful if you want to keep something longer.

#4: Seek out ugly, bruised produce that people are less willing to buy and packaged food closer to its sell-by date.

Number four, if you cannot find quick sell items and are planning to prepare and eat the food soon, try to overcome the compulsion for freshness and buy something a little older, bruised or closer to its sell-by date, rather than as far away as possible. This helps reduce waste in the store, since many other consumers will avoid these products and they might have gone to waste. This is not freeganism obviously, but it is a middle ground and every little bit can help.

So that's it, thank you so much, I really hope you enjoyed this video if you have any comments or questions, please leave them below, if you are freegan I would love to hear from you, that would be really cool, so please leave your comments below, any kind of experiences you have or maybe something that I got wrong, that'd be cool and if you want to subscribe, subscribe and thanks again, I will have a new video [shrugs].


------------------------
*References*

Part 1 on food waste:
https://youtu.be/PEP0A93pYIk

Meaganism and the End of Animal Agriculture:
https://freegan.info/what-is-a-freegan/freegan-philosophy/freeganism-and-animal-rights/meaganism-as-a-strategy-for-dismantling-animal-agriculture/
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