Freeganism

Freeganism is the practice of minimising one's adverse impact on the environment, animals, and human lives by limiting participation in the capitalist economy.

Related Topics:
Environment - Animal - Capitalist economy

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Sometimes misunderstood to only apply to food, freeganism is a broad-based lifestyle ethic encompassing food, housing, transportation, clothing, and all other necessities of daily life.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Freegans see capitalism as inextricable from exploitative practices like sweatshop labor, rainforest destruction, animal testing, and factory farming. They are also concerned about the enormous volume of waste generated by a society that produces more than it actually uses.

Related Topics:
Sweatshop - Rainforest - Animal testing - Factory farming

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Freegan practices include, but are not limited to, recovering and using discarded goods (food, clothing, etc.), inhabiting abandonded buildings (see squatting), foraging for and consuming wild plants, trainhopping, hitchhiking, growing gardens in abandoned lots (see guerilla gardening).

Related Topics:
Squatting - Trainhopping - Hitchhiking - Guerilla gardening

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Freegans place a high value on community, sharing, and mutual aid. They tend to reject the concept of private property, reflecting a school of thought common to anarchism and popularized by proto-anarchist Pierre Joseph Proudhon. Freegans see the pressure to maintain employment in order to purchase commodities and pay for necessities like food and shelter as a form of oppression. They view the advertising-driven push to constantly purchase new commodities as a form of manipulation for profit.

Related Topics:
Private property - Anarchism - Pierre Joseph Proudhon - Advertising

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~