I’ve been thinking about this common waste object since Halloween: candy wrappers.

In the weeks following Halloween, it’s tough to walk around any semi-residential area without spotting lollipop wrappers, squished chocolates, and tiny cardboard Nerds boxes.

One of the simplest ways Douglas frames the concept of dirt is “matter out of place” (pg. 36). When the candy is eaten, the empty wrapper belongs in its designated place, which is an appropriate garbage receptacle. Leaving it anywhere else is disrupting the order of the universe! Seeing this wrapper on the ground in the center of a sidewalk is wrong, but seeing it on the ground in a dumpster or landfill would be acceptable.

Another interpretation of dirt could be matter that may pose hygienic or pathological harm to us. This wrapper itself is seemingly innocuous, as someone trusted its manufacturing process and food cleanliness standards enough to consume its contents. If this wrapper were handed to me alongside a crumpled ball of printer paper, I would most likely trust the cleanliness of the paper before this wrapper. Maybe it’s the knowledge that food once existed in it, or that someone’s mouth may have been pressed against it to lick out the last crumbs. Why is my mind brought to food again in this example? I’m absolutely certain that, of the 500 inorganic lab-synthesized chemicals compromising the candy’s ingredients, 499 of them are high-strength preservatives that would render the candy sterile even after a nuclear meltdown at the Nerds™ WonderFactory™. Any type of food just seems to carry this aura of potential disease.

Matter out of place goes into our disgust of things when they are in the wrong place. This mainly covers trash and disposable products. When trash is in the trashcan it doesn’t bother us, but when we can see it pouring out of the trashcan or on the ground. We have been taught to stay away from trash because it can carry bacteria. Matter out of place really goes into the factor of if we can’t see it then it’s not a problem. Trash in landfills will not be a problem for us because they are meant to be there. Dumpsters are hidden around the back of stores to hide garbage from the shoppers eyes. This class went over what we usually don’t think about and let our primal emotions of disgust take over but instead it makes us think about what really goes into everything even something as simple as a dirty napkin

In class we discussed how dirt and other products would disgust us if they were in the wrong place. If dirt was found inside a house we would try to get rid of it but if it were outside no one would really mind. This thought process comes from our need to organize and how things need to be in a certain place or it will be messy and contaminating. This affected me a lot in my past as my family is half Asian and as a tradition we are very strict about shoes and dirt in the house while the other side of my family did the opposite. This rule mostly stems from tradition though as of recently is seen as a necessary as covid and other diseases can find a way in through “dirty matter”. This lesson showed how we as humans are against any sort of dirt or trash that is completely normal in small quantities. Trash in our world is only ok in our eyes when it is out of sight in a trash can or in a dump.

A big discussion point this week was the concept of dirty and dirt, the idea that as long as it’s in its designated space it’s not noticed. In class we discussed for example how if you were to find dirt in your house you would be unhappy and complain about how dirty it is, and then clean it by tossing the dirt. Stepping outside there is dirt everywhere but we wouldn’t call it dirty in the same way. It shows that the idea of trash and “being dirty” is a concept that we as a society created. It’s a system of unspoken rules that tell us exactly what is considered dirty and disgusting and what is considered clean and proper that seems to fluctuate based on the person and place.

On the typical day of me working on the farm, we see a lot of produce that goes bad. There is an entire food production process that throws away produce that seems to be a little bit hard. In my mind, I have a hard time throwing away food. It takes a lot out of me to toss away perfectly good food that no one wants to buy. The farmstand I work at, has to throw away produce once it starts going bad so that it doesn’t make the rest of the produce rot also. A good example of this is the tomatoes, they go bad quickly and take out a couple previously good tomatoes with them. The problem with people thinking that food is waste, is that people are less considerate about where and when we decide that produce is no longer good to each. I think eating rotten vegetables is really nasty but at the same time I believe that there is so much produce at local farms that would still be perfectly good to give to food pantries and community kitchens. There is a community of homeless people that lives in the small cities around here that I believe would have a much better time getting good produce if the farms were able to give produce directly to them. I don’t believe that the food ‘waste’ I make in my house is bad because we have chickens to eat the scraps.

An object in our daily everyday life is paper, plastic, and food, which are typically considered as waste.

Mary Douglas’ conception of dirt helps us to understand why this is waste because we package our food in paper containers or containers made of styrofoam. We use plastic cups for our drinks and throw them out. We eat food, but we throw away food or leftover food which is considered as waste. This type of waste can be used for composting to feed our plants or trees the vitamins they need.

(https://recyclenation.com/2014/08/recycle-medicine-bottles/)

An empty medicine bottle is considered waste. I take a lot of different medications daily so I end up with a lot of empty orange bottles that I don’t know what to do with. When I say a lot I mean multiple bags full of empty pill bottles over the years. My pharmacy does not have a take back program so I assume many people will simply throw them away after the course of 30 days where they get another bottle that will become empty and repeat that cycle. These are made of a nice plastic and could be reused and there are places to ship them to so they don’t end up in landfills but despite my collection (which includes my sister’s and parents) has been growing. I don’t have the energy or reminders to find a box, create a shipping label, potentially pay for it, print it out, then package it all, tape the box, and then ship it off. The amount of tasks it requires creates a stall in my brain. It fills with clutter and static, then I decide to simply deal with it later. There are also interesting crafts that they can be used for, I have seen people attach the individual bottles to the bulbs of Christmas lights to decorate dorms. My friend used to make earrings out of unconventional items so these could work too albeit a bit large (some do like bulky earrings and jewelry). I have seen them as storage of small objects, I bought a bag of jewelry making supplies a few years ago at a thrift store and some of the beads were inside of old medicine bottles. I have also seen the bottles used for geocache containers which is brilliant since they are generally waterproof.

(https://spiritclouds.square.site/product/pill-bottle-led-string-lights/5)

An empty medicine bottle is considered waste as it has finished its original purpose, to hold medication in a uv resident enclosed space that keeps the medication fresh and safe to use. It contains a label which shows the ownership of the medication, the type, amount, how to take it, and when the pills inside expire. The medicine bottle’s life cycle is considered over once the medication runs out, not to be reused as it is considered “contaminated” , unable to be reused for its original purpose by the pharmacy.
While the original use is lost, there is potential for reuse; we just need to be creative.

I will fidget with anything not nailed down if you let me. Just in front of me as I write this I have a few beech tree seeds, a folded up piece of foil, and some paper straw wrappers I’ve rolled into spirals. While the seeds serve an actual function in nature, the foil and straw wrappers are just repurposed “waste” of various meals. To me, these objects aren’t waste, at least not yet. They’re still being used, even if not in their intended manner. The line is very thin though, I accumulate them at a rapid pace, and they wear out easily, generally disintegrating within a month, so even a fully functional fidget becomes waste very quickly when I realize I need to trim the herd. I haven’t “saved from the dumpster” any of the wrappers in my fidget repertoire, the all end up there eventually, just not on the same day they things they contain are eaten or used. In this way, they are waste waiting to happen, I’m just delaying the inevitable trip to the dumpster.

Examples of the straw wrapper/paper spirals I fidget with.

Something I use everyday that can be considered as waste is my plastic cup. Yes, I may use the cup a few more times after the first use but I eventually throw it away. It’s considered waste because once I feel as if its use is no longer needed then I no longer have to keep it. I would rinse the cup and reuse it for the day sometimes but I would not keep it for multiple days.

Mary Douglas implies that “washing, scrubbing, isolating, and disinfecting has only a superficial resemblance with ritual purification”. We focus a lot on hygiene and whether or not something is clean or dirty. For instance if the worshipers didn’t shower, they would be wasting time trying to pray because they were impure. Anyone who would be in contact with them, clean or dirty will become impure. In my cup scenario, since it’s been left on the counter for hours after being cleaned, it can become dirty because it’s an open cup and could easily be contaminated, therefore it’s a waste.