Dumpster Diving Punks

"Mainstream American food with its labor and natural components cooked beyond recognition is countered with the raw and rotten foods of punks; foods that are ideally natural, home grown, stolen, discarded and incommodities. These foodways define punk cuisine and punks themselves.”
-Dylan Clark

I really do believe that the food we eat reflects who we are. When I hear the word punk I automatically stereotype it as people who don’t care about life and who go around making trouble. However, this stereotype has been countered by my newly discovered idea of what being punk is all about. Reading “The Raw And The Rotten; Punk Cuisine” has taught me to be more open to the punk culture just as we are encouraged to accept other cultures. The punk idealism actually reminds me of what this class supports; consuming organic and natural food that is not altered or changed by man. The punk culture rejects separatism of classes such as social status, and race as well as separatism of food such as “raw” or natural food verses genetically altered food. They believe that we as humans are being controlled by the pesticides and genetically modified organisms in our food; and therefore do not support eating anything that has been killed or changed by humans. I find it fascinating that they can actually find treasure out of waste and give them major props for doing so because I would never be able to do that. I get mad a lot of the time when I see perfectly wrapped bread and other food in garbage cans because there are so many people out there that need food. Although I along with other people are bothered by this, we would never actually take the food out of the garbage and eat is because it is defined as “trash" in our eyes. The punks, however, take delight in finding food in the garbage because it is a way they can overthrow the “mainstream’s” definition of trash, and feed themselves and others that have been outcast or looked down upon by society. Some people may think that this is a little strange because usually food that is in packages is genetically altered with a lot of preservatives so why would they want to eat that when they were so against eating food with preservatives? I think that the reason they still eat the food is because since it was rejected by upper/middle class, it is no longer looked at as modified by humans. The punks believe that society changes the food to make it better for human consumption, but the fact that people did not want it, voids the fact that it carries preservatives, therefore making it "raw" again. The punks want to prove that it is still food that can nourish anyone, especially those who do not have food in the first place.

Even though it is not good enough for nicer restaurants, it is still nourishment for the body. Although I don’t think I could ever go to the Black Cat Café or eat food that came from dumpster diving, I have a newly found respect for the punk culture because they live there lives based on equality, peace, nonviolence, and ideally natural elements.