Part One : Trouble
It is anything but easy to be a book-smart and life-stupid savant. I do not get along in this world. My father was the same way and a famous inventor, but if you know anything about that kind of thing you know that that is very often a curse. Einstein's son was a crazy person. My father's brains were also a curse to him because it was GE that owned his mental expertise since he worked for them. It was they that made the millions he thought how to make. He was barely more than a poor man. He was self-taught and did not have a college education so they did not pay him very well. The guys who had college educations who worked with my father in the research and development labs at GE made better money. It made no difference that Dad was full of good ideas.
I have been a writer for Opednews.com for a bit. I love to write. One of the reasons I can write and talk to the world and can afford to do it for no pay is that I meet my needs in unusual ways. One of those ways is dumpster jumping. You could also call me a recycling expert and an "Urban Ore Technician". One of my dumpster jumping friends calls it that.
But today it did not work very well. Today, 10/5/2011, I was almost arrested at a Goodwill dumpster in Farmville, Virginia. The way I feel is that stuff in dumpsters which is thrown out should be accessible for others to take. I know needy people and I give to them on a regular basis. And often I give them Goodwill dumpster stuff and often they thank me profusely. And my entire house is full of Goodwill stuff I bought for a few dollars in the store as well as got out of the dumpster behind it. But no more, for I am now forbidden to visit the store under threat of being arrested for trespassing.
Goodwill says ... "if you climb in the dumpster and get hurt you could sue us." I could engineer a trip and fall in your store and sue you. If I were the kind of person looking to sue others for false reasons I would probably be set for money already and not need to jump in your dumpster. I am poor partly because I am an honest person, so what are you talking about? I have been jumping in dumpsters for years and have yet to get hurt.
Furthermore a bit of thought about the matter should indicate to a thinking person that all of creation belongs to God and that we humans as earth citizens are not greater than she ( Earth , or Gaia ). All her resources are God's first, hers second and ours third. And the human race and its constituents all share in the right to enjoy and share in the goods things of earth. A thinking person should realize that we do not live in an ideal society and that injustice is rampant. Therefore we all have the obligation to share anything that is unused by one with another. To throw something in a dumpster and then deny another the right to claim and use it is criminal. It is morally criminal wether it is legally criminal or not.
The excuse that I might sue is not a greater consideration than the waste of large amounts of things given to Goodwill to be shared with the poor. Anybody can sue anybody any time and folks do it all the time. Every time you do a favor for someone it can theoretically turn into a dangerous situation for various reasons. That does not keep people from doing good things.
I have taken homeless people in from the street and shared my house with them only to have them steal from me. It is risky to be generous to others but you can not stop living and being nice just because someone might abuse you. And good things should not be in the dumpster in the first place.
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