The Hidden Life of Garbage

The Ever-Growing Trash of Shoprite According to “The Hidden Life of Garbage,” Heather Rogers states, “Today’s garbage graveyards are sequestered, guarded, and veiled.(178)”Rogers claims that the Waste Management Inc. operates its Geological Reclamation Operations and Waste systems (GROW) landfill on a historical river valley in Pennsylvania in which Washington had crossed the Delaware river. At the landfill site, Rogers’ states, “the logic of our society’s unrestrained consuming and wasting quickly unravels. (178)” In addition, Rogers explains “the aptly named GROWS landfill is part of Waste Management Inc’s (WMI) 6000-acre garbage treatment complex, which includes a second landfill, an incinerator, and a state- mandated leaf composting lot.(178)” Perhaps the landfill GROWS is aptly named due to the fact that the landfills have become increasingly larger. Moreover, Rogers stressed that although landfill regulations make them less dangerous, these answers will only be short-term solutions. Altogether Rogers attitude of the situation is that these landfill projects are being kept away from the public eye for a reason, which is to keep us from asking questions. In short, Rogers concludes her article by asking the repressed question, “what if we didn’t have so much trash to get rid of?” We generate a large amount of garbage ourselves, everywhere we go. At my grocery store, trash is being generating by the lack of a proper recycling program, untouched, edible food going to waste, and certain materials not being reused. In this day and age, it is becoming more and more common to find recycling cans at your local restaurants and shopping malls. However, at ShopRite grocery stores there are none of these recycling cans to be found. It is alarming to see the amount of plastic bags, bottles, and papers that are simply thrown away without any thought into it. Every day when I am at work, I see countless amounts of plastic bags thrown away carelessly when in reality there