Y’all, I gotta be real with you—some things just make my blood boil. My son just told me a story that had me wanting to scream at the top of my lungs. There’s this 16-year-old kid, working his very first part-time job at a Meyer store. Every day after his shift, he grabbed some fruit—just fruit—from the trash to eat on his way home. These were little fruit cups they tossed out at the end of the day.
And guess what? The manager at Meyer waited. Waited until the total value of what this boy had “taken” added up to over $100 so they could call the cops and charge him. A misdemeanor. Putting a 16-year-old in jail over food THEY THREW IN THE TRASH.
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Why Are We So Cruel?
I just can’t wrap my head around this mindset. That boy might’ve only had that food to eat. He’s working there, making maybe $15, $16 an hour—if that. And what was he taking? Stuff they were throwing away anyway. It wasn’t sellable anymore. And yet they still wanted to lock him up.
The manager didn’t even tell the kid, “Hey, you can’t do that.” Nope. They stayed quiet, built a case, and set him up. That’s calculated. That’s heartless. That’s straight-up bogus.
We Waste Too Much
And this ties into the bigger issue—we waste so much food in this country. I’ve seen it with my own eyes. They’ll put a huge bin in the aisle saying, “Buy 3 for $4, $8,” when the expiration date is literally just hours away. I promise you, I am not exaggerating.
And what happens when it doesn’t sell? They toss it. I know the answer. But why throw it out? Why not send it to Dollar General, or anywhere else it could still be useful?
The Simple Solution We Ignore
You know what we should be doing? The thing we’ll probably never do because we live in a capitalist society and nobody wants to talk about it. But anyway—we should be pulling items off shelves before they expire. Like three days before. If nobody buys them by then, give them to people who can’t afford food.
Instead, they wait until the last second, and then it’s too late. Into the dumpster it goes. Meanwhile, there are homeless shelters, food banks, so many places that would gladly take it.
When Greed Drowns Out Humanity
We waste too much food in America, while people are literally hungry, all so they can squeeze every last dime out of everything. They’d rather trash it than let someone eat it. That’s exactly why that manager called the cops on that kid.
I get it—maybe there’s some company policy that says employees can’t eat out of the trash. But come on, that’s insane. Why can’t someone take home what’s about to get thrown away? And it was just fruit cups. Wasted anyway.
The Ugly Truth
I hope people dragged that manager online, because the fact that he waited until the total hit $100 just so he could call the cops—that’s not just petty. That’s cruel. Let the boy eat.
If I were the manager, I’d have said, “Take it, son. Take as much as you want.” That’s who I am. If it’s in the trash, I’d probably hand my own kid a little more to take. If it’s trash, unsellable, why can’t he eat it? It makes no sense.
The boy ate it on his way home because that might’ve been all he had. That’s shameful. He works at Meyer, making barely a few bucks—maybe $15, maybe $16 an hour if he’s lucky. Do you think he’s stacking up cash? No, he’s probably just trying to save what little he can.
This is why we need to change how we look at food and sharing. Compassion has to come before greed.
