The ability to “support/provide” one’s own self (or family) with the primary goal of becoming & maintaining a self-sustaining “personal ecosystem/Homeostasis”, Being a “Human Being” as well as “Conscious” to the dangers around us especially when basic necessities are not meet can drive many individuals to do just about anything in order to earn a living & support themselves simply because, it’s a “natural instant” at “self-preservation”.
This essay will effectively highlight with proof supported within the reading texts (stories) that everyone has an instant at self-preservation, thus have a “threshold” by which if met will create/would do just about anything in order to ensure a living. Furthermore, my essay will actively compare how these characters experiences compare to one another & finally consider how their experiences compare to the real life working experience detailed in Eric Schlosser’s “The Most Dangerous Job” and Barbara Ehrenreich’s “Nickel and Dimed”.
The Instinct of Self Preservation & the Human “Threshold”: The sheer Act of “Self Preservation” can take on many forms, Nevertheless, we as human beings have a certain “threshold (level of desperation) with regards to what we will do, when it comes to self-sustaining ourselves as well as our families, and even our current live styles rather they are seen by the wider social culture as “honest, dedicated & hard working or cunning (slick), Taboo & even completely “socially unacceptable”.
The three main stories entitled, “Crippled: A Story by Agent Tattletale” by Chuck Palahniuk, “Fast Food Nation” by Eric Schlosser and on “Nickel & Dimed On (Not) Getting By in America” by Barbara Ehrenreich, are all highly fantastic examples of what it means to sink so low into “desperation” for employment that several individuals within these stories actually resort to some “shady”, as well as highly cruel, unusual, utterly mortifying, as well as the various scheme in which people make up in order to maintain their own personal “Homeostasis” within their own environment (lives).
To being with, in the story entitled, “Crippled: A Story by Agent Tattletale by Chuck Palahniuk” the two main characters of the text (a Cripple”/Private Eye Investigating Rat) as well as Sarah cross paths in the most unfortunate of ways. As highlighted within the text, the crippled Investigator once had a beer job delivering beer Kegs between “distributors, little bars & taverns and while humping kegs platforms when one of the Keg managed to rolled off the rack and creamed me out flat on the pavement.” (Palahniuk, Agent Tattletale).
This of course limited the fellow’s ability to work until he found a television advertisement for becoming a “Private Detective” allowing him to discover another employment outlet. As described by the crippled private eye in the story, “They teach you how to stake out a suspect, digging through their garbage can for evidence, After that, I had my own spreadsheet of deadbeats to go spy on, making my own whistleblowing little “stalk-umentaries” and “turning in your fellow cripples in most cases you don’t even have to appear in court. Just turn in your expense report for the motel, the rental car, the restaurant meals, and you get your check in the mail.
Plus the commission”. However, in the case of this private eye, he gets caught by a fellow neighbour named Sarah, who during the excerpt of the text (and according to the crippled private eye detective himself) is actively contemplating in her house how to kill the investigator, since she already got him locked up in her shed. Throughout the text, the investigator makes it clear that he would understand if Sarah were to go along with her plan to kill him as his private eye “livelihood” has the complete ability to most certainly jeopardizing government benefits (disability).
According to the “Crippled Private Eye”, he was put into her shed under lock & key when she discovered that he was on her property recording footage of her “lifting sacks of steer manure, slippery white plastic bags packed with cow crap. Each bag printed in black letters: Net Weight Fifty Pounds” (Palahniuk, Agent Tattletale). This of course would have earned the crippled money to support himself, because he would be turning Sarah in, however by doing so he would also destroy her family as the “disability” is her only living sources.
Furthermore, the Cripple know of the direct implications of his actions because he boldly stated in the text, “Here’s the five minutes that will end life as she knows it. My short “stalk-umentary” that’s going to put her back into blue-collar slavery” (Palahniuk, Agent Tattletale). This short expect is a great example of how individuals will “Tattletale ” on others to save themselves as well as when they are put in the situation in which they have no other way to support themselves. Both characters had limited capabilities to do so. Sarah being both physically as well as implying mentally disabled” & the Tattletale being a utter cripple.
Likewise, the Most Dangerous Job Excerpted from the Book “Fast Food Nation” by Eric Schlosser reveals both the dangers & disgust of the Meatpacking Industry within the United States of America. To being with and quoted in the text, “the injury rate in a slaughterhouse is about three times higher than the rate in a typical American factory,with more than one quarter of the meatpacking workers in this country roughly forty thousand men & women suffering an injury or a work–related illness requiring medical attention beyond first aid” (Schlosser, Fast Food Nation).
The text goes on to continue that, “A large proportion of these workers are illegal immigrants, with thousands of additional injuries & illnesses most likely go unrecorded” (Schlosser, Fast Food Nation). Specifically, it has been revealed that, “Lacerations are the most common injuries suffered by meatpackers, who often stab themselves or stab someone working nearby, & cumulative trauma disorders are also quite common with Meatpacking workers
