♪ ♪
John Wilson: Hey, New York.
Every time I throw something out,
It feels like I'm getting away with something.
On Tuesday and Friday every week,
all the evidence of my shameful lifestyle
is removed without any question.
And I never have to think about it ever again.
It's amazing to think that it's this easy
to get rid of something.
But there's always going to be some stuff
that you're never quite sure how to throw away.
I have a big box of used batteries
that I keep in my apartment. (clears throat)
They're, uh-- I think they're all dead,
but I'm afraid to throw them into the normal trash
for reasons I don't quite understand.
I thought I was the only one,
but when I-- but when I talked to my neighbors,
it seems like they had the same problem as me.
-This is my bag for... -(bag crinkling)
things like that, I guess.
Wilson: What else is in there?
I don't know what to do with them, either.
You're stuck with them, and then they dry up,
and you can't use them at all.
Wilson: There seemed to be a lot of mixed messaging
about how to get rid of stuff like this and,
and that causes some people to hold on to things indefinitely.
And so if I just put it out in the trash,
I feel like I'm not being a good citizen.
I really do.
Wilson: Disposing of things correctly can make you feel
like you're doing the Lord's work.
So instead of holding onto this stuff longer than you have to,
stick with me, and I'll show you
how to get your life in order
and finally figure out the right way
to get rid of all your batteries.
(clears throat)
The first place you should try is the
hazardous waste drop-off site that the city has set up
right under the Manhattan Bridge on the Lower East Side.
But when you get there, it seems like
it's temporarily closed,
and they don't give any indication
as to when it's going to reopen.
So, you're gonna have to figure something else out.
♪ ♪
Thankfully, when you're walking around your neighborhood,
you actually stumble across,
uh, an electronic waste event,
where you're supposed to throw out stuff like this.
But when you ask them if they can, uh, take your batteries,
uh, you get some disappointing news.
-Wilson: You don't take batteries? -No.
So, we used to have a warehouse in Brooklyn,
and then the landlord raised the rent.
And so now, if you look behind you, we've got a truck there.
Wilson: So, where would I throw out my batteries?
Best Buy, Staples, Home Depot,
Lowe's, or IKEA will take them.
-Wilson: Oh, really? -Yeah.
Wilson: So, take your batteries down to the subway station
and bring them all the way to the place
he was talking about.
The first place, uh, didn't, um...
it didn't seem open right now. So,
get back on the subway and take your batteries
all the way to the next place that he mentioned.
But when you get in there,
you have a tough time finding the receptacle
that he was talking about.
And you have an even harder time,
uh, finding an employee.
Excuse me, do you work here?
-No. -Wilson: Oh, sorry.
-You don't work here, do you? -No, I don't.
-Wilson: Okay. It's the orange shirt. -(laughs)
And after searching for a while,
you start to wonder why they make this so hard.
♪ ♪
If you're gonna be buying batteries
for the rest of your life,
are you going to have to come back
to this godforsaken place
every sing-- every time your box fills up?
And you wish you could just get rid of these
the same way that you do everything else.
But, for some reason,
that's not an option.
Even if you were to recycle these things,
you're not even sure if that would make you feel better.
You separate all your cans and stuff
from the normal garbage, but
you read somewhere that only 9% of plastic
is actually recycled.
And no matter how environmentally conscious
you think you're being,
it feels like it's just an illusion
to ease your conscience.
♪ ♪
Maybe it's just part of human nature
to hope that something
can take on another life
and return in a different form.
One thing that we see in reincarnation cases
is we're basically the same person
from lifetime to lifetime.
The soul projects a hologram,
if you will, into the developing fetus,
which results in the facial features
being similar from lifetime to lifetime.
Uh... Mark Zuckerberg
was an early data programmer
for the US Census.
Uh, Jay Leno is the reincarnation of Moliere.
Michael Jackson, at age 10,
was recruited into
this children's army
and was killed.
The resemblance is very striking.
You know, the mouth and the chin are pretty much the same.
-Wilson: Is that you? -Reincarnation Man: Yep.
-A few years back. (laughs) -Wilson: You're saying
you were the second President of the United States?
Reincarnation Man: Correct.
I met a woman,
and within six months, we were married.
And it turned out that
she was my son
in the Adams lifetime.
Wilson: Wait, your wife was your-- the reincarnation
-of your, John Adams' son? -Yes.
Wilson: Is that, is that incest?
Well, it's not incest because...
they're different lifetimes.
-Wilson: Oh, okay. -Yeah.
♪ ♪
Wilson: When New Yorkers aren't sure how to dispose of something,
it usually ends up on the sidewalk.
They often place it somewhere conspicuous
in the hopes that sanitation employees
will remove it because it's in the way.
And law enforcement is
absolutely powerless to stop it.
(inaudible)
There's a safe that's been on the sidewalk
near my apartment for a long time,
and I have no idea how it got there.
Do you know what's up with this safe?
Oh, okay.
It seems extremely hard to move,
and no matter how many
of my favorite combinations I try,
I can't seem to get inside.
♪ ♪
City garbage cans are also filled with objects
that people aren't sure how to throw out.
But if you put the wrong stuff in there,
it can seriously damage the people that collect it.
-How you doing, man? Morning. -Morning.
People throw out steak knives
in garbage bags. Needles.
That's the worst part.
You pick up a bag, and when it swings back...
There was stitches.
I cut the inside of my leg,
and I think somewhere else. Three times,
-I wind up having to get stitches on my leg. -Wilson: Damn!
Oh, look, look. Look! Here.
-Wilson: What's that? -Open it.
-Wilson: Oh, shit. -A guy in a garage down the street
had one of these explode on him,
and he was in the hospital for about...
-What'd you say, about a month? -Yeah.
For about a month.
-(whirring) -(pop)
There we go. Now, if that was that tank,
it's exploding on us.
Know what you're throwing out, do your work.
If you're not sure, call 3-1-1.
Wilson: It seems like if you throw out something you shouldn't,
they have to call in a special waste department to handle it.
And if you're sloppy,
it could even go on your permanent record.
Hazmat Worker: Nine out of 10 times, we will locate
the individual that deposited it,
and if they're found in violation, we'll issue a violation.
It could potentially go criminal,
-especially if someone's severely injured. -Wilson: Wow.
Once they took the tank away,
you got to talking with them a bit more,
and you asked if you could come see
how the Department of Sanitation works.
And they actually said yeah.
♪ ♪
Everyone's garbage is brought back to this facility
and dumped into a big, stinky pit by the dump trucks.
And they have photos of dangerous objects
that they'll show you.
This is the remnants of an oxygen tank that exploded.
Shut down a two-block radius in Manhattan.
You can see there's some syringes.
You have some acid, poison, arsenic.
Just a simple photograph of our offices.
Wilson: Then they let you go to the recycling facility next door,
where they have people separating things by hand.
And they take a second to tell you how dangerous it is
to have batteries mixed in with the recycling.
So, musical greeting cards, for example, um,
you don't think about it, but there's a battery in there.
And there is actually a fire in New Jersey,
there's a paper recycling facility,
and the entire facility burned to the ground.
So, here's an example of a battery.
This is an e-bike battery. It came into our facility.
We didn't actually ask for this,
but someone thought they should be recycled.
And it could create a smoldering condition,
and it's hugely dangerous.
-We're good! -Worker: Alright, no problem.
Wilson: Um...
The tour was really eye-opening, and you didn't realize
that such a gentle household object
could be responsible for so much devastation.
(dogs barking "Happy Birthday")
When you look on YouTube, you see that there's actually a guy
who's dedicated his entire life
to warning people about stuff like this.
This chainsaw may unexpectedly start
without pressing the power switch
when the extension cord adapter is connected upside down.
These pastries may contain mold.
If you bought the carrots, don't consume them, but destroy them.
These garments failed to meet federal flammability standards
for children's sleepwear,
and they create a risk for childhood burn injuries.
Do not permit your child to wear these nightgowns.
Contact La Paloma and arrange a refund.
Wilson: Nightgowns are flammable?
Yep. Well, they're supposed to be not be flammable.
-Wilson: Oh, right, right. -But, they are.
Wilson: Why do you think people hold on to recalled products
even if they know they've-- they're dangerous?
Well, most people collect any product
because they think it is a collector's item.
That is, it's valuable.
So, I imagine if you had a bottle,
a jar with something in it,
like a screw or a bolt or a nut,
that probably would be an interesting collector's item.
Wilson: You never really thought of it like that before.
That something you thought was defective
could actually become a collectible one day.
♪ ♪
Maybe if we just take care of objects
that nobody else wants,
they might actually end up in a museum.
And there could even be hidden value
inside of your stuff
if you could just learn
how to crack the code.
(dolly rattling)
This is the Mattel Cabbage Patch Snacktime Kid,
and it was recalled because it was...
Instead of eating the snacks that came in the box,
it was actually eating children's hair.
-Wilson: What kind of batteries does it take? -Cabbage Patch Lady: "C."
That's the problem is that it doesn't stop
after you give it the food.
Wilson: So, this could, like, potentially scalp a, a child?
(water running)
Yeah. Yeah, it, it probably could.
Wilson: How-how much is something like this worth?
Cabbage Patch Lady: I think around $500 right now.
-Wilson: Really? Wow. -Cabbage Patch Lady: Yeah.
(doll motor whirring)
Wilson: Whenever I'm bored, I like to cruise around
on the free section of Craigslist.
It's filled with items that
people have decided they don't want anymore,
but they can't bring themselves to throw away for some reason.
A lot of these objects would make
the perfect piece of trash,
but they still feel like they could be of value
to somebody else.
You saw that someone was actually trying
to give away some old batteries.
They looked like they were from the 1950s or something,
and you thought maybe
they could be worth something one day.
So, you go to their house to, uh, meet up with them.
So, wh-wh-why are you getting rid of these batteries?
My ex had them decorating the top of shelves he built,
which you can see the remains of over there.
I liked them. I liked him. They reminded me of him.
Wilson: Is there anything else that you,
like, held on to from your last relationship
that's hard to get rid of?
Yeah, I still got my wedding rings. (laughs)
-Wilson: Oh, really? -Yeah.
Do you, do you plan on getting rid of them anytime soon?
No. (laughs) I guess I...
because I feel super guilty. Uh, I...
I don't think I could get rid of them,
but I also don't ever think I could wear them.
I got all my-- Like, I have five things in my room.
My stack of clothes, my disco lamp.
And then, this is...
-It's my cat's ashes. -Wilson: In there?
Yeah, she was born and then died in this apartment, so...
Wilson: Maybe getting rid of painful stuff is
more complicated than it seems
because even if you don't have a use for it,
you still can't bear to see it thrown away.
And when you go back to your apartment and look around...
you realize how much unnecessary stuff
you've had lying around for years, too.
♪ ♪
Some of it is sentimental.
Some of it might become valuable.
And some of the stuff you keep around
is emotionally radioactive.
When I was growing up, I used to make a movie
every single day.
I still have all the tapes
that I keep in a box in my apartment.
But, I never show them to anyone
because they're too embarrassing to watch.
(fart noises)
I even made a feature film when I was in high school.
It was a Christmas movie
called "Jingle Berry,"
and it took over three years to make.
When the time came for the premiere, uh,
I introduced the movie with my friend Chris,
and then ran upstairs to man the merch table in case
anyone wanted to buy
one of the 200 handmade DVDs
that we'd prepared for the event.
But when the movie was finally over,
everyone that exited the theater walked directly past
and tried to avoid eye contact with me.
♪ ♪
I didn't sell a single copy to anyone that came.
And it was one of the most painful experiences
of my entire life.
(clears throat)
I also screened it for my parents,
and my own father told me that
it was the worst movie he had ever seen.
I was so embarrassed afterwards that
I destroyed every single disk that I made.
But for some reason,
I still hold on to one of them.
If I was hit by a bus one day,
it would be the last thing I'd want anyone to discover.
And there has to be some reason
we hold on to stuff like this.
(inaudible)
-(rummaging) -(sighs)
Okay...
(sighs)
-Okay. -Wilson: Oh wow.
Um, this was brought back by my Uncle Bernie
who fought in the 45th Infantry during World War II.
Wilson: How long do you feel like you'll hold on to this?
Bernie's Nephew: Um...
It is... I, I, I don't really know.
I mean, this is not something
we would casually throw out in the trash.
For one thing... (laughs) I certainly wouldn't want,
you know, any municipal sanitation worker
to find a Nazi flag in our trash can...
-Wilson: Right. -(laughs) for starters.
It's just, you know, it's like
-"the very symbol of evil." -Wilson: Mm-hmm.
Which it is, but it's also
-a crappy piece of cloth. -Wilson: Yeah.
And, you know, maybe, maybe there's something to be said
for like not fetishizing it the way we do.
This is the warehouse where we store
approximately 1.2 million items
that have either been confiscated or seized by
the US Fish and Wildlife Service Office of Law Enforcement.
If you can imagine a product of some kind,
it's probably here in one form or another.
This is one of our more unique objects.
It is a tiger fetus
that has been taxidermied for preservation,
A phrase that, that we sometimes find ourselves
saying here is, "bad taste is not a crime."
It probably should be, but it is not.
Yeah, these are really awful.
Just awful.
Some of this stuff will remain here indefinitely,
and, and I would say when I say indefinitely,
I really do mean, um,
at least for the lifetime of the repository.
Wilson: Uh, what's the benefit of
preserving it over destroying it?
Um, even though they're no longer,
you know, living creatures,
they still play a significant role
in getting the message out about conservation
and, and combating the illegal trade.
(birds chirping)
Amputee: A speeding motorcycle collided into me,
clipped me, and took my leg off right away.
Basically, I was told that this leg
was no longer a part of me.
This wasn't even a human anymore.
I think they called it like biological waste
or something like that.
And now it was the property of them.
It was no longer my property, and that was just...
I couldn't even-- I couldn't even accept that.
They don't want you taking your leg, and, and
mailing it to the...
to the president or something. So, um... (laughs)
there's a liability there, and it's understandable.
Wilson: Why would you wanna mail your leg to the president?
Well, you know, people do crazy things.
So, yeah, after...
about a dozen no's, I was finally able to convince...
someone...
to give me my leg back.
Wilson: Wow.
Does it, does it make you upset to, to see this every day?
No! No, I, I, I love it!
To me, this is a treasure. Like, I, I will gladly display this.
I will, I will...
I will put this on the fireplace mantle. I, you know,
this is my talking piece, this is everything to me.
It's priceless. I couldn't-- I could never...
I could never put a tag on it.
Wilson: Maybe all it takes is a shift in perspective.
And if you begin to see something traumatic
in a positive light,
it can be something that actually makes you feel good.
♪ ♪
So, you sit down to watch "Jingle Berry"
for the first time since the premiere.
Maybe you just misremembered how bad it was,
and you were really just being a little too hard on yours--
-No, Scrimsly, no! You can't! -(dramatic music)
I need you now more than I ever, ever did!
Wilson: No, no, no. Uh, and on second thought,
you might actually need to find a way
to put it somewhere
where, uh, it can never hurt anyone else
ever, ever again.
What's the most responsible thing to do with toxic material?
Well...
(laughs)
try not making it, but that's, um...
That's one of the reasons why, personally,
I figure that we shouldn't be having new nuclear power plants
till we figure out where we're putting the waste we've generated.
The Waste Isolation Pilot Plant
is where they're disposing of radioactive wastes,
and the project was
how do you mark the site and have it be
intelligible for 10,000 years?
You don't know which language is gonna survive.
Certain facial expressions
work across cultures.
-Wilson: Mm-hm. -Something like this,
which would say it's not a good place to be,
should be on there.
You've got hurt, you've got pain,
and as time goes on,
the hazard from these wastes diminish.
I mean, no one likes the idea of being near toxic stuff,
and particularly toxic stuff you don't know was toxic.
And that's part of the reason
to tell people that you really don't wanna be here.
♪ ♪
Wilson: I used to live on the most radioactive block
in New York City.
In the 1950s, they used to dump
hazardous waste into the sewer underneath, uh, this deli
because they didn't know what else to do with it.
The city tried to block the radiation
by covering it with heavy lead and steel plates,
but that was only a temporary fix,
and the radiation will still keep harming people
until they fully excavate the site
and displace everyone above it.
Maybe it's such a low priority
because there's no obvious solution,
and it's easier to just ignore what's there.
Supposedly on Randall's Island,
there's more housing for sex offenders
than anywhere else in New York City.
They're pretty strict, as I understand.
You can't be by schools, you can't be by...
(truck drives by)
can't live with a thousand feet of a, a school,
can't be by children under the age of 17.
But, you still have to have a place for them to go.
And, for some reason, they picked Randall's Island,
which is a little strange to me.
Wilson: Do you think a lot of people here know that they're so close?
I, I, I doubt it.
I doubt that they even...
have a clue that they're here.
You can see there's a park right there. If you turn around,
kids are playing in the parks, and they got about
27 fields like that on this island.
And right there, sex offenders. Right there.
You wouldn't even know... If I showed you them,
you wouldn't even-- Like, "no way." Like,
I don't know how I look,
but most people would never suspect that I'm a sex offender.
-You know what I'm saying? -Wilson: Did you...
I mean, I clean up good sometimes, you know what I'm sayin'?
I'm homeless now because I can't live in certain situations
-because of my level 2 sex offense. -(truck beeping)
I was in with these crazy child molesters and shit.
I couldn't deal with it.
Most of the sex offenders in New York City
go through this system right here,
and most of them go to Clark Thomas.
This is where you get off at, right there.
That's the stop, and you go to Clark Thomas right there.
It's the worst possible bus
that you could get on.
However you call the one in Afghanistan?
That's what that bus is like.
Most of the people that make the decisions about these places
haven't experienced these places.
They just come up with an idea, like, "That would be great.
Let's go live on the moon." You never been to the moon!
But, "Let's go live on the moon!
"Let's make some housing on the moon.
That shit would be great!" And they make it on the moon,
then they realize, "Damn. There's no atmosphere here.
How are we gonna live here?"
With being a sex offense,
you definitely have to admit to it.
Even in the programs that they put you in,
if you don't admit it, you're not going home.
And a lot of people admit it just to go home.
Wilson: Have you admitted it to yourself?
At first, I didn't. I was in denial.
Even talking about it now,
I don't even wanna fully get into it
because I start to cry when I even think about what I did
and what I did to her,
and what I did to me and my family.
You know what I mean? I've been selfish my whole life,
so I think about it, of course, but
I haven't forgiven myself for what I've done.
I'm still living with that right now, you know what I mean?
Trying to forgive myself for what I've done.
So, you know, even if she forgave me...
(stammering) I got to forgive me. You know what I mean?
I can't-- I gotta forgive me, and it's hard for me to do that.
♪ ♪
Wilson: Maybe your past isn't something
that you can just throw away.
Because it'll always be part of you in one way or another.
As I was about to leave the island,
I saw that a fire started in the trashcan
at the bus stop we passed.
And it didn't really seem to faze anybody there.
And even though I was standing right next to it
the whole time,
I still had no idea how it started.
This is just another day in a shelter system, man.
This is what they do. You're dealing
with mentally ill people, man.
Like what do you expect when you put a bunch
of mentally challenged people and you're not helping them?
(Wilson speaking)
It's about to go out, but it's still dangerous.
Fumes and shit like that.
Officer: Hit at the bottom, the bottom!
(indistinct chatter)
(inaudible)
(birds chirping)
♪ ♪
Wilson: Once you decide something is a piece of trash,
it becomes hard to see it as anything else.
Even though there's still a part of you in there somewhere.
And if you don't figure out the right way
to deal with all your stuff,
it could end up doing lasting damage to somebody else.
So even if your problem seems insignificant in the moment,
you should find a way to deal with it while you still can.
Because once you're able to recognize the person
that you were, you can
finally start to work on who you want to become.
And then you might not have to throw anything out.
Because even if something seems toxic now,
there's a good chance it'll be valuable
to someone else one day,
and could even be used to educate them
-about what not to do. -(clang)
So long as you warn them about
the stuff that you left behind,
they should be able to decide
how close they want to get to it.
And even though you feel bad for having created a mess
in the first place,
future generations will thank you
for doing the right thing.
This is John Wilson. Thanks for watching.
(dogs barking "Happy Birthday")
(howl)
-(barking stops) -(paper crinkling)
♪ ♪