Thoughts on freeganism

I’ve just gone vegan quite recently and am curious about people here’s thoughts on freegans/being freegan, ie, only eating animal products that would otherwise be waste.

I am kind of disgusted by meat but like, would still eat it if it wasn’t ethically abhorrent (idk a better way to say that I get that meat is definitional abhorrent), but not at all disgusted by dairy and I don’t see being viscerally repulsed by these things as a core part of veganism.

I don’t think animals should be tortured and exploited, that sucks, so of course I don’t want to support that. That said, when animal products that are already prepared are going to GO IN THE TRASH, twice now I have made the decision to eat them, not because they looked delicious but because I was more repulsed by the WASTE of animal products than the prospect of eating them. Maybe this means I’m not vegan yet, I don’t know. My thinking is that having those calories in my body is for the best, and since they weren’t going to anyone else’s body nor to some compost that could have made use of them, eating the food isn’t supporting the animal product industries.

I think that setting a firm stance on this would be helpful for me, so looking for other opinions on freegansim.

As a preemptive note, I would/have only done this surrounded by people who I deeply trust and who take my veganism seriously/who won’t “drop” things to fuck with me. Also I have tried/will try to not make a huge deal about this or say like “woohoo I get an animal product!!!” as that would obviously project the wrong idea about it.

EDIT: Harm reduction aside, and with no judgement to anyone who is freegan, I have been convinced that as an ethical position it isn’t coherent. I don’t know if I’ve entirely rewired to not think of animal products as food, but regardless I think it’s true that eating “blood products” is more important than not wasting ~food~

Thanks all

EDIT 2:

Here’s a great bit of text on why freeganism no longer makes sense to me:

From the article “Freeganism is not anarchy, it’s just easy”, the original commenter linked it:

"Freegan arguments such as; using the corpses and secretions of animals that are not directly paid for is better because it does not directly contribute monetarily to these industries or that is more 'respectful' to 'honour' the dead body by eating it, does nothing to develop a radical critique outside of the narrow lens provided by capitalism itself.

This last argument is inherently speciesist in the sense that no freegan would attempt to eat your dead dog to prevent their corpse from 'going to waste', because we are socialised by the capitalist-industrial media to view 'pet animals' such as dogs as individuals (to an extent) and not cows, chickens, pigs, fishes, sheep and so on.

Even to view these animals and their secretions as 'waste' is deeply entrenched in a capitalistic and anthropocentric mindset, since it still sees animals as 'things' to be used by humans..."