Ive never stolen anything really... im the "Marge" type, who pays for a grape in the supermarket... Sad, I know. I'll still kill the bastard who stole my hot pink bike when I was 8. Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
A large faction of the American people believes that the government steals from them. It's kind of hard to argue with that position, since so much of what the government does with the money they confiscate is either to squander it on pork barrel programs, to use it for ends that the people in question consider to be evil, or at the very best to dissipate it on a huge staff of civil servants who spend most of their time "administering" each other and produce very little of any real value. A smaller but still substantial portion of the people believe that large corporations steal from them. This is also difficult to argue. Take the music downloading controversy, for example. As the comic strip "Out of the Gene Pool" recently dramatized, record companies hype one song off of a CD on the radio and MTV and get lots of people to go out and buy the CD. Then they discover that the rest of the songs on it are of a completely different type from the one they fell in love with, and that often the one song was not even composed by the band/artists and was produced by a different producer than the rest of the CD. If you take the CD back to the store and demand your money back on the grounds of deceptive marketing, they laugh in your face. It's kind of hard not to sympathize with people who would happily download about 100 songs to make up for the last ten crappy CDs they purchased. It's impossible to fight either the government or a large corporation. They control the entire political system which includes the courts and the banks. Therefore many people have reached a conclusion that the only way to achieve "fairness" is to steal money or goods or services back from the government or the large corporations. Some people make a regular practice of doing this. Others do it less often. And a few do it so much that they may actually come out ahead, although personally I think that only unemployed people who never have any of their own money to spend could achieve that position. But I'm willing to bet that most of us have done it a few times and therefore the only honest answer to this question is "Yes, but with extenuating circumstances." You Canadians and residents of other countries may have a different perspective on this. It would be interesting to hear it. And perhaps it would make us Americans realize that life here is not so bloody perfect.
As I said some time ago, we human tend to go mischievous at occasions, and theft is just one of the very many mischief we wish to do................... *steals a friend's cookie can*
I would like to add a short other comment. There are lawyers, doctors and other professionals out there that overcharge up the ass so they are stealing your money legitimatly aren't they? They use their "fees" to make you pay what they want because no one regulates their profits but themselves. So just what is ment by stealing is a matter of your perspective isn't it?
i try to get the most out of something if i feel i'm being ripped off. kind of like how ross steals everything from hotels because it's built into the cost. so if i get free refills on my tea, i make sure they keep em coming. if i buy an unlimited metrocard, i make a point to use it at every opportunity. i make copies of music because i have no money to buy it on overpriced discs that only cost a dollar to make in the first place. it is always music that you can't buy in music stores anyway or from artists who are ridiculously wealthy while i have no money at all. so i think it's fair. there's not much reason to rob, unless you're robbing the rich to give to the poor but i'm not a renegade benevolent theif so i avoid the theiving business altogether. i don't believe in that "all stealing is wrong" nonsense. only people with stunted moral development and religious people blindly follow rules like that. there are plenty of cases in which stealing is morally correct. ACTUNG if you are answering this thread, can you also answer the following question?: a poor man and his beloved wife live in a little village in germany. they are very much in love and pretty much live for each other's presence. the beloved wife becomes terribly ill with a disease for which there is no known cure and it is certain she will die without treatment. a scientist in that village develops a drug that will cure her disease after spending a good part of his life and fortune on it. it is so rare and hard to make that each dose costs no less than $2000 to make. assume that the wife who is close to death will make a full recovery if she gets the drug. the scientist will sell them the drug for not a penny less than $2000. the man tries to raise the money but the townspeople are also poor and can only contribute at most $500. the scientist refuses to give them the drug. should the man break into the scientist's lab and steal the drug? there is no "right" answer. it is your reasoning behind your answer that is important.
You ask "a poor man and his beloved wife live in a little village in germany. they are very much in love and pretty much live for each other's presence. the beloved wife becomes terribly ill with a disease for which there is no known cure and it is certain she will die without treatment. a scientist in that village develops a drug that will cure her disease after spending a good part of his life and fortune on it. it is so rare and hard to make that each dose costs no less than $2000 to make. assume that the wife who is close to death will make a full recovery if she gets the drug. the scientist will sell them the drug for not a penny less than $2000. the man tries to raise the money but the townspeople are also poor and can only contribute at most $500. the scientist refuses to give them the drug. should the man break into the scientist's lab and steal the drug?" I would go to the government and ask them to help subsidize the drug to bring the costs down. I would go onto the TV stations and ask more people for help. I would go onto the internet to see if other might help me there. I would find a better paying job and ask to pay for the drug over a period of time instead of right away.
i would just steal it ... everything else takes a lot of time ! the scientist won´t die or starve without his cool medicament Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! edit : btw , germany wasn´t a perfect example maybe .... people here don´t have to pay for needed drugs if they have no money Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
Is it posible to get a loan in this village? If so that'd be preferable to theft. I would steal it, might kill the scientist if he confronted me. Thats Irrational but thats how I think I would react, If I didn't have any alternatives. Probably going to get flamed for "killing the scientist" cause this is sci-forums not X-tian-forums. I don't think I'd be able to think clearly if my "beloved wife" was dying.
i put all the pertinant info in there. it is a poor rural village in germany, not a modern day city. he tried getting money in the village but only could collect $500. tv stations and gov help aren't an option (no such thing as tv then!). the question is simply, should he steal it? should he or should he not are the only options. now rationalize.
I download music. I've been known in the past to steal small items from my employers--pens, printer paper, &c. Beyond that my unfair acquisitions are best identified through extended arguments of social responsibility. In that arena, I'm a world-class thief.
i have two main options : - steal the drug - let my wife die i think it´s pretty obvious what almost ALL people would do in this situation Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
By the way: • Reuters: "Venezuela to decriminalise theft." See http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/s1026900.htm Edit: See also: Sciforums topic - "Venezuela: Decriminalizing theft"
well sure, that's what i'd do. but then we have to think about the scientist. it's the product of his life's work. he spent all his money on it. many of us are scientists ourselves and i'm sure we'd be heartbroken if we spent our life working on something to have it taken away. i'd definitely steal it but this isn't about what i'd do, it's an exercise in morality. is it wrong for him to steal it? i don't know. my answer is that it is his moral duty to preserve life above money. but really, i don't know. because working on this project was the life of the scientist.