One hell of a condensing

I have no respect for people shoplifting non-essential items (like makeup, etc) but essential items like food is a different story.

In my opinion it depends more on whom you are stealing from than what. Food is okay, anything else not absolutely required for immediate survival isn’t is a somewhat cruel and arbitrary position.
Even a dirt poor person has more needs than just food sometimes, to stick with your example even a dirt poor woman or girl may want to feel pretty for a moment, and I feel that’s nothing bad either. Granted this is a slippery slope to outright lawlessness, but there certainly is a lot of room for valid needs that are less immediate than nourishment and shelter, but still important to people feeling human at all. Counts twice for people already in the extremely dehumanizing position of being poor.
- She may need it for an interview to improve her prospects too. As long as it's from a big place like Walmart I see no harm in someone desperate doing it to improve their situation.
  The Walton family will be fine.
- My policy has become: "If you see someone shoplifting, no you didn't." All businesses write a little bit of theft loss into their budgets. I don't care what shoplifters take. It's not my concern. Let the egg heads in accounting and the beef sticks in loss prevention figure it out. That's what they're paid to do. Not you.
Makeup is an essential item for professional women. I'm not saying it's right that it's essential, I'm just saying it is.
- What about all the women who get by without wearing make-up?
- Professional streetwalkers, maybe
The world is burning down around us, and the only people with the power to make an actual difference are throwing gas on the fire. Why the fuck should I even notice somebody shoplifting? Save your disrespect for the real criminals of society.
- Reminder Wage Theft has by far the greatest total value compared to all other kinds of theft
(legitimate question) why don't people in need use food availability programs like food stamps instead of stealing for essentials?
- Because if you make over $1400/month then you don't get food stamps. That isn't even rent where I live.
  The median STUDIO apartment costs $2100.
- when you have children to feed and you're hungry yourself - standing in line to fill in a form and wait an interderminate amount of time to be potentially denied something that comes with a huge amount of restrictions it's just easier to steal.
  There is enough food and wealth to feed and home everyone. Theft is a service issue.
The difference between stealing luxuries and necessities.

We judge ourselves by our motives, but others by their actions.

I'm certainly not a snitch, but my respect only goes towards people who are stealing what they need rather than what they want - the former is surviving the struggle, the other is kleptomania

Stealing Pasta and canned veggies = necessity.
Stealing Nike TNs when you're already wearing a pair = yeah fuck you.
- Exactly, exactly - though I wouldn't judge people taking non-food items like soap, detergent, and other basic hygene products either. They're low cost goods most people need but might not be able to afford.
- You think the slaves that made those Nike's aren't getting their days pay because some cunt in another country stole them? Fuck Nike.
It’s not my job to care or judge what someone else needs.

At Walmart, or at least the one I worked at, every single case and jar of baby formula was tagged with a security strip that sets off the alarms at the door, on the inside of the container to make it difficult to remove. Baby formula was the most stolen item in the store. It's also one of the most expensive food items in the store.

Coincidentally, I would also find empty packaging with the security strip still attached in the handicap bathroom that was far away from the front doors and the alarm sensors.

How fucking depressing is it to live in a country where people have to steal baby formula just to feed their babies?
- Sounds like the education system should be improved to inform people of just how expensive and time consuming it is to procreate. All the time you see people do it who definitely do not have the means, and then being forced to steal and/or just suffer for years
Me omw to shoplift a magnet:

Here people are stealing expensive cheese and meats to sell to pay for drugs

I'm not particularly sympathetic towards that.

Sick, where is this place I can go to for cheap cheese and drugs?
- I think most stores stock cheese and it's fairly cheap if you use the five finger discount
The fuck? How/where do they sell them? Who in their right minds would buy cheese or meat from a sketchy source?
- You don't buy artisan cheese from your local toothless meth head ?
- Streetfood vendors mostly don't care about sources as long as the goods are good. I had a favorite place before that sold chocolate bars with no markup compared to nearby stores, and I was wondering why they'd even sell them given that chocolate doesnt really go well with their main offerings. Until I witnessed a junkie carry a box to them from the nearest supermarket and it all fell into place. Selling stolen product right across the road might've not worked in their favour though as the place changed hands not long after.
- My brother in law used to work in an off licence (booze store) so got to know a number of customers, some of which were drug addicts. They would steal from the local supermarket which was right next door. Things like expensive meats, cheese, coffee, spirits, etc. high value products which are easy to shove in a bag or jacket. They then go and knock on the door of anybody they remotely know who lives nearby, ask if they want to buy some cheap goods. Often about 50% off.
  I know people who would buy this stuff. It's usually stuff straight from the shop but I suppose you can never say for sure.
- A long time ago, I lived in a trailer park, and a homeless guy would come by once a week selling steaks at a lower price than you could buy at the store. Some people would buy them. Needless to say, everyone there was in a pretty bad situation, so a luxury like cheap steaks was tempting.
- They sell to people they know. And they're still in their packaging and you know they've recently stolen it, so why not. Really cheap too
- I doubt they sell it, I bet they go back to the same chain of stores and try and get a receipt-less return for cash.
- I bet there are restaurants that will. Especially if it's still packaged.
If I see someone stealing food, they could be stealing to sell it for drugs or they could be stealing to feed their hungry family. Why should I worry about the former when the latter is also a decent possibility?
- I don't know, worrying about it didn't cross my mind
If you're gonna steal cheese why wouldn't you steal the best cheese?
- Right, especially if you're going to sell it. It used to be that you could sell the cheap stuff to Russia but even they aren't buying it anymore.
How else are people supposed to get drugs
- Could use the benefit money for it. Which they do. Welfare benefits in Finland are top notch, but yeah there's never enough money for (enough) drugs. So lot of them do crime, burglaries, stealing from stores, stealing bikes and whatnot to get more money for (more) drugs.
  It doesn't make me very sympathetic to them stealing from a store though. It's not like they're stealing to not starve or something.

What about someone who helps and teaches others how to shoplift effectively?

true gigachad right there. stealing from large corporations is always morally correct

Whose pocket does it come out of when someone steals from Walmart?
Whose pocket does it come out of when Walmart does its stealing?
- the store . easy question. They pay more for insurance, and maybe the store stocks more garbagey stuff so the loss isn't as much.
  people who chose to shop there. Another easy question.
  These were hard for you somehow?
What was your motivation for stealing?

But if Javert casually nukes a couple of planets with trilithium, nobody cares

stealing a loaf of bread? good

stealing silver from a bishop? also good because he'll also give you some silver candlesticks too

Another reason that I need to read this book!!

Fuck that, I'm going to say something.

Whoever you shoplift you raise the price I pay at the store.

The problem with that argument is that prices can't be raised indefinitively without negatively impacting revenue. If prices go up, demand goes down. So, yeah, basically all arguments that increased costs get handed off to consumers are flawed, if a business can increase its profit by raising prices, they are going to do so sooner or later, anyway. They might wait for an excuse to do so, but even then they won't wait forever.
When people shoplift from big chains it doesn't even register for the company, much less impact their pricing in any way
- It's already inflated to account for shoplifting.
  I'm already paying extra because shitheads don't want to buy the products they use. It's like paying extra tax that goes to benefit the undeserving directly
Its already included in the price. Whether you report it or not
- The price will be much much higher if shoplifting becomes generally acceptable.
Agreed. Your reasons and their appropriateness isn't my problem. Nor the cops' problem. Nor either lawyers' problem. Whether your reasoning justifies the crime, that's on the judge to set aside a verdict if a jury returns a guilty verdict.
I'll go one further and say that people who steal, claim it's for a noble purpose but run from the cops, didn't commit.

Wikipedia article on fried dough? What am I missing?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fried_dough