Earlier quoted context omitted.
actually you do
technically this is not true
It's not true in any way, technical or otherwise.
Italian court rules food theft 'not a crime' if hungry
61–70 of 406 posts
Re: Italian court rules food theft 'not a crime' if hungry
#62Seems reasonable. Not like he was nicking razor blades and booze just some necessities. Shame it had to go so far but hopefully it will prevent similar court action or arrests in future.
So, if you are proved to be poor or hungry (whatever that means), does it give you a green light to steal? Maybe, let's say, steal 10 times a day from 10 different shops, and resell the goods for half the price and use the money for something else?
I mean that's a lovely headline and all, but in startups lingo, it doesn't scale.
Re: Italian court rules food theft 'not a crime' if hungry
#63It's a little hard to understand how this ruling won't cause a certain degree of chaos. Can any hungry, homeless person now steal food from any store in Italy without repercussion? Certainly as a matter of compassion, this ruling can be argued as being reasonable, but how can it work as a practical matter?
Also, surely the store from which he stole is still victimized by the theft. Is every supermarket now de facto required to set up small food pantries for the poor to protect themselves from theft?
Considering the massive amounts of food that gets thrown away even before the expiration date, I'm amazed this is even an issue. There was an entire episode of "Last Week Tonight" on this topic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i8xwLWb0lLY
Re: Italian court rules food theft 'not a crime' if hungry
#64I'm interested, what test do they perform to check if a person in question was hungry?/s Still, it's a bad precedence imho, so according to such logic, a homeless person could also invade my home and sleep in my bed, because he can't afford his own.
I'm not seeing the same logic you are. If someone is hungry (or pretending to be), why would they want to break into your home and sleep in your bed, rather than steal food?
Re: Italian court rules food theft 'not a crime' if hungry
#65Reminds me of La miserables.
Les Misérables
Edit: With appreciation to lorenzhs
Re: Italian court rules food theft 'not a crime' if hungry
#66Re: Italian court rules food theft 'not a crime' if hungry
#67I'm glad that stealing beer is still a crime :)
Re: Italian court rules food theft 'not a crime' if hungry
#68The Judeo-Christian Bible calls this "gleaning". From what I understand, it was considered an essential part of the social safety net and farmers who erected fences to keep truly needful gleaners out were considered sinful.
Gleaning was more about allowing the poor to have inefficient access to the raw materials that with hard work could be made into food. Taking prepared food from a merchant would have still been a crime. For example "People do not despise a thief if he steals to satisfy his appetite when he is hungry, but if he is caught, he will pay esevenfold; he will give all the goods of his house."
I'm not sure that the ancient Israelites had many places you could go get "prepared food," but the Bible also says you should leave behind grapes for the poor which clearly do not need preparation.
e: Previously I claimed that olives don't need preparation which is false. Sorry.
Re: Italian court rules food theft 'not a crime' if hungry
#69I have wondered whether this applies to the ethics of piracy too. For example, on release of a blockbuster movie - the distributor will do blanket advertising saturating every channel trying to manufacture a demand - tv, internet, sides of buses, roadside-hoardings, in taxis, talk shows, newspaper native ads etc. You just can't escape even in your own home eating your breakfast cereal when the box is smeared with adv…
It's true that the *AA's create a lot of perverse incentives, but I don't think it's that complex. If people can get what they want legally they generally will. If they can't, they are more likely to get it illegally anyway. I don't think the desire for a piece of content has to get very high before people are willing to pirate it.