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A subreddit dedicated to busting shoplifters

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Re: A subreddit dedicated to busting shoplifters

#121

I'm historically a very liberal San Francisco resident. But I'm finding it really hard to understand the amount of shoplifting going on at my local Walgreens (Mission and 30th). I visit the Walgreens about once a week mostly for diapers and covid test kits. I go at various times of day. About 1 in 4 times I'm there I've witnessed shoplifting. Mostly groups of teens and, in my uninformed assessment, not struggling fin…

>They seem to be doing it for the thrill. Like a sport. I will admit that I sometimes steal candy/snacks from convenience stores for this exact reason. There is a very real thrill involved in getting away with something, and I've (mostly jokingly) considered going to SF just to steal things from convenience stores. It really seems like a no brainer why this is happening more often. If, as a child, your parents said "…

> I will admit that I sometimes steal candy/snacks from convenience stores for this exact reason.

If you can't stop doing this, please at least don't do this at mom and pop places.

Re: A subreddit dedicated to busting shoplifters

#122

I'm historically a very liberal San Francisco resident. But I'm finding it really hard to understand the amount of shoplifting going on at my local Walgreens (Mission and 30th). I visit the Walgreens about once a week mostly for diapers and covid test kits. I go at various times of day. About 1 in 4 times I'm there I've witnessed shoplifting. Mostly groups of teens and, in my uninformed assessment, not struggling fin…

I know teenagers prosecuted, fined (minimally) and sent to do social services for like palming a lipstick and caught on camera. They'd think twice before doing it again for fun. But yeah this is Switzerland not USA.

Re: A subreddit dedicated to busting shoplifters

#123
post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It might be a red flag. But that can't be some roadblock to entering the industry. People get into careers for all sorts of reasons. A paycheck. The thrill of succeeding at their job. The thrill of being the best in the business. You can't just exclude those people from that career and focus on people "the goals of the business". Personal goals are better drivers to excellence than business goals.

The problem is when their personal goals conflict with both the business's and society's goals. Think of it like a manager who announces "I love bossing people around, that is why I'm in the industry." Sure, that is part of the job, a person in that role shouldn't have an issue with it, but someone who says that is the reason they are doing the job is directly telling you they are unfit for the job.

The business's goal is to minimize theft of their products. Society's goal is to prevent theft. It seems like those goals are in alignment with someone in loss prevention who enjoys the thrill of successfully catching shoplifters.

I don't see this as any different from people who work red team in infosec and get a thrill from getting root on a box, or those who are blue team and the highlight of their week is catching an intrusion attempt. Some people just thrive in that sort of competitive environment.

Re: A subreddit dedicated to busting shoplifters

#124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a little more indirect than you're presenting, but it is still a fraught situation where people have significantly shorter lifespans. Starvation is unusual, but murder, exposure, overdose, and withdrawal are common. A lot of these people shoplift to keep up a physical addiction that they can not easily or safely move on from.

How can letting people shoplift stop them from getting murdered? Also, I wonder how many people die of overdose who would have survived if they had less money to buy drugs with, versus how many people die of withdrawal who would have survived if they had more money to buy drugs with.

letting people shoplift doesn’t make it better, but arresting them doesn’t either (often worse)… it’s just the symptom of a greater problem

Re: A subreddit dedicated to busting shoplifters

#125
post #2

Article kind of bums me out. One loss prevention officer says: > He finds the environment of loss prevention thrilling and takes pride in the training he’s received to track down and apprehend shoplifters. “That’s a huge adrenaline rush,” he says. “I think that’s a major factor in why people are in this field.” But also says: > “I don’t do this because I think shoplifting is wrong,” he says. “If I’m perfectly honest,…

One of the best teachers I had in college was a criminal justice counselor. And the job of criminal justice counseling isn't like other jobs in psychology, sure some of your job is to help the convicts, but a lot of the convicts don't want help or are actively hostile to your help, but part of your job is to help the state. Either way someone in the class asked how he can do the job if "helping people" wasn't more co…

See Daniel Pink on autonomy, mastery and purpose.

Re: A subreddit dedicated to busting shoplifters

#126
post #73

> “A lot of people are like, ‘How, morally, can you do this job?’” How did people's moral compasses get so corrupt that instead of believing stealing is immoral, they believe that stopping other people from stealing is immoral?

The full quote: > Although McLeod enjoys his job, he knows it’s one that’s frowned upon by many. “A lot of people see that a homeless person got arrested for stealing a candy bar. They’re hungry, right?” he says. “A lot of people are like, ‘How, morally, can you do this job?’” I still think this is a perfectly moral (and important!) job. And it's the role of our justice system to define what punishments should be whe…

> The "man steals a loaf of bread to feed his starving family" thing is a pretty classic ethical dilemma.

But that's also an insignificant fraction of shoplifting cases. Changing our overall policy based on it would be like legalizing running red lights because once in a while people are rushing someone to the hospital.

Re: A subreddit dedicated to busting shoplifters

#127
post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The full quote: > Although McLeod enjoys his job, he knows it’s one that’s frowned upon by many. “A lot of people see that a homeless person got arrested for stealing a candy bar. They’re hungry, right?” he says. “A lot of people are like, ‘How, morally, can you do this job?’” I still think this is a perfectly moral (and important!) job. And it's the role of our justice system to define what punishments should be whe…

> The "man steals a loaf of bread to feed his starving family" thing is a pretty classic ethical dilemma. But that's also an insignificant fraction of shoplifting cases. Changing our overall policy based on it would be like legalizing running red lights because once in a while people are rushing someone to the hospital.

It's related to 100% of the quotes I was responding to, however.

Re: A subreddit dedicated to busting shoplifters

#128
post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yea let's just shit on the people who are at their lowest point in our society and not let them have comforts such as alcohol that the rich enjoy on a daily basis. The existence of people in poverty is absolutely fucking horrible compared to what most experience in the US and other OECD nations

> at their lowest point in our society and not let them have comforts such as alcohol that the rich enjoy on a daily basis. A lot of them are in the position they are in now due to drugs and booze. Let's not conflate those homeless for economic reasons with the ones that just burned all their bridges via substance abuse. > absolutely fucking horrible compared to what most experience in the US and other OECD nations I…

>A lot of them are in the position they are in now due to drugs and booze

Quite simply this is false. Mental health issues generally lead to addiction, in nearly all cases its a dual diagnosis situation with mental health issues and substance abuse which is usually due to the mental health issues. These people are just trying to cope with their daily existence and all the rich people are constantly shitting on them, telling them to pull themselves up by their bootstraps and hiring lobbyists and think-tanks to write legislation to shit on them more. We spend so much money on stupid programs instead of just giving people fking places to live its insane in the US

>They got a place to sleep at night

That's the big difference. Austria also has great public housing

Re: A subreddit dedicated to busting shoplifters

#129
post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> at their lowest point in our society and not let them have comforts such as alcohol that the rich enjoy on a daily basis. A lot of them are in the position they are in now due to drugs and booze. Let's not conflate those homeless for economic reasons with the ones that just burned all their bridges via substance abuse. > absolutely fucking horrible compared to what most experience in the US and other OECD nations I…

>A lot of them are in the position they are in now due to drugs and booze Quite simply this is false. Mental health issues generally lead to addiction, in nearly all cases its a dual diagnosis situation with mental health issues and substance abuse which is usually due to the mental health issues. These people are just trying to cope with their daily existence and all the rich people are constantly shitting on them,…

Generally can lead to*

Re: A subreddit dedicated to busting shoplifters

#130
post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Copying my other comment here. There definitely is a moral issue >busting people who are shoplifting items that they either need to survive or items that they can sell to survive to say, pay rent, because our capitalist system has shit on them and left them with no options Property rights should not be above human life. Full stop.

> Property rights should not be above human life. Full stop. Sure, if someone's bleeding out on the street, and you grab a tourniquet from a nearby drugstore and run out without paying for it, you should get a pass. But I think cases like that make up approximately 0% of shoplifting. Most of the times people say that shoplifting is necessary to survive, it's not actually true.

That's an extraordinarily short sighted view of the needs of a living human

Yes only things that can happen to kill someone within like 60 seconds are what should trump the property rights of the capital owners that have been looting the country and take advantage of the dire straights of the poor working class. Awesome

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