Stealing: Shop Lifting

Stealing seems to be a subject that everybody has something to say about! When a large amount of students were asked in the Being Bad lecture if they'd ever stolen, I was shocked to discover that over 50% admitted that they had, atleast once during their lifetime. Personally, I have never stolen from a shop or from a member of the public. It is not something I believe to be morally right, however, I have never been in the position that I have needed to steal anything, for example, it could be said many homeless people have taken food from a shop because they couldn't afford it and would otherwise, potentially die from starvation. This kind of shop lifting, I tend to find myself tolerating, despite the fact homeless people have usually caused their place in society. Moreover, I can not help thinking that it is not fair to judge at homeless people at face value and I try to understand that they MIGHT NOT be there by choice. Opposing this, the fact that theives steal people's personal belongings I find disgraceful and people need to learn to respect others!

Somebody suggested in this lecture that stealing from a big company, for example shop lifting a television from Comet, is ok because it is not really going to affect their 'already large' profits. The fact that our society is starting to think this way is a real shame! Although, it may not hugely affect their profits, shop lifting IS NOT morally right and this kind of stealing is purely members of society being greedy, and if everybody thought this way, our society would crumble.

Take a look at this link, this is quite an interesting News article that explores, what, where and why people steal according to British 'stats' and research: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/4477596.stm