I am not advocating shoplifting, but we all did something dumb as a kid. What is your story?
Me, I was 2 years old and at Tim Hortons with my mother and a family friend. This was almost 50 years ago and Tim Hortons still had servers back then, so there was a cutout in the counter for them to go in and out. The donuts are in racks behind the counter. I had had a chocolate donut paid for by my mother, and apparently I decided I wanted another, and I was so little I nipped behind the counter when nobody was there, helped myself to another, and was only discovered when my mother noticed me polishing off a different donut. She did pay for it and everyone laughed, I was just little and it was funny. Sadly the quality of Tim Hortons donuts has gone way downhill over the intervening years, as older Canadians know.
I nicked a LEGO winch brick from primary school and my gran made me take it back. Not a criminal mastermind.
My moms heart when I was born.
The first thing was probably a set of earrings when I was a really little guy. I handed them to my mom when we got home and she was shocked at what a smooth swipe I pulled and we immediately went back to return them. So much for my thoughtful gift! Hahaha.
I also recall this thing at my very conserva-religious elementary school, where people set up a little market selling things as gifts and such. I was given some money to go buy presents for people, but nobody told me how to pay for anything, and I assumed it was like a big box store where you pay at the end.
So here I am like, what, 6 or 7 maybe? Going from table to table and just yoinking knick-knacks into my little bag. Nobody stopped me or otherwise corrected me. I still don’t see anywhere to “check out”! I end up just leaving, basically.
Cut to me waiting in the lunch line and just getting straight up shaken down and accosted for cash by some authoritarian staff types. I just handed them the bag of spending money I’d been supplied with and I don’t really remember what happened after that. Looking back though, those people were very mean to a confused child under 10, treating me like some deliberate criminal mastermind of petty-thievery lol.
In my teens, I stole some CDs. This was pre-napster. I didn’t have money to spend bit it’s hard to deny the importance of music to people, especially in those formative years. I only took 2 maybe 3 total, because the guilt walking it with the CD each time wasn’t worth it.
To give you an idea of how much guilt, I don’t like people offering me food… Because it was theirs and now it’s not. The fact they offered it means nothing. (Of course the reverse isn’t true)
When I went to malls as a teenager I would often get stopped and searched as if I was shoplifting. Was over 6’ at 16 and often wore hoodies. When I started getting into cross-dressing I was too ashamed to go through checkout with it. So I dressed in nicer clothes then hoodie and jeans, and shoplifted women’s clothing from every clothing store that ever stopped and searched me incorrectly previously. Part shame part revenge part kink.
I stole so many books as a kid. The library didn’t have books on Wicca and Paganism so I stole them from Waldenbooks.
Does software piracy count?
Ah who am I kidding, of course it doesn’t.
You wouldn’t download a car…
Wait… Yes I would.
I downloaded more ram, does that count???
Some loose change from my dad to buy lunch at school.
In first grade? There was this little Hot Wheels style car that could transform into a robot man. I loved that little thing. Top favorite toy in the classroom.
Took it home one day. I was too afraid to play with it, so I just stuffed it into the box with the other toy cars. I was also too afraid to return it after a while. I still have it, and the guilt over taking this thing lives rent-free in my head.
When your kid goes to first grade, take it in, donate it, and tell the story.
I am advocating for shoplifting but the only thing I ever stole was a small packet of seeds from home depot when I was 7
If wages had kept up with CoL since the 70s, it would be minimum 10× what it is now. The only reason why things are expensive is because of Greedflation. Things could easily be 1/10 the price and companies would still be profitable, it’s just that the Parasite Class wouldn’t be making off with their unearned billions that they stole from the working class.
I have no problem with people taking what they need and don’t care about big box stores. I’m just not wanting to get in trouble with the mods.
What do you like to steal the most when in a supermarket in Minecraft?
It’s interesting seeing it from the admin side. Here, at least, they’re largely just trying to stay out of trouble. When lawyers or police come knocking at the door, it’s already too late, and we’re not always sure where that line is.
A couple things we absolutely know will cause trouble. I don’t know if/where that line would be with shoplifting.
And of course the mods have their own opinions.
I just mean I’m not trying to start off anything controversial. Haha. But I’m not angry at the tent encampment people in my city swiping food from Walmart at all.
Same. Just without talking, people always think the worst. The admins for Lemmy.World are a non-profit in the Netherlands.
They’re a bit more professional than Midwest.social, who I absolutely respect. But there’s a different level of professionalism here than the guy hosting a server out of his Ohio basement.
On the other hand, they don’t have the big corporate backing and structure of something like Reddit. LW doesn’t have a team of lawyers if they get into trouble. Do they even have one lawyer? How involved is that lawyer if they do exist? I can’t say.
Well it’s hard to see a grocery store here charge 8.99 for deodorant and care a whole lot about the ethics of swiping it.
Understandable
Hmmm, I used to steal roasted pistachios at Tesco as a kid. I mean, like every time I was there with my mom. Not that she cared.
In 5th grade I discovered that my hand and wrist were small enough to reach up into 25 cent bathroom pad and tampon dispensers. I didn’t really understand what they were for but I thought it was funny to empty them out whenever I saw them.
A bottle from mad dog 20/20 from a gas station. I was like 15. Me and some buddies wanted to get drunk, none of us had fake IDs, and the weed dealer who normally supplied the booze wasn’t answering his phone. 5 of us went in, my buddy Brian volunteered to be tribute, and he grabbed a case of beer and just went to walk out the door with it. While the clerk was distracted dealing with that, we shoved mad dog in our pockets, and then went to the register with sodas. Brian dropped the case of beer and booked it. It was a very smooth operation.
Didn’t steal anything else for years, until I was like 18, and we were so poor that my mom and I started shoplifting out of genuine necessity, while waiting on her disability to kick in.
I’m sorry you had to go through that. Shoplifting with your kid is a different level.
Yeah, hunger genuinely sucks. A lot.
We’re okay now, though :)
It was a red and green plastic pencil sharpener shaped like a dachshund. You stuck your pencil in his butt. I stole it from a desk in Sunday School. I stole from God.
God wanted you to steal that sharpener. Such an unholy object does not belong in Sunday School.
Breakroom at my father’s office had snack and soda vending machines, and also a change machine. My younger brother and I discovered the change machine was faulty, and would dispense way too much change for a dollar bill. We fed it every single we had (4 or 5 dollars between us) and got back $20 or so in quarters, nickels and dimes. This was in the late 1970s. $20 was a lot of money, especially to a couple of dumb kids. We thought we’d hit the jackpot.
Oh 20 dollars was a wad back then! Nice find.
Was gonna say maybe they did it on purpose expecting you to dump it all back into the vending machine (which probably way overcharged) but yeah $20 for 5 seems a bit high for that.
A newspaper.
Did not know it was stealing… I was … maybe 7?
Up until that point in my life, I’d only ever been to stores or restaurants that had free flyers or small community newsletters.
First time I was in a similar small store, I assumed full, 30+ page newspapers worked the same way.
After being informed that full newspapers cost money, and I had stolen it, I returned it.
The store clerk did not even realize I had taken the paper, laughed, appreciated my honesty, and gave me a tootsie pop.
Aww…
