Lol. This is such a pathetic article. It's irresponsible as fuck to encourage people to do this. Maybe shoplifting from a big corporation is a morally neutral act, I won't debate that because I tend to agree. But that does NOT mean that you should provide other people with a moral justification for committing acts which can get them in trouble. A bunch of 18-year-olds are going to read this and the next time they're at the store, they'll remember it, stick something in their pocket, get collared, and have to pay a fine. And for what? Is it really a statement worth making?
Stores today are not there for you. They are there for profits. They may claim low prices, but in all truth the merchandise is usually marked up 200% or more.
The writer thinks it worth remark that, in a consumerist, quasi-capitalist market, retail stores have a business model that results in them making a profit. What is s/he, fucking 16? No shit, they mark goods up. How do you think they turn a profit so that they can compete with other business which do the same thing? The author is here ascribing an anti-social motive to individual actors, when in reality, the negative motivation comes from the structure of the market itself, and the incentives that structure creates. Grow the fuck up. I bet you have an iPhone, you fucking twat.
I have seen some instances where cologne has been marked up 450%. This is outrageous.
Then don't fucking buy into a consumerist culture that endorses wearing stupid fucking celebrity-brand scents. Yeah it's fucking outrageous. Don't be one of the drones that thinks something like that is worth your time or thought, and you won't have to worry about outrageous price mark-ups.
Why should we pay those kinds of prices, when we can get it for free.
See above. Don't pay those prices, and don't indirectly support a superficial consumer culture by giving subjective value to the possession of stupid fucking products like that.
Many stores may claim that shoplifting increases prices, but the real reasons for price increases is greed.
See above. Retail stores are not charities. They are profit-oriented. They have to make a profit in order to remain competitive. Don't blame the individual actors unless you have a specific reason. Blame the system.
They won't always stop you if the sensors go off. I have set the sensors off a couple of times and they didn't do anything. No one even approached me because they didn't have proof.
Brilliant reasoning. "I've gotten away with it, so it's probably cool."
If you run out of shampoo or something why would you waste money on it when you don't have to
It's called budgeting. You can buy a fucking gallon of fragrance-free shampoo for $30 at a bulk store. If you can't budget $30 for a gallon of shampoo every year and a half, shave your fucking head.
or if you want a drink and have no money, don't think of it as a problem, just go to the store and get a drink.
Drink some fucking water. You fuck.
The founding fathers destroyed commercial cargo on British ships by throwing tea into the Boston Harbor.
The "founding fathers" were a bunch of slave-owning white men who wanted to replace one ruler with another, so that they could be the ones levying the taxes. The founding fathers wrote a constitution without any input from the people it was to govern, which explicitly preserved the right to slave ownership, which gave no suffrance to women, and which envisioned a Congress that was elected by the rich white Christian men of the state legislatures. Fuck this pathetic attempt to make an emotional appeal to a national meme, fuck the founding fathers, and fuck you, too.
The equivalent today would be to board commercial vessels from China and throw the cargo into the Pacific ocean, to protest our trade policies/deficits, low tariffs, shipping jobs over-seas, corporate off shore tax havens, etc., etc. Shoplifting hits 'em where it hurts most, merchandise/ money.
Note the writer's attempt to shoehorn an ideological justification into an otherwise value-neutral/negative act. If you're really shoplifting because you want to make a statement, you should leave a fucking note. Otherwise they're just going to think that you're stealing because you need the item, or because you're a klepto who doesn't feel like paying, like most people who shoplift. Note that the author doesn't suggest leaving a calling card that turns the shoplifting act from simply being theft of an item to a political statement. Probably because this is a half-assed afterthought.
Yes, shoplifting hits Walmart where it hurts. Fuck Walmart and fuck gigantic corporations that can abuse human beings with impunity because of their size and political power. Fine. But your shoplifting a $5 or $50 item isn't going to make a dent in that giant profit margin. Don't make high-falutin' ideological justifications for what is in essence a selfish act. Is it bad? I don't particularly think so. Is it dangerous to the actor? FUCK YES it is, and that's why it's irresponsible to promote this act, to do anything to plant the idea in the head of someone who's impressionable. What if someone reads this, thinks it's a great idea, shoplifts, gets caught, fined, can't pay the fine because they don't have the means, get a bench warrant, and end up in jail? What if they have a kid at home? What if they don't have a support structure to take care of the kid? What if, what if? This categorical appeal to impressionable minds to do something that could ultimately compromise the actor's freedom is the height of irresponsibility. There are so many worthy causes in the world, it's inconceivable to me why you would spend your time promoting this half-baked horseshit