A close friend of many years whom I’ve always thought of as an extremely honest, ethical person recently confided in me that she shoplifts on a regular basis. She explained that she never steals from small or independently owned businesses, only from large companies, and only when no small business nearby carries the items she needs. She targets companies that are known to treat their employees badly, or that knowingly source their products from places where human rights are violated, or whose owners/C.E.O.s donate to ultraconservative, authoritarian-leaning candidates, etc.
My friend volunteers in her community and has worked her entire life for nonprofit antipoverty and human rights organizations. While she isn’t wealthy, she is able to afford the items she steals and believes that she is redistributing wealth; she says she keeps track of the value of what she’s stolen and donates an equal amount to charity. She thinks of her actions as civil disobedience and says she will accept the consequences if she’s caught.
When she told me, I thought, Stealing is wrong. But as we discussed it, I realized I was oversimplifying a complex moral issue. Is it wrong to steal food to feed your starving children? What if I stole a legally purchased gun from a person I knew was about to commit a mass shooting? Are those who bring office supplies home from their workplace also thieves? I find myself struggling with the question of whether an individual’s actions are morally defensible if they do more good than harm. — Name Withheld
From the Ethicist:
Let’s start by asking what your friend thinks she’s doing. Is the aim to produce social change? Evidently not. Because she isn’t letting these corporations and their bosses know what’s happening — this isn’t a consumer boycott — they can’t consider shifting policies in response, and anyway, her pilferage isn’t on a scale that would be detectable at a corporate level. So perhaps she just wants to diminish the coffers of the wicked, even if it makes no practical difference to them.
Insofar as the cost of shoplifting is passed on to other consumers, though, the redistribution to her is largely not from the corporations but from other customers who don’t steal. And here we have to consider the overall practice of shoplifting to which she’s contributing. The moral and legal proscription of theft is meant to create a system that allows people to hold on to their possessions and dispose of them only when they choose to. Theft undermines this system — a system we all have reason to value and a duty to help sustain by keeping to the rules.
Your light-fingered friend may protest that she steals only from retail outlets connected to bad actors. But the rest of us aren’t picking and choosing in this way; we pay what we owe at the checkout counter. So she’s taking advantage of our compliance without complying herself. Consider too that when the bosses of these corporations support candidates and causes she deplores, they are exercising their rights as citizens. A world in which we all feel free to violate the rights of people whose politics we don’t share (her conservative counterparts could target those they thought were spreading the “woke mind virus”) would be a world without the benefits of democracy.
For your friend, shoplifting may be a thrill-seeking activity with real psychological rewards; by imagining herself to be the Dexter of the retail aisles — channeling illicit desires into supposed acts of consumer vigilantism — she’s able to maintain a belief in her own righteousness. But this is a delusion you shouldn’t indulge. In fact, the three cases of permissible theft you mention provide a useful set of contrasts.
People who steal to feed a starving family confront conflicting rights claims: They’re forced to violate the property rights of strangers to do their duty to their dependents. In a decent society, they wouldn’t be faced with this choice. But your friend isn’t making a choice out of necessity, and there are no rights she’s advancing; her actions aren’t aimed at getting the corporations to do better.
What about swiping a gun that you believe is about to be used in the commission of a serious crime? Here you’re temporarily interfering with the rights of the owner in order to protect the rights of the prospective victims — stopping a crime, not securing retribution, is the objective. Your friend can make no such claim.
As for those pens and pencils that may travel home with you from the workplace: Employers generally accept some amount of this, especially given that so many people do so much work at home. But if you take more than what’s reasonable in the light of that consideration, then, yes, what you’re doing is wrong. Which leads me to a final point. How bad a theft is depends on how it affects the welfare of others. What your friend is doing is wrong, but it’s not very wrong. Mainly, it’s self-harming; she’s exposing herself to serious reputational consequences should she be caught.
Because you care about her, you should try to persuade her to drop her unfortunate hobby — and her insistence that it’s fine to steal from others when you disapprove of them. She might see things differently if you pointed out that this rationale would encourage those of us who disapprove of theft to steal from her.
Readers Respond
The previous question was from a reader who was worried about an unpaid bill. He wrote: “I recently rented a car from a well-known car-rental company in a tiny office connected to an Amtrak station. … I did receive an email detailing the cost — almost $700 — but never saw it reflected on my credit card. I called once to let them know, and a friendly “old duffer” (his term) answered and said they would deal with it. Weeks later, still no charge. I am quite grateful for what the gentleman did to help us, but I am unsure of how to proceed. Should I keep calling back? Or can I, with a clean conscience, let the matter go?”
In his response, the Ethicist noted: “The skills of that little office would seem to be on the customer-service side, not on the accounts-receivable side. That’s decidedly not your fault. But if you’re right, you do owe a lot of money to the company. Because the transaction was booked and processed, I would think that the company will eventually expect payment from this local office or franchisee. Get in touch again, and explain that you still haven’t been charged. If you don’t, the company might penalize the friendly, if inefficient, folk there. You don’t have to make a mission out of it — it’s certainly not your job — but I wouldn’t stop with one call. Honk your horn a little.” (Reread the full question and answer here.)
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I agree with the Ethicist that the letter writer should “honk the horn” a bit, but not only to fix the writer’s bill; the amount may well have been charged in error to someone else’s card! — Camilla
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The letter writer should get in touch again in writing. Calls are all well and good but they won’t leave a record of one’s attempts to pay. He should email the location and copy the corporate address if he can find one. — Christine
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I agree with the Ethicist. The letter writer should not walk away after one call, but I wouldn’t keep calling. Years ago, I charged a television to a seldom-used Sears credit card and never received a bill. After three phone calls, I gave up and kept the “free TV.” — Maria
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The letter writer should contact the rental car company again, perhaps even doggedly so, because that transaction could acquire penalties for nonpayment and might adversely affect his credit report. — Susan
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I agree that the letter writer should probably make at least one more attempt to pay the rental car charge. I think, after that, he can in good faith just wait to see if the charge shows up without troubling himself anymore. Weird story: For six months, I chased down a bat excavator in the hopes of paying a bill. Bat excavators are kind of a breed in and of themselves and this one’s business card only had a telephone number. I called continually and he would never call me back. I finally got him on the phone and asked what I owed. He wouldn’t give me a price. I don’t feel guilty; I made a good faith effort and wish he would have allowed me to pay him. I did my best. The little brown bat colony never returned. — Jana