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Is this stealing?

16:25 / 15.03.06

You know those little wooden stirrers they give you in coffeeshops, the ones they leave by the sugar and are free? If you take lots of them all at once because they're really useful for stirring resin, is that stealing?

It is, isn't it...

16:34 / 15.03.06

I don't think they're free -- I think the use of one or two is included in the price of your purchase.

16:36 / 15.03.06

My boss used to own a franchise of A&W, and I asked her once how she could afford to lose all those gigantic glass mugs. She grinned and me and said, "Why do you think the burgers cost so much?"

semioticrobotic

18:32 / 15.03.06

Don't worry, Lula. I'm SURE the price of several stirring sticks is included as part of the inflated cost of whatever else the establishment sells.

Tryphena Absent

18:34 / 15.03.06

Are you going to reuse them?

I ask this because they get thrown in the bin. They're disposable, used once and thrown away so if you're going to use them a few times I'd say you're recycling and reducing as much as stealing.

18:50 / 15.03.06

A dodgy gambling mate of my Dad's used to proffer advice on getting rich. He said "always take the free sugar". There's some sort of life lesson in there somewhere.

Mind you, I last saw him when he was making multiple trips across the channel to bring back duty free booze and fags. So perhaps it's not worked for him.

19:02 / 15.03.06

In my last year of university, a friend and I built an architectural model using those wooden stir sticks which we had stolen (we didn't even buy a coffee, so in our case, it was theft). Yep, that was a good day. If you take extra paper napkins because you have a runny nose, would that be stealing, too?

19:25 / 15.03.06

Nina, I'm going to re-use them many times, they're very useful things.

I quite often blow my nose on the napkins. Perhaps I should invest in a hanky instead and stop the thievery.

16:04 / 16.03.06

it's not stealing, but not everything that makes someone a social degenerate is actually a crime. i think it's understood that things like free sugar and napkins are distributed primarily at the discretion of reasonable customers. if everyone stashed as many stirrers into their pockets as possible all the time, the coffee shop would have to limit their distribution themselves instead of trusting the public to mind themselves.

but if you stash a pile of napkins, it's ok as long as it doesnt cause others to do so, and you can do penance by trying to convince people that you were wrong or at least never do it again. if it causes a revolution wherein all coffee drinkers throw the entire industry into upheaval by disrupting the financial balance and putting coffee growers out of business or forcing them to sell their children into slavery to make cheaper napkins, and it can all be traced back to one person stashing too many napkins, you may not be tried in a court of law, but you mind wake up to a deranged escaped slave trying to stuff your mouth full of fresh paper products, which, by the way, stink like death and bitter broccoli.

so just dont tell anyone what you're doing.

17:39 / 16.03.06

Just trying to golden-rule it a bit, Lula, don't get mad. My mom gives out little blank cards 'for free' at her flower shop, and every so often somebody will pocket a deck of them. It costs her money to replace them. Not a million dollars, but they're not free to her.

17:48 / 16.03.06

it's not stealing, but not everything that makes someone a social degenerate is actually a crime.

i as about to post in general agreement with much of your sentiment until i reread that first line.

taking a few extra stirring sticks makes lula a social degenrate? isnt that a bit harsh?
needlessly and wantonly so?

personally i would steal anything that is not nailed down by any corporation who operate on more than one continent.
fuckem, frankly.
i dont buy the line about these thefts costing consumers because i have worked inside these companies and seen the price take into account theft.
that's before any theft, incidentally.
it may be based on a projection of thefts based on real stealing, but you know for sure they dont reduce their price if no one steals.

built into their price is padding for your theft.
if you go overbvoard, as mrS mentions, shit gets a bit more complicated.

i would also make honorable mention here of german law.
i have been led to believe that in germany you can get picked up for shoplifting food and, unless you are carrying money, will be set free.
no, its not really relevant.
it is nice, though.

ONLY NICE THINGS

18:02 / 16.03.06

taking a few extra stirring sticks makes lula a social degenrate? isnt that a bit harsh.

Woman.

I wonder about this - I'd certainly favour doing it from large, high-volume coffee shops, and if possible chains. This is economics, really - coffee is a very high-margin product - the cup you pay £1.50 for costs about 10p to produce, I think. So, a shop that sells a lot of coffee is likely to be generating more cash than one that is not, and will be able to cover the expense of more stirring sticks. Also, a large enterprise will be more likely to absorb the extra costs.

Also, consider how many you are taking. If it's 10, say, that's as many as 5-15 extra customers might have used. For a shop with two seats, that's more than for a shop with 100.

Personally, for some reason I nick lots of the postcards in the lobbies of cinemas. It's a compulsion. However, I then recycle them, which is possibly more than the cinema would do, and I don't think the organisations promoting them will miss those particular ones - at which point we get back to the categorical imperative.

18:45 / 16.03.06

taking a few extra stirring sticks makes lula a social degenrate? isnt that a bit harsh?
needlessly and wantonly so?

what if those sticks were going to be used to hold a pilot's eyes open during a long flight? now is the time to consider all scenarios, not during the screaming and the wailing.

18:58 / 16.03.06

I have a compulsive-thieving thing with free matches in bars. It had never even crossed my mind to feel shifty about it before, although I would never take my customary handfuls in front of the bar staff, which I suppose does mean that I always knew it was a bit bad.

Now, however, I feel the heavy hand of ethics and / or morals upon my shoulder. I don't even know which hand it is.

This can't be good.

Should I just buy a lighter?

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

19:27 / 16.03.06

Once we're into the realms of cinema postcards and matchbooks, the waters become even more muddied. These both constitute advertising, and I'd guess the more that leave the premises the better, from the advertisers' points of view.

Tryphena Absent

19:41 / 16.03.06

Act only according to that maxim by which you can at the same time will that it would become a universal law.

If you want to get really Kantian then carry a handkerchief, buy a drink, use the stirrer to stir, wipe the stirrer, put it in your pocket. Go once a day for two weeks and you'll have plenty.

19:54 / 16.03.06

Instead of leaving the stirrers there to be taken by the bulk, why not just bring one with the damn coffee?

When I was young and reckless, I used to steal paper napkins (the cheap ones that come in those elevator looking thingies) by the dozens to roll joints with it. In fact, I've come to the point of choosing the establishment I'd go to based on the napkin quality. Sooo, is it stealing if I only buy something to cover the stealing?

But I've quit drugs nows.

20:33 / 16.03.06

Oh, scratch a waitress and you'll find a frustrated artist flailing beneath:

Mrs. Mick and I were in a coffee shop the other day and she grabbed a bunch of said stirring implements. "What are you doing?" asked one of the waitresses
"Um, it's for an architectural model" she replied.

Siad waitress beamed a warm smile and ushered us out.
I'm jus' saying, they're there for the taking..

21:03 / 16.03.06

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

In the criminal law, theft (also known as stealing) is the wrongful taking of someone else's property without that person's freely-given consent.

For example, if X goes to a restaurant and, by mistake, takes Y's scarf instead of her own, she has physically deprived Y of the use of the property (which is the actus reus) but the mistake prevents X from forming the mens rea (i.e. because she believes that she is the owner, she is not dishonest and does not intend to deprive the "owner" of it) so no crime has been committed at this point. But if she realises the mistake when she gets home and could return the scarf to Y, she will steal the scarf if she dishonestly keeps it. (I think a badger pictorial would be helpfull here)

A kleptomaniac is a person who helps himself because he can't help himself.

21:26 / 16.03.06

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

In the criminal law, theft (also known as stealing) is the wrongful taking of someone else's property without that person's freely-given consent.

Hmmm, I suppose it depends upon how many you take and if you have the companies consent to take that amount.

For example if you take 1 free wooden stirrer per cup of coffee then that would be with consent of the company, however if you take all of the 'free' stirrers then this would probably be done without consent and therefore stealing.

01:07 / 17.03.06

Not to go all von Mises on yr asses, but Lula didn't specify that she was buying coffee and helping herself to other items from MegaCorp. When I hear 'coffee shop' I tend to think of small cafes, and having had friends who own them, I can tell you that many of them struggle to get by. The difference between the cost of production and the price of sale has to cover rent, stock, salaries, health insurance, etc. The business has to both sustain itself and provide a living for a number of people, and as with many small business, profits are often slim for some time.

I'm not saying you shouldn't take an extra napkin if you need to sneeze -- I'm saying you shouldn't take a big stack of them to transfer the cost of providing napkins for your home from your pocket to the coffee shop owner's.

Not everybody who own some little neighborhood shop lights cuban cigars with hundred dollar bills and the souls of small children, it so happens.

pointless & uncalled for

01:07 / 17.03.06

Overheads would be the out that you are looking for in this one.

Anything for which you are not charged a fixed amount for, and thus is not elective, such as heating, light, table wiping, an actual receipt, stirring things, toilet maintenance and so on are considered overheads, the cost of running the business that are not part of the product sold.

Thee stirrers are freely given to the customer with the implicit consent of the business owner. There is the matter of intent of use but the law is typically uninterested in either proscribing or prescribing this. If the shop puts up a sign stating that it's one stirrer per person and only for stirring beverages then things change although mostly in theory only.

The business accepts whatever outlay is made on the stirrers, and thus demands no limit on taking of them, under the proviso that it can reasonably afford them as a portion of the overhead costs derived from the sale of product. Therefore taking of multiple stirrers is, in legal terms, categorically not stealing unless the store from which you are taking them states or reasonably implies otherwise.

Lula, consider all charges agaisnt you dropped and commendations for being ethically and environmentally motivated.

pointless & uncalled for

01:10 / 17.03.06

fred

As I crossposted with you, sorry mate but lax resource management does not make Lula a grubby little thief. If the business owners in question object to her use of something offered freely then they need to withdraw or caveat their consent in a clear manner.

07:34 / 17.03.06

Lula, just ask the person behingd the counter if you can take a load. If it's a starbucks or similar, they really won't care and you will have sticks and moral right on your side!

Brigade du jour

09:34 / 17.03.06

Personally, for some reason I nick lots of the postcards in the lobbies of cinemas. It's a compulsion.

Sir, you shame me. All these years I've assumed they were free anyway! I picked up a lovely Spider-Man 2 postcard for my girlfriend the other day, incidentally. Keep an eye out.

Brigade du jour

09:38 / 17.03.06

I just re-read the Thread Summary.

Sorry, I really must stop posting when I've just woken up. Especially when there's even the slightly moral ambiguity to be considered. It's ok, look, I'm writing it on my hand ...

ONLY NICE THINGS

10:58 / 17.03.06

TSK - could you cite legal precedent for this one? The idea that use of the facilities in a manner unintended is acceptable simply by dint of the place being a coffee shop seems to me unlikely - if one were to take the crockery home, for example, it would not be an expected expense.

Further, we are probably talking not only about legal liability but also ethical liability. Olula wants to be a good person. Therefore, she wants to know whether or not she should be taking these stirrers, not only whether she can. In which case, fred's point becomes very important. Those stirrers have a cost, and although a degree of loss is accepted, irresponsible usage by everyone has a deleterious effect on operating profit. There's a nice little article here on the finances of the coffee house in the US, which has some relevance here.

So. There are totally ethical ways of doing this - an easy one is to approach the counter and ask if you could get a chunk of the stirrers in the next order to their wholesalers. Another is to wipe and repurpose the stirrer you get with every free coffee. Slightly less pure might be to establish a ratio without consultation that you feel is reasonable given the markup on the coffee - so, three or maybe four per cup. If your mind works that way, you could steal from chains, although they may in turn respond to the rise in overheads (if everyne does it) by cutting staff or sourcing less ethical but cheaper product. And, at the end of this sliding scale of ethics, there is barricading the doors, firing dolphins through the windows of the cafe with an onager until it is silent, and then plucking the stirrers from the sticky mess of human and tursiops covering the wreck. It's a matter of scale.

15:33 / 17.03.06

It is fine to take some of these sticks if done in moderation, and only once in a while.

Have you ever taken a stack of napkins and stowed them in your car?-I feel that is just fine, and like was said before, a business plans for these types of things.

There are, however, those of us that take advantage of these freebies, and those that do ruin it for the rest of us. More and more establishments keep napkins straws condiments ect. behind the counter and give them out only upon request. They do this because to many people were taking more than their share too often.

Before college I spent a number of years in fast food managment, and I learned first hand the troubles of turning a profit. You only make so much profit from each burger and extra napkins and ketchup packets eat away at that profit. However every good business has budgeted to have a number of these things be taken by customers.

So, my answer is, take handfulls of stuff sometimes.

16:54 / 17.03.06

Quote me calling anybody a grubby little thief.