C: “Good Sextidi, everyone, and welcome to part one (1) of Goth Angel
Sinners, a podcast about anarchy, anarchists, and anarchism, and not about
Lil Peep.”
T: “We’re your hosts, I’m @trewbot…“
C: “…and I’m Chloe (Χλόη)…“
T: “…here today to talk about shoplifting.”
Two main arguments against shoplifting:
People who maybe almost have a sense of decency and think it hurts workers
Wrong, but if they’re genuinely concerned with that (our research shows
most of them aren’t) then at least they aren’t the worst person in the
world.
Companies are financially incentivized to assume there will be some
shrink due to theft (both external and internal), which indicates that
there is no direct effect on workers but also none on the company itself
[refer back to this when discussing praxis].
43% of total losses in retail come from employee theft, so clearly
employees don’t give a fuck.1
To quote Wikipedia here: “Because associates have access to the entire
building and during non-business hours, they are capable of creating
substantial losses to the company over a longer period of time.” Which
is extremely radical.2
Also, as long as I’m quoting Wikipedia, the page on loss prevention
also contains this hilarious bit: “The vast majority of thieves have
one thing in common, they will steal only if they have the opportunity.
So theft prevention is fairly easy.”
According to a 2005 report from the Food Marketing Institute, the most
commonly stolen items from grocery stores were meat, over-the-counter
medicine, baby formula, and health and beauty products3
So like i was trying to find statistics about employees being fired or
punished or if it was even legal to do so because of shoplifters and I
literally can only find news articles about people being fired for not
just letting shoplifters go
When i searched “shoplifting hurts workers” i found thinkpieces from
conservatives with no data….and more information about how employees
are more responsible for losses than shoplifters…
It’s almost like the idea that shoplifting hurts workers is a scam pushed
by those with institutional power in order to get those they have
institutional power over to hate those with no power
It’s not shoplifters that do anything to hurt workers, they just took a
thing, it’s bosses, and if you have a problem with the way bosses
punish workers, perhaps try organizing unions
Yeah all I can really find is that most people are grossly misinformed on
workers’ rights and on unions, in which case anyone who really cared
about the wellbeing of workers would be educating and organizing on
workers rights and unions rather than just blaming shoplifters for the
actions of bosses
Wage theft is a thing, and it happens in every industry, not just
retail, your boss is looking for any reason to fuck you over, it’s not
shoplifters4
This is the part where I plug my article on this topic, because it covers
most of these points from a ground up theoretical perspective.
A similar argument I’ve seen less often is that theft of particular items
leads to stores no longer stocking said items, this relates to a topic
further down in the effects on smaller businesses that can’t employ loss
projections.
This is, of course, very absurd if you’ve ever been in a store since
the items that are subject to the most opportunistic theft (deodorant,
condoms, sometimes shampoo, I don’t have a source on this it’s all
anecdotal) are still sold, but in locked cases.
Businesscucks who believe stealing is wrong
Legality -/-> morality
It is necessary for any economic system to be backed by a cultural
assumption that said system is right. (This stands for anarchism as
well, that is to say this is a motherfucking culture war).
Arguing against shoplifters is not only defending the status quo of
capitalism but is a necessity to ensure that the boom and bust cycle of
capitalism does not lead to its complete collapse.
From an evolutionary perspective it just wouldn’t make sense for it
to be ingrained in human biology to be manipulative, exploitative,
murderous, and “evil” towards fellow humans, we are social creatures,
not individual creatures, we thrive on cooperation
Violent, antisocial behaviors in people are created by the societies
they live in, social inequality and unmet needs are the greatest
contributors to interpersonal violence7
Not all stealing is shoplifting
People are worried that people won’t have class consciousness, and
that’s why we shouldn’t encourage class consciousness(?)
People seem to think “shoplifting is good” means “armed robbery is
good” or “home invasion is good”, but these are all clearly different
and if you disagree you are wrong
Stealing and intention to part with the item:
Businesses, by definition, have their products in excess, if they
didn’t have anything in excess they wouldn’t have things to sell
Literally they are actively trying to get rid of things, the
stipulation is that they want people to pay them for the stuff they
don’t need and the people do need
This is where I point out that small businesses do literally the
same thing: if they’re a store, they have excess, doesn’t matter if
they’re big or small
Meanwhile if you break into someone’s home, you have no idea what
stuff they intend on parting with, except if you wanna dig through
their trash can
Stealing a TV from Best Buy =/= stealing a TV from your neighbor
Prices are literally just a restriction on the efficient distribution
of resources
What does shoplifting do as far as anti-capitalist praxis goes?
I guess the first thing is who cares? Not every action has to be such a
large act that it alone will bring down capitalism, getting out of bed
doesn’t stop capitalism but we still do it
Creating a culture which doesn’t respect property rights and instead
prioritizes human needs and desires is a good anti-capitalist thing
People getting their needs met here and now is good, it’s a constructive
behavior not a destructive one, it’s about making the lives of the
oppressed better, not necessarily ruining businesses
What do we need in a cultural shift towards post-capitalism and anarchism?
(Further specification of points made earlier).
Property rights / ownership fucking merced.
What is ownership? Violence. Next question.
BuT wHaT iS vIoLeNcE?!?!
Distinctions between private/personal property, maybe use the LP-LSC’s
language here since it works a bit better with “Americans.”
The language typically used to draw the line between something like
shoplifting and robbing somebody’s house is, at least among leftists,
“private” versus “personal” property. Here “personal” property refers
to items intended for personal use, such as the common example of your
toothbrush; whereas “private” property is a legal relationship that
defines the restrictions of other people from using said item. More
simply put private property is something that is owned but not used by
the person under this definition.
However, private property has other more common definitions so it isn’t
beneficial to use this terminology. Property that is owned but not used
could more aptly be called “absentee ownership.”
Outro
C: “Be sure to follow us on twitter at ‘goth angel sinners with no
vowels’. If you really care about preventing shoplifting, we have a patreon
you can donate to so we don’t have to shoplift, at ‘patreon dot com slash
goth angel sinners with no vowels’. We have an instagram, at the same
username we used for the previous two accounts. You can follow me on
twitter at ‘shitpostscarcity with no i in shit’”
T: “and I am @trewbot”
T: “Have a good night and be sure to join us next Sextidi for part two (2)
of Goth Angel Sinners when we discuss the past, present, and future of
Catalonia.”
