OT----Opinions requested on a moral dillema

Yes, it is fun to post little quotes taken out of their proper context instead of actually coming up with something original, isn't it?

There is a vast difference between not sticking your nose in everyone's ass you meet at the store (OMG THEY MIGHT STEAL A GUMBALL!!) and turning a blind eye to genuine evil and injustice. It is a reflection on our culture that being a busybody is no longer relegated to the lonely old maid, but has become something that otherwise decent men have taken upon themselves to do, and act proudly for doing so.

It relates to giving other men their own space, their own privacy, and their own dignity to conduct their own affairs as they see fit.. Yes, some do not deserve this, but IMHO it is best not to naturally assume in every situation that everybody needs a mental cavity search.

As for myself, I tend strictly to my own affairs, unless I am beckoned to intercede in a situation which genuinely needs my attention. Hence, I do not fixate on what everyone in the line ahead of me is purchasing; I am usually too deep in thought to bother with such nonsense anyway.

Jon

To me the best thing, the really exceptionally cool thing about this thread is that it exists at all. Where else can highly trained people exchange viewpoints in this manner? Before the advent of newsgroups and the Internet in general, such discourse between individuals would have been very unlikely, maybe limited to two or three people in some chance encounter.

I have learned a lot reading this post, and I suspect others have too.

Grant Erwin Kirkland, Washington

Still smoking lots of dope huh?

You are aware that living in a perennial white zone..zip situational awarness is simply a Darwin event waiting to happen.

But hey...if the bus driver doesnt mind running you over, it works for me.

"All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing." (Edmund Burke)

"Pax Americana is a philosophy. Hardly an empire. Making sure other people play nice and dont kill each other (and us) off in job lots is hardly empire building, particularly when you give them self determination under "play nice" rules.

Think of it as having your older brother knock the s*it out of you for torturing the cat." Gunner

Indeed. And some of it explains the decline in this little corner of our civilization.

Gunner

"Pax Americana is a philosophy. Hardly an empire. Making sure other people play nice and dont kill each other (and us) off in job lots is hardly empire building, particularly when you give them self determination under "play nice" rules.

Think of it as having your older brother knock the s*it out of you for torturing the cat." Gunner

Exactly what you did -- and stayed ready with CCW. (As soon as I get mine here in Ohio, that is.) You don't instigate a kerrfuffle when armed. You might terminate one, but you don't initiate one. :)

You made your complaint known and wisely let it drop when the guy made a complete ass of himself in public. His actions from there on simply reinforced the opinion most of the people in the store already had formed.

Aside:

I got tired of arguing with checkers, too, after pointing out a mistake on their part. Instead of leaving the store with a lower bill and a guilty conscience, I left the store having paid the right price, but both the checker AND the folks in line behind me angry with MEing the right thing. Now I ask (as you do, Jerry) if it's correct. If not, they'll catch it. If they don't, I have peace of mind after trying to point it out to them. Life's too short to second-guess fate.

How do you know he was a thief? A real thief would have put the items in his coat pocket and walked right past the register. Don't be so damned quick to judge -- lest ye be judged.

It's not just that little corner anymore . I think they call it "situational ethics" . Means that it's only wrong if you get caught . I hold strong opinions on right and wrong , but they're based on "religion" and "absolutes" and are therefor invalid and politically incorrect .

I learned that you , sir could quite possibly be somewhat unbalanced . If you hate Home Depot *that* much , you must also hate most retailers , cuz they *all* do business in the same way - and that much hate ain't a good thing . Fortunately for me , I seldom have to do business with the chains . I support the local mom-n-pop with my dollars ...

I have spent - and continue to spend - large amounts of my allotted time in Central America. Upon arriving there for the first time I was given lots of 'helpful' advice from fellow 'gringos'. One part of that advice - given over and over - was count your change carefully - "they" will screw you any chance they get. Well, after many decades of experience I an able to say that this advice was total BS.

To be sure I have, on occasion, been short changed but, overall, it is "they" who have short-changed themselves time and time again. When I pay attention is when the advantage is mine. I *always* point out the mistake and have had to, at times, patiently teach a little math lesson. "One Cervesa is Lps. 7. Two is 14. etc...... This in a bar that was so low-down dirt-poor they couldn't afford a $5.00 calculator or staff who knew the first thing about a multiplication table.

The upshot of this behavior has been an outpouring of gratitude (a little mistake can mean the loss of a day's profits in some of the family owned businesses I frequent). One only has to do this once in a small village to be, in effect, given the keys to said village. The ones who take the mistake and laugh about it are usually the ones who end up being ripped off big time (and in some cases - killed - I lost a friend that way). I listen to the experiences of these people and I have to wonder - 'Where they actually describing the same place I was hanging out in'? Honesty not only feels good - it *is* good.

Ken.

Similar thing happened at my local Home Despot. I was rummaging for tubing/pipe fittings and notices a rather large number of baggies were torn open. After investigating for a bit I found that there were a whole mess of $5 baggies with $0.85 parts in them. Looks like some enterprising individual swapped baggies to get a discount. I let one of the lummoxes know about it, but he didn't care in the least--even if it did mean some OTHER customer down the line might wind up paying five times for a cheap fitting. A week later in the same aisle I saw a guy doing just that--swapping parts and bags. Again I told a lummox (different lummox) and again the lummox didn't care. Now my policy at HD is to look over the prices very carefully for my own purchases, but not bother to interfere if I see someone else stealing.

Switching price stickers is nothing new, that's why so many of them are sliced through in several places to make it more difficult to peel them off and stick them something else.

UPC codes and scanners have helped a lot, but as with most things of that type, there's a law of diminishing returns on how much more it costs to close off the final increments of cheating.

But, it sounds like it wouldn't take rocket science to train the cashiers at HD not to ring up stuff in torn bags without calling someone "in the know" to verify that the correct merchandise was in them.

Jeff

And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother's eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye?

What's sad is that the bags have a drawing of the correct part in them. The cashier just had to take a moment to look at the part and picture to figure out the difference. Ah well, another day in "Corporate America."

"shopping"

Gunner

"Pax Americana is a philosophy. Hardly an empire. Making sure other people play nice and dont kill each other (and us) off in job lots is hardly empire building, particularly when you give them self determination under "play nice" rules.

Think of it as having your older brother knock the s*it out of you for torturing the cat." Gunner

Well, Here it is, the big-fat-down-and-dirty moral truth as applied by RedDeath/FaxMeBeer/Poor Boy:

First of all, who was ripped of? Home Depot? Home Depot will not open a store in a town in which they don't get tax abatement, which, as far as I'm concerned is sanctioned thievery. In otherwords, the gentleman that got over, was only recouping some of his investment in that store. Maybe this sounds rediculous or petty to you -- or a call for all out anarchy at all companies which receive tax abatement. Well, it may be petty, and I may not be against anarchy at companies which receive tax abatement.

There is also the issue of where many, many of the products that Home Depot carries are produced. They buy a great deal of their products from China, a nation which not only uses slave labor, without regard for worker's rights or safety -- but a nation which has also threatened twice in the last 7 years to Nuke various American Cities. To me, the simple act of profiting on the misery of others is morally deplorable, and to me, there is no moral obligation to deal straight with a company that is inherently corrupt, morally.

Does that mean that we can now all find morally dispicable things that multi-nationals do, and use that as an excuse to rip them off? Wouldn't matter to me. As far as I'm concerned, small acts of larceny are the only power that individuals have against large concerns such as Home Depot.

However, if you steal from a multi-national company without being aware of its dispicable acts, then you are just a thief, and aren't any better than they are.

Home Depot has some self service checkouts in some locations. Would people be inclined to handle the situation differently if they saw it at one of those?

Recently my dad bought many hundred $$ of stuff at HD, including an air nailer. Got home, looked at the receipt and they had rung it up twice. Drove many miles back, before correcting the charge they looked at the security tape to verify there was only one purchased.

I returned a never opened, still sealed cordless drill kit bought there when I found I could borrow one from a friend for the project instead. They opened the package to check for the presence of the battery. Interesting question what my recourse would have been if the battery had been missing from the factory!

HD doesn't have those here, but if they work like the grocery store ones it would have been caught. The grocery store self-checkout lines weigh the items as they are run up. Because of weighing tolerances, a crook could probably get away with something small and high value (saffron?) inside something heavy (stainless pot?), but I suspect the human overseer would check that sort of thing.

Sounds like they've been scammed on that before. I always have a pretty good idea of what stuff will cost (including tax)- maybe within a few percent- before I go to the checkout so that sort of thing seldom gets by me (unless it's small in relation to the total), but some people don't seem to add things up in their head as they go. It helps with restaurant bills to know the total so you can fiddle for the tip before the bill comes.

Take the drill back home, call up the manufacturer and tell them what happened- chances are they would already know about it, that sort of thing tends to happen in bunches, and they'd likely send out a new battery immediately, then return it when you get the new battery. No sweat (of course I live 10 minutes from two HD stores and pass them a few times a week anyway, so the drive wouldn't be an issue).

Many years ago I ordered an expensive memory upgrade for my laser printer. I opened the shipping container only to find that the factory packaging had be opened and that the memory was gone. The vendor accepted the empty package and sent me a full one without question.