this post was submitted on 07 Jan 2024
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It turns out shoplifting isn’t spiraling out of control, but lawmakers are pushing for tougher penalties for low-level and nonviolent crimes anyway.

Over the last couple of years, it seemed that America was experiencing a shoplifting epidemic. Videos of people brazenly stealing merchandise from retailers often went viral; chains closed some of their stores and cited a rise in theft as the primary reason; and drugstores such as CVS and Walgreens started locking up more of their inventory, including everyday items like toothpaste, soaps, and snacks. Lawmakers from both major parties called for, and in some cases even implemented, more punitive law enforcement policies aimed at bucking the apparent trend.

But evidence of a spike in shoplifting, it turns out, was mostly anecdotal. In fact, there’s little data to suggest that there’s a nationwide problem in need of an immediate response from city councils or state legislatures. Instead, what America seems to be experiencing is less of a shoplifting wave and more of a moral panic.

Now, those more forgiving criminal justice policies are at risk, in part because of a perceived trend that appears to have been overblown.

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[–] originalucifer@moist.catsweat.com 150 points 11 months ago (11 children)

"a moral panic".... generating this is standard operating procedure for the people in charge.

if you want to bring the hammer down, develop 'a moral panic' and get those susceptible constituents to go along with it.

hate brown people? pretend there is an immigration problem. scared of homosexuals? dont ya know, theyre comin to convert your kids.

"a moral panic" is the rod conservatives use to beat their voters into submission with.

[–] RagnarokOnline@programming.dev 28 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Yep, gotta agree here.

It’s not so much that there’s a conspiracy or anything that defined, but Facebook or other non-authoritative news sources create a “news-wave” (as opposed to a “crime wave”), and legislators come across it and balk.

[–] gAlienLifeform@lemmy.world 9 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (1 children)

It’s not so much that there’s a conspiracy or anything that defined,

I mean, I do think some people (maybe conservatives especially) have a psychological longing to live through a moment of crisis where they can live out a brave hero fantasy, and they're always looking for that moment of crisis, and legislators and others are just organically responding to that, but there are definitely some organizations out there that are pushing this particular moment of crisis

[–] VikingHippie@lemmy.wtf 5 points 11 months ago

I thought that was gonna be a link to the Project Veritas fraud farm but yeah, fuck the NRF too!

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[–] gAlienLifeform@lemmy.world 85 points 11 months ago (1 children)

lawmakers are pushing for tougher penalties for low-level and nonviolent crimes

Oh joy, when we did this in the 90s it ended with the Supreme Court saying there's no issue with giving a life sentence to a father of three for stealing VHSs of children's movies from a K-Mart. I imagine some details will change this time around, but not the important one.

[–] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 36 points 11 months ago (1 children)

These days it will be a life sentence for a single mother stealing baby formula.

[–] Bakkoda@sh.itjust.works 17 points 11 months ago

I mean what fun are crippling poverty, miserable healthcare and horrific political ideologies if you can't rub it in our face every single fuckin chance that comes around?

[–] crystalmerchant@lemmy.world 67 points 11 months ago (5 children)

Citations Needed had an episode about this. Extraordinary bullshit media narrative around shoplifting

And barely a peep about corporate price gouging, wage slavery, etc etc

[–] MonsiuerPatEBrown@reddthat.com 31 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

This is all cover for the wage theft addiction bosses have.

https://newrepublic.com/post/175343/wage-theft-versus-shoplifting-crime

[–] lennybird@lemmy.world 11 points 11 months ago (1 children)

PBS Newshour covered this last week, too, saying it's mostly a bullshit excuse (in whisper-talk).

[–] VikingHippie@lemmy.wtf 12 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Just once, I want a PBS host to bellow with the volume of a Republican that just watched the newest Project Veritas fraud 😁

[–] Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world 8 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Closest they come is at the beginning when they're thanking the billionaires for their financial support.

[–] VikingHippie@lemmy.wtf 6 points 11 months ago

"This episode of Wait Wait Don't Tell Me is brought to you by Capital One and FTX: what WAS in your wallet?"

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[–] Jaysyn@kbin.social 51 points 11 months ago (13 children)

Quite literally less crime is occurring every year. Got to keep those private prisons filled.

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[–] Ghostalmedia@lemmy.world 51 points 11 months ago (3 children)

I worked in the HQ for one of these big American retailers. All in all, the product and customer experience teams know that customers hate this but execs keep siding with the bean counters over the customer.

If you want to stick it to them, just keep placing online pickup orders. Many places don’t have service fees for pickup, and it forces the retailer to hire employees to run around the store and parking lot.

Retail stores are not designed like an Amazon warehouse. Fulfilling an online order with your own employees is clunky and inefficient. Also, people who buy online tend to make less impulse purchases than when they’re inside of a Target or Walmart.

So, all in all, pick up orders cost the company more, make them less money, and force them to hire back the people they replaced with self checkout machines.

[–] slurpeesoforion@startrek.website 5 points 11 months ago

Bean counters = investors represented by the board

Rank and file accountants that often are associated with this term don't give a shit.

[–] Rodeo@lemmy.ca 4 points 11 months ago

That's funny because the grocery I work for is pushing hard on online orders. They love it. The only logic I've heard so far is that online orders are a "guaranteed sale", whatever that's supposed to mean.

They literally tell us to set product aside and not put it on the shelf so we can sell it online instead. They are valuing online shoppers way over in store shoppers.

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[–] numberfour002@lemmy.world 40 points 11 months ago (2 children)

Eons ago when I was working in retail, pretty much all the training on "shrink" (aka losses, including theft) emphasized that the overwhelming majority of it comes from employees (and not necessarily from employee theft). Things have certainly changed in the post-covid era, but the fundamentals haven't changed all that much. So, I have been skeptical about some of the retailers' shoplifting claims.

[–] Canadian_anarchist@lemmy.ca 5 points 11 months ago (3 children)

When I worked in retail, anecdotally, it was my understanding that most theft was internal. At Real Canadian Superstore (think Walmart Supercenter, but not Walmart) I saw lots of my coworkers steal all kinds of things. We went through one loss prevention after another, fired for, you guessed it, stealing (ironic, I know). Most of my co workers stole their food for their meal breaks. I very rarely saw or heard of a customer being caught stealing. And no, no one reported others to management.

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[–] TheColonel@reddthat.com 5 points 11 months ago

I was IN loss prevention. Literal store detective.

Did we catch the occasional shoplifter? Yes.

Were they as common or as high dollar value as employees skimming or scamming? Abso-fucking-lutely not.

If you’re in retail, rest assured, those folks are there to catch you more than they’re there to catch shoplifters.

[–] RizzRustbolt@lemmy.world 34 points 11 months ago

Gotta fill those slave pits somehow.

[–] agitatedpotato@lemmy.world 33 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Manufacture consent, pass bills that shit on ordinary people and raise the magic economy line. Repeat.

[–] Adalast@lemmy.world 9 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Politically appropriate ways to solve poverty:

  • Lower the poverty line so fewer people qualify.
  • Make up ever lower and lower bars for incarceration. The incarcerated are not included in poverty statistics.
[–] agitatedpotato@lemmy.world 9 points 11 months ago (4 children)

Prison solves so many problems from a political POV. Work no one wants to do? Incentivize prison labor with commuting sentences. Reagan closed all the mental health facilites instead of making them work for the patients? Detain the mentally unwell during an episode and tell them to stop resisting while you beat them, then charge them with resisting arrest. A close friend of mine is a CO and man the shit I hear straight from his mouth. Fun fact if you know a CO well you will learn things about your state or county that don't make it to the media. Easiest example I can give is when they rotate high value inmates so they tell you something like "hey we got one of the dudes whose connected to chappo xfered to us for a stay"

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[–] iforgotmyinstance@lemmy.world 30 points 11 months ago

At what point do we fight back? I didn't vote for these corps to lord over me.

[–] Seraph@kbin.social 22 points 11 months ago (2 children)

They're trying to build a prison!

[–] USSEthernet@startrek.website 5 points 11 months ago (1 children)
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[–] RememberTheApollo_@lemmy.world 17 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (1 children)

Could we push for tougher penalties for things like wage theft, tax evasion, forcing employees to work off the clock, and all the rest of the shit businesses and employers do to fuck over employees? Walk They through the store, out the front door, put them in the back of the cop car and book them, just like the guy that steals a pack of underwear?

The problem is theft for sure, but it’s happening at the top of the payscales in this country, not at the bottom. People getting fucked out of decent paying jobs and a shot at the education it takes to get one. That’s what drives petty crime. Poverty.

[–] reagansrottencorpse@lemmy.world 4 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (1 children)

No because those at the levers of power are fine with the crimes being done to us.

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[–] afraid_of_zombies@lemmy.world 16 points 11 months ago

What we need is stronger laws about white collar crimes. With mandatory prison assignments so no activist judge can send them to Club Fed.

[–] Rentlar@lemmy.ca 13 points 11 months ago (2 children)

Sure, stealing is wrong. But there's a limit, if you're operating a store as poorly as Dollar General, stealing from stores that actively take advantage of both the community and the staff is moral. They were receiving so much stuff that the cashier/cleaner/stocker-in-one can't get them out of the boxes in time for the next shipment, should just be giving those boxes away.

[–] 7u5k3n@lemmy.world 5 points 11 months ago

won't someone think of the shareholders!

/s

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[–] BeautifulMind@lemmy.world 12 points 11 months ago (8 children)

Yeah when I visit boomer relatives they seem to think retail stores in big cities are war zones- and they vote, which kinda tells me there's political support to put S.W.A.T. teams in every retail store

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[–] rez_doggie@lemmy.world 6 points 11 months ago

Gotta have the public funded police protecting the corporate wealth!

[–] Remmock@kbin.social 4 points 11 months ago

“For social order we need tighter reigns! Incarceration hasn't worked as a deterrent, I say we expand execution to include lesser crimes!” - Chief Judge Griffin, Judge Dredd (1995)

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