I have often struggled with the idea that theft is inherently immoral. I mean sure, we don't go around hitting old ladies over the head, but that is a tired trope. What if there were a banking executive who had amassed millions of dollars through nefarious dealings. Is it immoral to steal from him?

If your answer is "no", then OK, how far do we go? Is it OK to use violence, or is surreptitious theft OK?

If your answer is "yes", then OK, we just let "the smartest guy in the room" run around unpunished? He is essentially stealing from the rest of us.

stealing from the rich is good in my books. they wont even notice losing .0001% of their networth. That is why if i had a chance to steal 99% of bezos money and then donate it away i would obvious if there is no jail time, and i wont get caught

Realistically you should probably be doing that even if there is jail time-- and you'd be a hero.

Yea no thanks, I still want to enjoy life and not have butt sex

I’m 33 when I’m 60 n old with no butt sex involve I would do it but not in my prime

I've certainly changed my view on things over the years.

For instance looking at Politicians who exempt themselves from laws so they can insider trade and get rich, is IMO more immoral than a thief stealing from a store.

Gaining the leavers of power and abusing them to your own benefit while jailing others who do less, is IMO a terrible moral crime. Spitzer aggressively jailing prostitutes and Johns while indulging is a horrible transgression.

So if you could find a way to outsmart Nancy Pelosi or any politician enriching themselves at the teat, maybe thru cyber blackmail, I would not consider that immoral despite it being theft or blackmail. The concept of 'justice' has to play a part in IMO, and there is no bigger perversion of justice than those in power distorting it to their benefit. They should be fair game for whatever grift comes their way.

I no longer accept a black and white concept of 'right or wrong', 'moral or immoral', based on 'legal or not'. When those with power to write laws do so to advantage themselves while disadvantaging others I am ok with most of the means the 'others' might use to get a more 'just' result.

"we go", as in I'm assuming you are talking about society.

Speed limits....there's nothing immoral about going over the speed limit, but there are consequences for doing that for other people, so speed is restricted.

If it is from a society's perspective, I don't necessarily think morality is relevant.

From a moral perspective... If you steal from a thief you're just reappropriating someone else's property. And that gets into morality of private property.

Or you can be in Omar Little's camp:

"Money ain't got no owners, just spenders"

Good luck stealing securities. How do you steal ownership of wealth, without extortion, coercion, force?

Our first (iirc) conversation was me trying to explain that moraility was prior to the law rather than defined by the law. Maybe that makes more sense now.

Lots of moral system perspectives but utilitarians would think tt right to steal whenever the expected consequences are good. Kantians not so much. Personally, if someone I was responsible for (including the dog) was going hungry or otherwise in need then I'd steal in a heartbeat if there was no better alternative. I have no doubt it's the right thing to do and that to let then starve/etc would be morally awful. Against that, I'd change the law on theft to make 'need' a legal justifcation so that it's not theft when I or anybody does it. Same with all laws - the 'moral' aim is to make good laws not to obey any old rubbish

The reason I ask - I was playing pool tonight with a guy who is a pretty talented pool player, and also a pretty talented card mechanic. I suggested that one day we hit a private game I know and get him in as a dealer. Does this change anyone's minds?

Btw, this dude literally dealt out a royal to himself while it's just me and him sitting at the dinner table, and I am watching for what he is doing. I caught some shady riffles, but that was it. And I just let him examine the deck face up for 10 seconds before he did it, and it wasn't a fresh deck.

Before you all say "you're a cheating scumbag", homeboy can deal any cards to any seat. So, let's say we go for this. How do we choose our mark? They are all rich execs.

Or is this totally immoral?

Also, I think I know how he does it. He creates a slug, then riffles it in. The creating the slug part is hard though. The fact I know how it's done and I still couldn't catch him doing it while he is literally doing it is amazing, though.

How do you create wealth without extortion, coersion, or force?

You say "please", of course.

I guess the question is how is theft being defined? Slight problem is in the wording, theft is, by definition, illegal or immoral, so you've already defined yourself into corner. Might be better to say what you think is good or bad and work your way from there.

Create a business, innovate a product or service, sell that product or service to willing buyers, then sell shares of your company to willing buyers. You now own a company that has value, and you now have wealth.

Or, sell your labor, use the currency you receive to buy shares of a profitable company from willing sellers. You now have wealth.

It's certainly illegal by definition, but you have made a stretch there to say it is also immoral. That is what the question is asking, and you have answered it with "by definition".

In modern society, if you, an employee, take $100 out of the till of your business, you're a criminal and could go to jail. If your employer takes $100 out of your paycheck, your employer, at most, after an expensive, protracted civil trial, has to pay you back, faces no criminal penalties, and then, only has to pay back the employees who bother/pay to fight back if this was done to a lot of employees.

By being a landlord, an employer, a shareholder, or some other form of capitalist.

Shoplifters Close 17 Walgreens in San Francisco

California Shoplifting Surgel

Quote:

“We’ve had incidents where our security officers are assaulted on a pretty regular basis in San Francisco,” Dugan said.

The retail executives and police officers emphasized the role of organized crime in the thefts. And they told the supervisors that Proposition 47, the 2014 ballot measure that reclassified nonviolent thefts as misdemeanors if the stolen goods are worth less than $950, had emboldened thieves.

It's pobably not close to sainthood.

At least when the headlines and conspiracy theoriest are wide eyed about a Russian IT professional with a suspiciously high blood alcohol level being found hacked to pieces in a bin bag then we will know ...

Lol.

I am making it more of a hypothetical now. I don't know if he can literally deal any cards to any seat. I'm pretty sure he could set up a cooler though.

The hypothetical is interesting to me though. For all those people saying it's fine in theory, I am crystallising that. We are stealing money by "cold decking" our theoretical guy in a high stakes live game. Still fine?

If you went through the execs' wallets when they weren't looking and gave the money to the needy I think it's probably morally justified.

If you present a rigged game as fair and give the money to a wealthy BI developer I'm not so ok with it.

To be fair, the police work for the landlords, employers and shareholders and they will happily apply force.

Kind of a mundane con, even if it was fresh in "Rounders." As to the morality of it - meh, whatever - if you do this then you are cheating, and you know it so you decide if you care or not. Others talking about when they would steal from Bezos to avoid butt sex or theories about evil landlords using police to inflict their will on the heroic underclass is not really part of that choice.

If you are fine with it then you need to accept that is is also ok if the same is done to you, or that if you get caught then whatever is done to you and your buddy Worm is relatively justified as well. More of a risk/reward scenario than a moral one, since your cheating scam would generally fail the basic definition of moral, but you know that.

This is kind of too easy for you D2.

It's not moral to steal in this scenario because you're doing exactly the same thing as the banking exec you're stealing from. You have may even be using the same rationalization (they deserve it).