Is stealing wrong?

[Saft]

Just a topic over on another forum about someone has a friend who is stealing.  Now, I have never stolen anything before so I might not be getting the point across that has been made but to me it's clearly black and white that stealing is wrong under any circumstances and if there is a situation in which it makes it somehow okay for the person to steal then it's acceptable.  I think I've missed something completely.

So is stealing wrong in any circumstances or just a few?  And if you had a friend who you know has stolen something would you inform a figurehead in authority or would you inform your friend that it is wrong?

I am not an expert in the friend matters but I presumed that you would tell a friend that it is wrong...again, I think I have missed something...

Thank you for any responses....

[Mumbling]

Stealing is always wrong in a sense because you take something that someone else has worked for. Personally I find things like Robin Hood quite realistic (steal from the rich that don't do a thing and give it to those that need it), but do not know if it is a good solution.

According to the father of Amir in the book The Kite Runnier, Theft is the biggest sin of all..

If you kill, you steal someone's life, you steal children of their parents and husbans from their wifes.

If you rape, you steal someone's privacy (or in some cases virginity).

He tries to say that you do not merely steal objects, you can steal a lot more... To me, stealing is bad, and stays bad, no matter what circumstance. If one is at the end of his life, starving to death, I'd say go see a food bank or something... They must exist!

[landbeforetimelover]

Not always.  If you're going to starve, I don't think it's wrong to steal from someone who's really well of - so well off that they wouldn't even feel it.  But you must exhaust all other possibilities before resorting to something like that and you must actually be starving.  If you didn't really NEED the fool to survive, stealing it would be wrong no matter how well of the person you're stealing from is.

If we stick to the strict definition of stealing, piracy is stealing as well.  I don't think that piracy is usually wrong.  Most of the time people pirate software because it's too goddamed expensive.  If they couldn't pirate it, they wouldn't have it.  If that's the case, then the company loses ABSOLUTELY NOTHING by that person pirating their software.  Now there are exceptions to this.  If the person downloads a crack online then downloads the trial off the company servers, then that IS stealing.  They're stealing bandwidth from that company, which costs the company money.  That is wrong.  But I know a lot of people that are DIRT FRICKIN' POOR.  There's no way they could pay $1,000 for Photoshop.  But they want to learn it.  If piracy wasn't an option, there's no way they'd have a copy.  It would take them 50 years to save up $1,000 and even if they did, the last thing they'd spend that money on would be Photoshop.  Because of this, piracy isn't usually wrong.  Now if you can afford it and would actually buy it if piracy was an option then piracy is wrong, but that's the minority of pirates.

[Stegron]

Of course stealing is wrong!  

[babidikrakenguard]

Yes, stealing is wrong, but when it comes to survivel, you gotta do what you gotta do in order to survive..

Stealing food or things like that is fine, but if it's something like stealing someones identity or stealing something like a microwave thats another..

[Malte279]

Generally stealing is wrong of course as it means taking possession of what does not belong to the thief. There are countless possible scenarios in which the severity of the crime can be relativized, sometimes even to the point where the damage caused by the theft can be considered less than damage that would have been the result of the theft being not committed.
It is kind of a case by case thing and I think there are not too many generally acceptable rules that one could write about what kind of thievery (wrong as theft generally is) could be seen as "morally excusable".
I know a man who in war (that unnatural state in which by the grace of governments the killing of other people whom one has never met before is suddenly not only not considered wrong anymore but is even praised as commendable and courageous) robbed the boots of a dying man right from the feet of the dying man. The thief did so to protect the own feed from the literally crippling cold around. From a moral point of view this horrible deed may be considered more acceptable than the theft of which many of us are guilty with regard to music or movies. That man stole to save his own health while our stealing is based on just "wanting to have it". No matter how much we may lament about the high costs if we are perfectly honest I think most of us would have to admit that they "could" afford the money. I suppose much of it has to do with the fact that the thievery we commit is one from some anonymous instance. If we were instead to pick CDs, movies, computer games whatever from the pockets of a dying man we would probably not do it in spite of the fact that the dying man wouldn't have any use for it while that anonymous instance really does loose money from it.
We try to justify it by the extraordinarily high prices etc. but if we are really absolutely honest to ourselves and if we are in total agreement that stealing is wrong, then I'm afraid the lack of a visible victim and the easiness of that kind of theft is not an excuse from a moral point of view.
I don't mean to hold a sermon, but it cannot be denied that if we totally agree that stealing is wrong, and if we agree that lack of obstacles in committing a theft does not mitigate the wrongness of such an act, then I'm afraid many of us must consider themselves as evildoers.

[LBTFan13]

In my opinion, stealing is wrong no matter what the circumstances.

Unfortunately, I am guilty of downloading music from websites other than Itunes, which means I am downloading pirated music. The main reason why I think piracy happens on the web is to send out a message to companies like Apple and Sony. People refuse to pay such high costs for software and resort to piracy in an attempt to tell the companies to drop their prices. Is this effective? I don't know. Probably not because I doubt the companies even take a notice to these things. Now I know that some websites have been taken down because of pirating music, games, etc... but there are still quite a few websites that offer these products.

So in a way, I guess I'm being a bit of a hypocrite.

[Blitz]

Naturally speaking, yes. Well, in some cases, of course.

[Noname]

95% of the time, stealing is totally wrong. In very rare cases, it is only "right" if the action directly offsets a larger wrong, but almost every time, this is not the case. Stealing food is not nearly as common as stealing cars, after all. Who ever heard of a robber holding up a store to steal bread? No, they hold up a store for what is in the cash register, not the dairy section.

[Malte279]

Not quite sure. Our figures about stealing bread vs. stealing cars are likely to be the figures from some western country where death by starvation has become mercifully rare (and alas partly so because the western world is in a position to consume liberally the resources which might save lives in other countries in Africa and Asia in particular). I daresay in some of these countries the more justifiably kinds of stealing for survival would be more frequent. I'm afraid there will also be such terrible scenarios as one starving human saving the own life by stealing from another human who will starve as a result.
I detest the principle of the "right of the stronger one" but it is also hard to blame anyone who is stealing for the natural instinct of survival.
As I said before, the action of theft is generally wrong, but there are many possible scenarios (though those would rarely occur in countries where actual death by starvation is rare) in which the damage done by the theft is not as severe as the damage would have been if the person did not steal. Many laws actually provide for rules by which the theft of food by one in dire need of it is not to be treated as regular theft.

So in a way, I guess I'm being a bit of a hypocrite.

So I suppose many of us are. One who is absolutely constant with morals about theft could probably only look down at many of us with contempt.

[Noname]

Oh, make no mistake, stealing is still not right, even if its severity can be mitigated by the circumstances. Something like stealing due to starvation is held even to be a partial exception to rules in countries in which hands are chopped off of thieves for other, non-food related kinds of theft!  

[Petrie.]

Personally, stealing is always wrong...that's 100% of the time.  There is no "ok" stealing.  Now, however, lets look at Haiti after the earthquake...oh there was stealing....is survival stealing in that circumstance wrong?  Well....a lot more would've been dead because there was literally nothing left after that natural disaster.  Survival of the fittest in those cases I guess.  But stealing isn't justified in places where resources are plenty.

[Noname]

Stealing isn't automatically justified when resources are scarce, either. It is all too imagine to easy that strong will steal from the weak during a time of shortage. This happens during when poor countries suffer from trade embargoes all the time.

Interestingly enough, something kinda like that happened in the 1st land before time movie, which I wouldn't have mentioned had this not been a forum on the topic, when those sauropods rushed at that tiny oasis, taking almost everything, and leaving only a bit left for the main characters.

Which is often what happens when a country like Iran or Iraq is hit with trade sanctions. The rich will take from the poor in order to keep themselves up to a high standard of living, while the economic hardship the poor suffer from only intensifies.

[Clawandfang]

Interestingly enough, something kinda like that happened in the 1st land before time movie, which I wouldn't have mentioned had this not been a forum on the topic, when those sauropods rushed at that tiny oasis, taking almost everything, and leaving only a bit left for the main characters.

That's more of a "first-come first-served" philosophy than stealing; the Gang didn't actually own the tree.