'you go to prison not for stealing, but for stealing too little'
this might helpfully distinguish theft as an emergent market corrective that spontaneously reallocates hoarded and clogged wealth, and theft as primitive accumulating, cartel extorting, market disciplining dispossession
ie the poor steal to satisfy their deprived needs, which is criminalized and punished, while the rich steal to accrue capital and exact tolls on restricted access, which is permitted and protected
The law locks up the man or woman
Who steals the goose off the common
But leaves the greater villain loose
Who steals the common from the goose.
https://www.onthecommons.org/magazine/%E2%80%9Cstealing-common-goose%E2%80%9D/index.html
@bcham
this is true but it's also a simplifying narrative
one of the worst things about theft *within* poor communities is that it's a negative-sum game: a deprived need turns into pure force of habit, and people often steal what they don't need at the expense of their peers who desperately need it — and then just throw that stuff away because it's useless to them or they don't want to get caught. it becomes a form of waste that exacerbates scarcity and drives social distrust and division.
ben chambers 🏴
Alex Rodríguez
Alex P. 👹
gnate
Patrick Foley
punIssuer