
Italian court rules food theft 'not a crime' if hungry - pekko
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-36190557
======
stronglikedan
I'm apparently in the minority, but, after reading the article, I still
maintain that there is never a reason to steal from your fellow man. The
potential for abuse due to hunger being subjective notwithstanding, there are
social programs in place to accommodate the needy. Do they not have these
programs in Italy? I am a very compassionate, empathetic (to a fault) person,
but I just don't see the justification for the theft. Ask me for help, and I'm
there, but please don't steal from me and think that it's okay. I am, however,
open to enlightenment.

~~~
steego
> I still maintain that there is never a reason to steal from your fellow man.
    
    
      * Stealing something back
      * Stealing Hitler's secret plans
      * Stealing a portion of everybody's property/income, but providing vital protection, infrastructure and social services in return.
      * Stealing the heart of a girl from a guy who abuses her.
      * Stealing land from the commons to efficiently put it to work
      * Stealing land at market value to create a public works project that benefits the rest of society
    

In all seriousness, property rights are a critical component if you want to
have a highly functioning economy, but as soon as you try to moralize the idea
like it's a sacrosanct moral imperative (even at the expense of hungry
people), you begin to sound like a foolish ideologue. The reason you sound
like a foolish ideologue is because different moral ideas can very easily find
themselves in opposition in common circumstances. If a situation forced you to
choose between compassion and property rights (Maybe you're asked to steal a
life saving medicine for someone else in dire need), which do you choose?
Morally speaking, does property rights actually trump compassion, or do we let
property rights trump compassion because that idea scales up to large
societies better?

Property rights is a critically important idea that helps to serve a society.
It's not an end unto its own, nor is it an unimpeachable moral imperative.

~~~
jeffdavis
I respectfully disagree. Property rights have a moral component independent of
their economic value, similar to privacy rights.

Say someone says "let me search your car, what have you got to hide?" What
argument can you use against it? The problem is that we've been manipulated to
believe privacy has no real moral claim. In reality, you should be able to
just say "it's private" and not feel compelled to provide further explanation.

It's not so different from being punched in the stomach. You aren't going to
die, so what's the problem? You heal and everything is fine. So why won't you
let me punch you in the stomach?

Theft is, similarly, a moral issue. If I make something, and someone takes it,
I will feel bad. Much worse than if I had to sell it to pay taxes (even if I
disagree with the tax policy).

~~~
coryfklein
> Say someone says "let me search your car, what have you got to hide?" What
> argument can you use against it?

How about, "A 2 year old was kidnapped 10 minutes ago from the apartment
complex you are leaving from. We need to be sure the child is not in your
trunk."

Good luck getting society to give you a free pass in that situation.

~~~
coryfklein
> See steego's reply.

I have... maybe I'm missing something here. Aren't steego and I saying the
same thing - he's saying it explicitly and I'm saying it by example?

Maybe what I'm missing is what _you_ were trying to say with the "search your
car" analogy. Is it that privacy has a moral component to it? If so I can
agree with that. I thought that "What argument can you use against it?" was
meant to rhetorically imply that there is no counter-argument.

~~~
jeffdavis
I guess I think of moral issues as "leaf nodes" in an argument tree. Things
you don't really need further justification for.

You still need to weigh them against conflicting values, but if someone
doesn't agree with you that issue X has a moral component at all (or if you
disagree whether it's positive or negative), then you are bound to disagree
forever.

When an officer asks "why? What have you got to hide?", they've turned it into
a practical issue and removed the moral component that I believe exists.
That's as ridiculous (to me) as asking why someone doesn't want to be punched
in the stomach ("why? Did you just have abdominal surgery or something?").

~~~
coryfklein
That clarifies it a lot for me. I hadn't considered how that phrasing just
removes the morality component from the question. It seems like a worthwhile
skill to be able to detect such comments and point them out for what they are
- I'm definitely going to develop that skill.

------
kome
In other news, sky is blue and water is wet. From the Italian criminal code:

Criminal Code, article 54 – State of necessity: “A person is not punishable
for having committed an act that he was forced to do in order to save himself
or others from an existing risk of severe harm, a risk not voluntarily caused
by him, nor otherwise avoidable, always provided that the act is proportional
to the risk”.

~~~
DanBC
But this is from the BBC, and in Britain we routinely prosecute (sometimes
privately) people who shoplift food.

There are cases of homeless people who stole a pint of milk from a doorstep,
and who left some money, being prosecuted for theft.

~~~
kome
Oh that's why anglophone media is so thrilled.

------
akrigline
The way the judges worded this decision makes it a lot less of a slippery
slope. This was only accepted because it was an "Immediate and essential need
for nourishment." I expect that if more people started stealing, they'd be put
through a court process to prove that they were in this condition.

What this doesn't do is fix the problem though, it just recognizes a symptom.
Why are these people forced to resort to stealing?

~~~
CajunAlexTrebec
Italy is falling apart, financially speaking. The people of Italy are
suffering as a result.

Nearly 50% of bank loans are non-performing (in default). The EBC is
conducting a stealth bailout via Target2. Just look at the major Italian bank
stocks. They are trading at deep, deep discounts. Maybe the market knows
something the EBC and others don't want to admit?

~~~
c0nducktr
People are homeless and go hungry in all countries. This isn't something that
only happens in Italy. It's a worldwide issue.

~~~
CajunAlexTrebec
Good point. On a related note, I personally cannot imagine a world where any
theft is justified. Personal property rights are key in maintaining a
functioning free market economy. This ruling by the court flies in the face of
those rights.

~~~
c0nducktr
I understand your opinion. I don't feel that taking from the person running
the store is really the right option, but I believe it is better than allowing
the person going hungry to starve. It's very upsetting to me that in a time of
such great global wealth, we still can't find a way to feed the poor.

I'm reminded of the quote by Eisenhower: "Every gun that is made, every
warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft
from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and not clothed."

------
orkoden
As the bible says
[http://www.bibleserver.com/text/ESV/Deuteronomy23%2C25](http://www.bibleserver.com/text/ESV/Deuteronomy23%2C25)

> If you go into your neighbor’s vineyard, you may eat your fill of grapes, as
> many as you wish, but you shall not put any in your bag. 25 If you go into
> your neighbor’s standing grain, you may pluck the ears with your hand, but
> you shall not put a sickle to your neighbor’s standing grain.

Stealing food is okay sometimes. There's even a word in German for it
Mundraub.

~~~
draugadrotten
_" For even when we were with you, we gave you this rule: "The one who is
unwilling to work shall not eat.""_ \-- 2 Thessalonians 3:10

[http://biblehub.com/2_thessalonians/3-10.htm](http://biblehub.com/2_thessalonians/3-10.htm)

~~~
vidarh
"unwilling"

------
hanief
Reminds me of the third islamic caliph, Omar ibn Khattab, who suspend
punishment for thief on famine. [1] I wonder if there is another legal
presedence beside it.

[1][https://books.google.co.id/books?id=ZRqe3iPwsTkC&pg=PA36&lpg...](https://books.google.co.id/books?id=ZRqe3iPwsTkC&pg=PA36&lpg=PA36&dq=omar+bin+khattab+thief+hungry&source=bl&ots=UOOfbPvzfB&sig=9ppWu9Dqt6IMgJA1tH80N4WvIRc&hl=en&sa=X&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=omar%20bin%20khattab%20thief%20hungry&f=false)

~~~
return0
Precedence of people not cutting off other people's hands for stealing? lots.

------
garyrob
It's a little hard to understand how this ruling won't cause a certain degree
of chaos. Can any hungry, homeless person now steal food from any store in
Italy without repercussion? Certainly as a matter of compassion, this ruling
can be argued as being reasonable, but how can it work as a practical matter?

~~~
delecti
Also, surely the store from which he stole is still victimized by the theft.
Is every supermarket now de facto required to set up small food pantries for
the poor to protect themselves from theft?

~~~
rootlocus
Considering the massive amounts of food that gets thrown away even before the
expiration date, I'm amazed this is even an issue. There was an entire episode
of "Last Week Tonight" on this topic:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i8xwLWb0lLY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i8xwLWb0lLY)

~~~
gedrap
Slightly related, throwing food away and the expiration date is a tricky
thing.

My dad works at grocery store and initially, they were allowed to bring the
food home once it expires for a symbolic cost (10% of the price or something).
Soon after that, the employees started to hide food so that they can take it
home almost for free. So it didn't last long.

~~~
omegaham
Same thing happens at restaurants. If a restaurant gives away excess food to
employees at the end of the night, you're guaranteeing that employees will
then cook excess food to take home a shitload.

As the saying goes, "This is why we can't have nice things."

~~~
gedrap
>>> As the saying goes, "This is why we can't have nice things."

Nah, it's just basic human nature. Would be really naive to expect something
different.

~~~
delecti
I don't think it's unfair to say "Human nature is why we can't have nice
things."

------
saosebastiao
If you're gonna force business owners to give to the poor, why not do it
through an established and equitable mechanism like taxation/redistribution,
instead of subjecting select types of business owners to the whims of a mostly
subjective claim? Why force the burden on a bakery but not a tailor or a
chocolatier?

I can't help but be concerned about this growing trend of governments slowly
pushing off the burden of general welfare onto businesses. You see it in the
US with health care being the responsibility of the employer, affordable
housing mandates on real estate developers, and minimum wage increases in
expensive areas. All of these "solutions" to poverty have huge unintended
consequences, even if they partially address the problem. The problem of
poverty isn't solved by forcing businesses to be compassionate, it is solved
by governments doing their fucking job and taxing everybody equitably to do
so.

~~~
KKKKkkkk1
Actually, when you think of it, maybe it's better to legalize stealing than
establishing a government agency in charge of equitable redistribution. I
would imagine stealing would work more efficiently and more fairly. (You see a
problem and you say: Hey, let's establish a government agency to solve that
problem. Now you have two problems.)

~~~
aninhumer
Am I missing some sarcasm here?

Legalising stealing is basically abolishing property rights.

~~~
gnaritas
And just out of curiosity, how far exactly do you think property rights should
go? Is your right to own something more important than another persons right
to life? Property rights are a social construct granted to you by society at
large, they don't have to be and are not absolute.

~~~
aninhumer
Oh I absolutely agree. Indeed, I often make a point of arguing against
libertarians who try to take property rights as a moral prior, and I'm highly
amused that so many people are now making the same argument against me...

But if we're going to limit property rights, we should do so systematically by
redistribution, not by allowing ad hoc violations. Predictability is the most
important economic benefit of the rule of law.

~~~
gnaritas
OK, just curious what your view was, I don't disagree.

------
nkrisc
A reasonable stance of compassion. It's a reprieve from the more common
misanthropic Randian attitudes towards the poor. Be nice to the poor, there
are so many things beyond our control that could make any of us poor tomorrow.

~~~
_Adam
The only "Randian attitude" towards the poor is that no one should be forced
to help them. This case is mandating that shops help poor people regardless of
whether or not they want. It's a clear violation of property rights.

Helping hungry people is a fine thing to do, as long as it's optional.

~~~
ctrlalt_g
The state isn't mandating anything. Store owners can physically prevent people
from stealing their wares if they wanted to.

------
lumberjack
>In 2015, Mr Ostriakov was convicted of theft and sentenced to six months in
jail and a €100 fine.

The first judge clearly messed up. A suspended sentence would have been ideal
in this case.

~~~
lazarus101
6 months in jail means free food for 6 months!

~~~
zaroth
And the most expensive way possible to feed someone too.

~~~
dimino
I don't know if the Italian correction system is corrupt in the same way the
American system is corrupt, though.

------
Tomte
When thou comest into thy neighbour's vineyard, then thou mayest eat grapes
thy fill at thine own pleasure; but thou shalt not put any in thy vessel.

When thou comest into the standing corn of thy neighbour, then thou mayest
pluck the ears with thine hand; but thou shalt not move a sickle unto thy
neighbour's standing corn.

Deuteronomy 23, 24-25

------
gioele

      Ci hanno insegnato la meraviglia
      verso la gente che ruba il pane
      ora sappiamo che è un delitto
      il non rubare quando si ha fame
    

Fabrizio De André (very influential singer-songwriter of the '60s-'70s)

    
    
      They taught us the wonder
      for the people who steal bread.
      Now we know that it’s a crime,
      not stealing when one is hungry.
    

(English translation from
[http://www.antiwarsongs.org/canzone.php?id=3225](http://www.antiwarsongs.org/canzone.php?id=3225)
)

------
gedrap
It definitely makes a nice headline, it might work in this specific case. Damn
it might even work in an utopian world where everyone is absolutely honest and
has high moral standards.

But applied widely in real world, it's just won't work. There are too many
people who would exploit such a system and cause chaos.

------
celticninja
Seems reasonable. Not like he was nicking razor blades and booze just some
necessities. Shame it had to go so far but hopefully it will prevent similar
court action or arrests in future.

~~~
gedrap
So, if you are proved to be poor or hungry (whatever that means), does it give
you a green light to steal? Maybe, let's say, steal 10 times a day from 10
different shops, and resell the goods for half the price and use the money for
something else?

I mean that's a lovely headline and all, but in startups lingo, it doesn't
scale.

~~~
sageikosa
Carrying capacity has no place in the calculation of the value of need.

~~~
celticninja
Not sure what you are trying to say.

~~~
sageikosa
I'm OK with that

------
sageikosa
One merely has to wonder whether a starving homeless man can be prosecuted for
"stealing" from another starving homeless man? Do we need to judge who was
more starving?

------
kolinko
"How noble the law, in its majestic equality, that both the rich and poor are
equally prohibited from peeing in the streets, sleeping under bridges, and
stealing bread!" \-- Anatole France

------
kh2ouija
Reminds me of how trying to escape from prison is not illegal in certain
countries.

~~~
vtail
Can you say in which countries?

~~~
halomru
From memory I think Germany is one of those countries.

It's not what some people imagine, though: when you break out of jail you will
still be wanted for your original crime, and when caught have to continue your
sentence. And while the act of breaking out isn't punishable by itself, theft,
property damage, assault etc committed in order to break out is still
punishable.

The human desire to be free is acknowledged and not punished, but that doesn't
interfere with the punishment of crimes.

~~~
talmand
Is the act of avoiding the authorities while being a wanted fugitive not
illegal in Germany?

~~~
halomru
Why would it be, it's not like fugitives will report to the police because of
some law.

But the better you avoid authorities the worse the prison you get sent to.
High security prisons are typically much less pleasant than low security
prisons.

~~~
talmand
Well, in the jurisdictions I'm familiar with it is quite illegal to avoid
authorities while being a wanted fugitive.

------
coffeeisgood
I have been homeless and hungry while working a manual labor job. I applied
for SNAP and should have been able to get benefits within three days. But I
was told I'm not homeless. I couldn't prove I was homeless. Shelters have
certain hours as do the food kitchens and I worked during those hours. I asked
many people for help and food, but they said no. So when I felt especially
desperate I stole a granola that cost about $2. The safety nets, so that
people don't have to go hungry failed me.

------
Dotnaught
But if the food is locked away, it's presumably still a crime to damage
property and/or bypass a lock to obtain the food. So this interpretation of
the law creates an incentive for grocers to keep food out of reach.

And thirst being even more basic than hunger, is it excusable to steal beer
when desperately dehydrated or just bottled water?

If food is deemed an inalienable right, then a tax to feed the hungry seems
like a better way to avoid legal inconsistency.

~~~
talmand
Your beer versus water question works for food as well. Will there be
difference of opinion by the law if the starving man steals bread versus
steak?

The tax, or charity for that matter, to feed the poor is something that works
quite well in many areas of the world, even in the evil capitalistic systems.

------
weinzierl
Until 1975 German law had a _Mundraub_ [1] (theft for the mouth) clause (§
248a Abs. 2 StGB a.F.). It was concerned with the theft of small amounts of
food for immediate consumption, like eating an apple from your neighbor's
garden.

[1]
[https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mundraub](https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mundraub)

------
golergka
It took them four years to reach a conviction on a most trivial of cases, that
was then appealed even later?

~~~
emodendroket
It is almost as though attempting to prosecute a homeless man who stole cheese
and a couple sausages is not a wise use of the state's resources.

------
deepnet
France has long had a similar leniency for stealing bread.

~~~
emodendroket
A sort of Jean Valjean rule, if you will.

e: That's probably exactly what you meant. Whoops.

------
nxzero
In theory, neither the store or those in need would want to deal with the
hassle of theft being the way to deal with the ruling. My guess is stories
would just start giving food to the hungry as needed, and then past the costs
onto the customers.

Why would this not work?

------
moron4hire
The Judeo-Christian Bible calls this "gleaning". From what I understand, it
was considered an essential part of the social safety net and farmers who
erected fences to keep truly needful gleaners out were considered sinful.

~~~
danielvf
Gleaning was more about allowing the poor to have inefficient access to the
raw materials that with hard work could be made into food. Taking prepared
food from a merchant would have still been a crime.

For example "People do not despise a thief if he steals to satisfy his
appetite when he is hungry, but if he is caught, he will pay esevenfold; he
will give all the goods of his house."

~~~
emodendroket
I'm not sure that the ancient Israelites had many places you could go get
"prepared food," but the Bible also says you should leave behind grapes for
the poor which clearly do not need preparation.

e: Previously I claimed that olives don't need preparation which is false.
Sorry.

~~~
knodi123
> olives for the poor which clearly do not need preparation

Olives cannot be eaten raw.

~~~
emodendroket
OK, sorry. Nevertheless, grapes do not require arduous preparation to eat.

------
chevas
What is going to stop a crowd of justifiably hungry people looting a grocery
store causing the grocer to become homeless themselves and thus making the
problem worse? The government has no right to sanction someone's property as
"ok" to be stolen because of need. I'm generally not in favor of imminent
domain for a public works project either, but that's another matter). This
ruling is an act of aggression by the government against the non-hungry that
steals not only their property, but their liberty. Most of us do not want
anyone going hungry, but this is not the solution.

------
adevendra23
Thnking what it feels like to be hungry for 3 days and no money to buy food.

------
adevendra23
I can't imagine what is feels like to be hungry for few days and no money to
buy food. May be in that state some human minds ignore morals, pride, social
and legal concequnces of stealing food.

~~~
ctrlalt_g
A few days is nothing. Fasting for a few days actually feels great. Weeks and
months of being constantly hungry, though, probably feels awful.

------
firimari
Surely the real reason for this is that the judiciary doesn't want to give
anyone a reason to write a new version of 'Les Miserables'

------
mbostleman
Can a group of hungry people combine, like a union, and steal the contents of
a food warehouse or grocery distribution center?

------
velox_io
In a perfect world this may work (arguably it wouldn't be needed).

How does it address professional thieves who steal to order, now they can just
argue that they were hungry. Frozen meat is often stolen as it has a high
value to weight ratio.

Many small business owners are far from rich, can they steal from their
suppliers to make up for the losses?

------
tmptmp
from the article

>>Stealing small quantities of food to satisfy a vital need for food did not
constitute a crime, the court wrote.

What about the loss sustained by the owner? Or perhaps if the "not-so-rich
clerk" at the supermarket was in charge of the goods and had to pay for the
losses? Whose going to give that "not-so-rich clerk" the lost money?

Tomorrow if a thousand "hungry" people stole "small quantities of food to
satisfy a vital need for food" then what?

I mean, such "populist" rulings are ultimately antithetical to democracy based
society.

~~~
vidarh
> I mean, such "populist" rulings are ultimately antithetical to democracy
> based society.

I find that an utterly ludicrous claim given that the court was applying the
law, and that parliament is free to change the law if they believe it is being
misinterpreted.

Others would find it ultimately antithetical to society overall to threaten
people with prison for a theft like in this case. I certainly would.

> Tomorrow if a thousand "hungry" people stole "small quantities of food to
> satisfy a vital need for food" then what?

Then society would need to decide whether to deal with that by tightening up
this law, or find other ways of treating the poor with some degree of dignity.

Consider such laws a recognition that life has greater value than property,
and an incentive to ensure society keeps that in mind when deciding how to
structure itself.

~~~
tmptmp
>>"life has greater value than property"...

This I agree. In fact, I am of the strong opinion that there should be very
hard limits set on the ownership of certain types of properties (e.g. land,
water, food). No one should be allowed to own any of such properties beyond a
certain limit. [1] But once a person who owns whatever is allowed by the laws,
then the law should protect the ownership of that person of that property and
in case any person ( _needy or not-so-needy_ ) steals such a property of other
person, the law _must not_ then take a populist u-turn to tell us grandiose
sounding principles like "life has greater value than property". If the judge
wants to show he/she is so "humane", he/she should pay for the loss of the
owner and allow the "needy" poor to keep the food.

Some other better ways the judge could have taken: The judge could have
ordered the officials overseeing the welfare matters and could have ordered
them to compensate for the losses sustained by the owner. In fact, the judge
had a very good opportunity to bring to the notice of that poor hungry person
some of the welfare schemes that are set in place by the society.

But saying that a theft, which has caused damage to other law abiding citizen,
is not a crime is not only ludicrous but is also dangerous.

>>Others would find it ultimately antithetical to society overall to threaten
people with prison for a theft like in this case. I certainly would.

I am not against the society helping the needy people to survive but there are
other "not-so-antithetical-to-democracy" ways of helping the needy people than
just ignoring the thefts carried out by the needy people.

What was wrong on the part of the owner? Why he/she was punished? These are
some very important issues here. We must not fall prey to sentiments like
"thefts of food by poor hungry _is_ okay and anyway the shop owner is always
that _dirty-rich_ person who needs to be punished".

[1] Note about private property: please note that I am not saying/suggesting
that we should embrace the communist style anti-people tyrannical systems
which prohibit "most"* people from owing any private property. Of course, the
communists allow only the "more equal people" [2] (e.g. party chairman and his
cronies in polit-bureau and few of their cronies in turn) to own _almost all_
of the property. The "party-people" are allowed to have as much fun as they
want and at whatever troubles such fun-acts of the party-people cause to other
"less equal" people, the communists just ignore.

[2]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Animal_Farm](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Animal_Farm)

------
ashitlerferad
Meanwhile the supermarket probably wasted many kilos of food the night before
and locked the bin they threw it into. That is the crime that should be
punished.

------
ManlyElectronic
May be the true reason of ruling is too many people, such as refuges,
preferring live in jail. All they have to do is commit a petty crime
occasionally.

~~~
zardo
This is why it's so important for your prison system to have a strong culture
of sexual abuse. It allows the society to pretend they have a liberal justice
system, while in reality all crimes are punished by rape.

------
talles
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Necessity](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Necessity)

------
DarkContinent
Who decides if a person is truly starving and homeless, or just acting it to
get free food?

~~~
Avshalom
The same people that normally decide if a person has committed a crime in
Italy Judge/Jury/Whatever?

------
xpaulbettsx
Isn't this the country that "Ladri di Biciclette" came from?

------
iamgopal
Reminds me of La miserables.

~~~
pc86
Les Misérables

Edit: With appreciation to lorenzhs

~~~
lorenzhs
Well if you're going to be pedantic, at least get it right - it's "Les
Misérables"

~~~
DonaldFisk
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muphry's_law](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muphry's_law)

~~~
lorenzhs
Thanks, I didn't know the name for this phenomenon.

As a side note, grammatically "le miserable" is more wrong than "la
miserable", as the latter is the right gender but lacking pluralization, while
the former gets both wrong :)

------
insulanian
Is it possible to prove that one was hungry at the time of theft?

~~~
swayvil
The assumption that people are lying unless proven otherwise is... well it
just opens the door to a whole world of problems. It's also distasteful and
ugly.

~~~
rhino369
That's sort of how many affirmative defenses are treated in many legal
systems. It's up to you to prove you have an excuse, so to say.

------
co_dh
I'm glad that stealing beer is still a crime :)

------
rhino369
That makes sense morally but are there actually starving people in first world
nations? There are food banks, shelters, and churches that provide food, at
least in America.

------
igotsideas
I see the good intention but I don't see it working out well for businesses.
Maybe it will work in Italy? I know it would be a $h!t show here in Seattle.

------
notsotrue
By this logic, money theft is 'not a crime' if poor.

~~~
emodendroket
You do not have a basic biological need for money, actually.

~~~
lorenzhs
I don't think anyone is saying poor people should be allowed to rob banks or
mug people. The article is about stealing small amounts of food to stave off
hunger.

~~~
throwaway7767
This site has a threaded discussion system, context matters. The post you are
referring to was responding to someone who specifically made the point that
this was analogous to allowing poor people to steal money, which is clearly
not the case.

In this context, it's clear you are both in agreement.

~~~
lorenzhs
Exactly, I was simply trying to elaborate on emodendroket's point to point out
the flaw in nosotrue's logic. Sorry if I didn't make this clear enough.

------
x5n1
Should probably say starving. I am always hungry.

~~~
sp332
It's a loose translation. A better one from the body of the article is "in the
face of the immediate and essential need for nourishment".

------
ap3
Jean Valjean?

------
fromthemorning
To massively simplify a complex debate, there are 2 main schools of thought
with respect to how to decrease future crime once a criminal has been
apprehended [1]. The first is to make the punishment disincentivize future
transgressions, and the second is to rehabilitate the criminal so that they
won't make the decision to break the law again. Recently, society has been
coming to terms with the fact that strict sentencing laws don't work in many
situations (and often have unforeseen consequences, like the Revolving Door
effect in American prisons [2]). In this situation, as much as we wish we
could have directed the poor man to the nearest homeless shelter serving hot
soup, it doesn't seem likely that taking away the threat of a 6 month prison
stay would make him less likely to do that. The various hardships that are
overindexed in the homeless population, from drug addiction to mental illness
[3] (to perhaps a language barrier in this case) not only make them less
likely to be able to find food consistently, but also make them less likely to
respond to criminal disincentives.

It is a more enlightened philosophy of justice to acknowledge that saying 'you
should have known better' won't make people know better. As the concept of
morality progresses from a simple Hammurabian ear-for-an-ear justice game to a
nuanced empirically-founded optimization problem, it will be interesting to
see whether or not people continue to take pleasure in exerting it. That the
latter problem tends to be incredibly engrossing to the technically literate
means many of us will respond to this quite positively.

Postscript: If morality were a solved problem, would there be as many
Effective Altruists?

[1]
[http://www.apa.org/monitor/julaug03/rehab.aspx](http://www.apa.org/monitor/julaug03/rehab.aspx)
[2] [http://www.pewtrusts.org/en/research-and-
analysis/reports/00...](http://www.pewtrusts.org/en/research-and-
analysis/reports/0001/01/01/state-of-recidivism) [3]
[https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Adriana_Foster/publicat...](https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Adriana_Foster/publication/230755953_Homelessness_in_schizophrenia/links/540dafa10cf2df04e7564937.pdf)
| relevant quote : estimation of mood disorders at "12% to 30% in various
homeless samples".

~~~
objectivistbrit
Interesting to meet an effective altruist here. I was somewhat involved in EA
for a while and even interned at an EA org, but after reading up a bunch of
different philosophies the one which I found most consistent with reality was
-- perhaps surprisingly -- Objectivism.

The inferential gap between EA and Objectivism is obviously huge, so it's not
worth giving a full argument here. For the intellectually curious, though,
I'll simply say that the two schools of thought fromthemorning cites both
assume that the purpose of morality is to maximise the greater good (rather
than, say, teaching individuals principles to maximise their own long-term
personal happiness).

On the off chance that someone on the fringes of the EA movement reads this,
someone who shares the concerns I once had - the ultimate issue with EA is
that it's hyper-empiricist: EAs love evidence but are highly distrustful of
theoretical arguments. This is an understandable position, but ultimately a
mistake, because you end up unable to synthesise the vast amounts of data you
gather. All truths are simplifications - what you need are rules to form
correct simplifications.

Objectivism isn't taken seriously in mainstream intellectual circles but it
should be, because it shows how to avoid the pitfalls of both empiricism and
rationalism. (See Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology for details).

------
fiatmoney
Similarly, under Italian law, beating the shit out of a bum isn't a crime if
they're trying to steal your panino.

------
krzrak
Do you need to be hungry and poor, or just hungry? If latter - you can just
help yourself in the supermarket whenever you wish?

~~~
lorenzhs
To quote the article, the court ruled the way it did because he took those
things "in the face of the immediate and essential need for nourishment".
Having a craving in the supermarket is not the same thing.

~~~
krzrak
One doesn't need to be poor to experience "immediate and essential need for
nourishment". I.e. you couldn't have time to eat breakfast, and you forgot to
take your wallet with you.

~~~
lorenzhs
Nope, that's called being hungry, not starving. Skipping breakfast does not
make an _essential need_ for nourishment. If you're a healthy person you'd
probably be fine without food for at least a couple of days, so you don't have
an excuse to go around stealing stuff ;)

~~~
krzrak
Maybe you're right :)

Anyway, my point is: theft is always theft. One may get lighter punishment
because of the motives, but still should be punished. It's really hard to die
of starvation in modern society.

------
panzagl
Sooo, what if he was stealing from a soup kitchen? Or if the prosecutor could
prove that there was food available through charity? Or that the man had
money, but didn't want to spend it on food? Seems like an awfully broad
precedent (assuming Italian courts work the same way as US courts).

------
scurvy
Europeans (DHH for example) constantly brag about what great social safety
nets the European countries provide for their people, and that US style
charities are a waste. Implying charity money should be given to the
government as tax money and let the state do their work instead.

Italy has just admitted that it can't take care of its citizens' basic needs.
I'm not saying it's time to eat crow, but I am saying it's time to realize
that both systems have flaws and there's no reason to get righteous about one
approach over another.

~~~
megalodon
What the what? Your generalizations are way out of line. You can argue about
or criticize the ruling but don't use it out of context to push your own
agenda.

~~~
scurvy
I don't have an agenda, that's my point. I'm saying it's time for certain
people to stop pushing theirs.

OK, I have an anti-agenda agenda.

~~~
megalodon
> Europeans (DHH for example) constantly brag about what great social safety
> nets the European countries provide for their people

> Italy has just admitted that it can't take care of its citizens' basic
> needs.

Maybe you don't, but you are implying that this somehow is a failure of social
safety nets.

As someone else in this thread mentioned, the italian justice system is based
on civil law, not on precedent (common law) so this ruling doesn't have the
repercussions many seem to think. I'm not a lawyer however, so don't quote me
on this.

------
kbart
I'm interested, what test do they perform to check if a person in question was
hungry?/s Still, it's a bad precedence imho, so according to such logic, a
homeless person could also invade my home and sleep in my bed, because he
can't afford his own.

~~~
Intermernet
>according to such logic, a homeless person could also invade my home and
sleep in my bed, because he can't afford his own.

Not quite, a homeless person could invade an empty home and sleep in that bed.
This is done all the time, and is somewhat covered by squatter's rights. It's
currently assumed that greater than 15% of the world's population are
squatters. [1]

 _Squatting is the action of occupying an abandoned or unoccupied area of
land–or a building, usually residential–that the squatter does not own, rent
or otherwise have lawful permission to use._

 _Author Robert Neuwirth suggested in 2004 that there were one billion
squatters globally. He forecasts there will be two billion by 2030 and three
billion by 2050._

[1]:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Squatting](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Squatting)

~~~
kbart
What you've described is more akin to gathering discarded food in the back of
supermarkets and restaurants, not taking it (stealing) from the rightful
owner.

~~~
Intermernet
The original article is about about someone stealing food from a supermarket.
Yes, the supermarket is the rightful owner, but they aren't going to actually
consume the food.

~~~
thaumasiotes
You're not going to consume your bed, either.

------
duncanawoods
I have wondered whether this applies to the ethics of piracy too.

For example, on release of a blockbuster movie - the distributor will do
blanket advertising saturating every channel trying to manufacture a demand -
tv, internet, sides of buses, roadside-hoardings, in taxis, talk shows,
newspaper native ads etc. You just can't escape even in your own home eating
your breakfast cereal when the box is smeared with adverts.

If a demand has been manufactured by a catastrophic pollution of our
environment, I can't blame anyone for satisfying it without paying the maker.
They didn't really have a choice.

~~~
nkrisc
That's absurd. Being subject to incessant advertising doesn't make you _need_
a movie or beyond responsibility for your own actions.

No one is saying this guy isn't responsible for stealing food, the court is
saying he ought not to be punished for it given his particular circumstances.

EDIT: I'll concede this may not apply to toddlers.

