Poll: Stealing from the rich to give to the poor.

[The Thief]

Its neither right or wrong, its natural.

Sorry, but "natural" doesn't apply to creatures of intelligence unless they are acting upon instinct alone. If a person steals something while they are fully aware of the concept of theft and possession they are either making a moral choice or are a sociopath.

 

[LiquidGrape]

I'm telling you, the sooner we abandon this whole currency nonsense, we'll all feel better with ourselves and our surroundings.

 

[Chechosaurus]

I agree with redistribution of the wealth so in a sense, yeah, I do agree with it.

 

[BiscuitTrouser]

I think if everyone has the same chance of success then no. However in todays world many people think the following incorrect fact.

Money earned. Proportional to. Work done.

No no no no noooooooo.

In some cases this is correct, and some cases are debatable depending on your definition of work. Is a footballers life hard work? Is life in the army hard work? Both are argueable but the salary tells us the footballer works harder than any of us. Its a hard question isnt it? Im going to sit on the fence but give those points.

 

[flaming_squirrel]

Nope. The rich earned their money, leave them alone.

Tell that to the royal family.

 

[One of Many]

Thats the problem with fancy motto's that are taken out of context and brought to different environment without much after-thought.

In Robin Hood the whole idea of stealing from rich and giving to poor was based on the fact that the mentioned rich were oppressing the poor, their money mostly came from abuse and represented a sort of rulership that does not care about the average people, hoping only to get their money. It was quite political in its meaning.

Now in democratic/modern civilizations we have taxes, which exist to support possibility of equal chance. Something that doesn't really worked that way in feudal systems where your heritage was pretty much deciding factor in whenever you will be rich or poor.
Sure in our times the fact that you have good family helps but even starting from the lowest level you can, through hard work climb up the social ladder. From the taxes government is expected to provide such possibility by social care, education and other means.

The whole idea of robbing the rich and giving to poor, while perfect from idealistic point of view has little to no logic in our societies and only discourages people to work hard, promising the goods for nothing at all.
When Poland was under socialistic regime of USSR we had saying that roughly translated to english would go "You can lounge or you can stand, 2 grands is what you'll get" which created a big group of people that consider hard work not worth their effort, expecting to be paid for just the fact they exist.

Some very good points Keava.

The only reason that stealing from the rich in the Robin Hood tales is acceptable is that they are set in federal Europe. As the common man, you were allowed the privilege of working the local lord's land and after he took a good portion of the efforts of your labor, he sent men with sharp pointy things to demand taxes from you. You didn't pay and you'd get stabbed and/or your hut burned down.

 

[randomize4]

Personally, I think it is wrong. The rich have been able to earn their own money, and if this happened to often, then the poor would just rely on handouts.

In the context of the Robin Hood stories, it is morally okay, because the rich/royalty had earned that money by taxing and oppressing the poor. It was more like stealing the money back and giving it to its rightful owners (the poor people it came from).

All in all, I believe it matters how the rich became rich, and the poor became poor.

 

[child of lileth]

It kinda depends, but stealing is still stealing. I guess if the rich stole it to begin with, then it would be okay to steal from them, and give to yourself, and never speak of it again.

 

[TheBoulder]

It depends how the rich got their money and how the poor doesn't have any. In my opinion, if the rich got their money by exploiting the poor, then they don't deserve it. If the poor lost their money by being irresponsible, then they don't deserve much. The rich deserve their money if they actually worked hard for it. Finally, if the poor lost their money because they were being exploited, robbed or anything like that, they deserve the money.

 

[Firepowered]

Stealing as the act per se is immoral. That said, the intention is what really counts: therefore you alone can determine, situation by situation, if a given heist is right for you or not.
Still, i don't give a shit if rich assholes are robbed, though the poor would then become rich, and from there it's a circle that never ends.

 

[the protaginist]

If it's a NICE rich person, like a Walt Disney or a Milton Hershey, stealing from them would be wrong, they worked to make peoples lives better and gave to charities already.

If it's one of these big banker assholes who lay thousands off but give themselves 50 million dollar salaries, ROB THEM.

In, of course, my opinion.

 

[Tucker154]

Nope. The rich earned their money, leave them alone.

Just a thought, but what if they earned their money and used it to make it so the poor has no chance of oppertunities the he/she had?Im not saying your wrong,for its your oppinion,but everyone should have an equal chance of suceeding if that oppertunty was given.I say that stealing from those that earned their money and did nothing to keep others from such an oppertunity is wrong,but if they did try to keep them from the oppertunity,steal away!Again,its just a thought, and you writen so little i dont know if you thought about that.

 

[Valksy]

Remembering that Robin Hood is a folk hero and not necessarily a historical figure I will say that I fucking love him (and will Hollywood get their paws OFF one of our finest stories).

Poverty at that time in history was a death sentence. And so much as stealing a loaf of bread was also a death sentence. The "haves" had armed me, the "have nots" died. And which you were was a total accident of death, there was no upward mobility, no bootstraps, most people were born into what was essentially a variation of slavery.

So yeah, Robin Hood =D

As for always being morally wrong? Not necessarily. If someone in the UK is caught nicking an Xbox because they wanted one then yes they deserve punishment. If someone is caught stealing a loaf of bread to feed themselves then I believe that there is no guilty there and would wish to both excuse them and work out why life had gone so badly wrong that survival necessitates theft.

 

[AdamRBi]

It doesn't really depend on how much they have, it's their attitude.

Are the rich overly smug Jerks? Then yes.
Are the poor humble, hard workers but are constantly screwed? Then Yes.
Are the poor lazy freeloaders? Then No.
Are the rich nice, hard working, and pleasant people? Then No.

 

[The Thief]

Its neither right or wrong, its natural.

Sorry, but "natural" doesn't apply to creatures of intelligence unless they are acting upon instinct alone. If a person steals something while they are fully aware of the concept of theft and possession they are either making a moral choice or are a sociopath.

Well its natural, because stealing has always happened amongst men, its a more straitforward form of competitions. You still consider thieving immoral? ok thats your opinion, i dont consider thieving immoral, i wouldnt like it, but its person living under diffrent rules for himself.

The concept of theft and possession is your moral perception, who are you to say that something belongs to you or another.

Just because someone lives under a diffrent set of morals, or none at all, doesnt mean they are sociopath, just means they have a diffrent perception of life.

It's not a natural behavior if people have control over it; The urge to steal is not the same as acting upon said urge, and no means to excuse the act.

I consider morals to be absolute, and I can see you believe they are relative. I'm not going to start arguing moral views since it is way too early in the morning, but I suggest you read this article on moral relativism. It's pretty long though, so only if you really give a shit.

http://www.bethinking.org/resource.php?ID=229

TL;DR version is that moral relativism doesn't work as a code of ethics.

 

[jpoon]

No. Why should my family be victimized?

Why should my family starve ?

That should maybe depend on the family. Some just mooch and don't do a damn thing because they know it's coming even with little to no effort, others honestly put every ounce they have in to bettering themselves and still fail. I would say it should be handled on a case by case basis but I still don't support stealing from the rich to give to the lazyasses poor.

 

[Danny Ocean]

Its neither right or wrong, its natural.

So are rape, war, and dying from painful diseases.

Your point being?

Something being "Natural" does not make it right.

EDIT: Oh right, you're a relativist. Don't bother arguing then, there's no point.