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Thread: Technically legal to remove grocery carts...

  1. #21
    Senior Member Packy's Avatar
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    I am VERY obsessed with hoarding. I plan to BUY an entire island in San Juan County,Wa., and use it to store the 1000's and 1000's of grocery carts I've "borrowed" over the years. Maybe I can build some "Grocery Cart Sculpture", and make the island a Tourist attraction. How about the "National Grocery-Cart Museum"? I could do that, too. Hey--If you don't like it, find something else to worry about. There are more than enough really serious issues to go around.

  2. #22
    Senior Member CathyA's Avatar
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    It's not like the taxpayers were paying for the round-up vehicle. And if they did have to raise food prices to cover those expenses, then that was their choice.......and it came back on the people buying the food and using the carts. If people didn't like it, then they could complain to the management or shop somewhere else. And isn't this the free enterprise that some of you guys are insisting is the best way to go? I think the objection to this was really some older issues that irritated some folks.
    I'm really surprised it was handled fairly rudely.
    If it became illegal, it was no doubt because some people were keeping the carts. Just like alot of other things..........something that might be working really well turns sour because some people don't play by the "rules".

  3. #23
    Low Tech grunt iris lily's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Kestra View Post
    ... Is it wrong to make it easier for people to shop at their store?
    You know that's not what's in question.

    I would like to see evidence that store management did not mind, and even encouraged removal of grocery carts from their property to be completely on board with this idea.

    But I do also agree with sweetana that there is likely a cultural issue here. I lived in New Mexico. The "manana" culture influenced the "gringo" culture, that's for sure. I can see liking a more "relaxed" approach to some things.

  4. #24
    Simpleton Alan's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Yossarian View Post
    I'm with Rob on this one. The stores didn't make those carts. Other people who may have gone to public schools might have made them and they were probably shipped on public roads to get to the stores. So I would just tell the stores - hey, you didn't build those so quit trying to act like you own them. They are clearly fair game for public appropriation.
    Yoss, I'm guessing you're preparing for the upcoming Elizabeth Warren campaign of collectivism.
    "Things should be made as simple as possible, but not one bit simpler." ~ Albert Einstein

  5. #25
    Simpleton Alan's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by CathyA View Post
    ....Even though it sounds like it was a big problem with illegals, wasn't this just companies trying to work around people not having cars, but still being able to buy food.....and the companies still making money?

    How would you others (Alan, IL, Bae) have handled this problem? Give me some alternatives.
    I think the problem handled itself as a reaction to abuse. My only commentary on the subject stems from the assertion that it was "legal" to convert someone else's property for personal use right up until the time it was suddenly "illegal". From a sociological perspective, I'm fascinated by the apparent belief that it was ever "legal" to do so.

    If a business want's to extend the use of its property to its customers, who am I to object? I would suspect that they found they could no longer extend the courtesy once it started being abused by non-customers who somehow assumed that it was "legal" to convert that property to personal use, and it became necessary to enforce the universal law against conversion of private property. I find the justification of the abuse to be interesting.

    I'm also intrigued by the continuing assertions that "illegal immigrants" or "the homeless" had much to do with the problem as opposed to the idea that these businesses were attempting to respond to the needs of a poor neighborhood, regardless of the label some may place on the residents.
    "Things should be made as simple as possible, but not one bit simpler." ~ Albert Einstein

  6. #26
    Low Tech grunt iris lily's Avatar
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    This discussion reminds me of the saga of increased theft and vandalism in my iris 'n lily garden that sits on a big corner lot in a near-ghetto neighborhood.

    Each year, a plant or two is stolen from my huge garden. Someone digs them up and takes them away. I accept that this will happen here, I consider this the "cost of doing business" for getting this lot free from the city. Most amusing, the theft this year was an iris that I love BUT have entirely too much of and the thing had to be thinned anyway. Last year someone stole a lily that I truly disliked, and I say Good Riddance to it.

    So this low level thieving goes on and it's something I accepted, not a big deal. But last year, a new family with lots of small children allowed their children to play in my lot. The kids mowed down hundreds of plants. They were hugely destructive. Neighbors thought we should call the cops about this. I was sort of on the fence about bringing in authorities because I knew that this troublesome family would move on by next spring, that's the MO of families like this. But after seeing another section of iris ruined for the year, I did call a city bureaucrat who suggested that we first put up "No Trespassing" signs before taking further action. So we did.

    And a year later (long after the errant family got kicked out of their apartment) those ugly, unfriendly signs stand in my garden. DH doesn't want to take them down now because he is a law and order type of guy. I'm hoping that they will soon rot.

    My point is that a little theft now and then is accepted, but I never encouraged it. When destruction became rife, I had to take a hard line of "no more."

  7. #27
    Senior Member gimmethesimplelife's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by iris lily View Post
    You know that's not what's in question.

    I would like to see evidence that store management did not mind, and even encouraged removal of grocery carts from their property to be completely on board with this idea.

    But I do also agree with sweetana that there is likely a cultural issue here. I lived in New Mexico. The "manana" culture influenced the "gringo" culture, that's for sure. I can see liking a more "relaxed" approach to some things.
    I'm starting to see New Mexico as a bump up actually.....part of it due to the slower life available there, and part of it due to their expansion of Medicaid - a really big deal in a state with such high poverty rates - and also due to same sex marriage now being legal there. For many years I had considered New Mexico hopelessly backwards but no more.....You do get things in return for what you give up by living there.

    And something else about it - it's like the mentality in Tucson - you don't go there to make money. Those who do find themselves leaving fast as that is not what it is about for most people there. It's a very different mentality for many Americans to grasp but to me it makes more and more sense as the standard of living plunges and opportunities leaves us. It seems like very current and up to minute thinking to me these days. Rob

  8. #28
    Senior Member gimmethesimplelife's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by CathyA View Post
    It's not like the taxpayers were paying for the round-up vehicle. And if they did have to raise food prices to cover those expenses, then that was their choice.......and it came back on the people buying the food and using the carts. If people didn't like it, then they could complain to the management or shop somewhere else. And isn't this the free enterprise that some of you guys are insisting is the best way to go? I think the objection to this was really some older issues that irritated some folks.
    I'm really surprised it was handled fairly rudely.
    If it became illegal, it was no doubt because some people were keeping the carts. Just like alot of other things..........something that might be working really well turns sour because some people don't play by the "rules".
    Cathy, Thank You for seeing that this was handled rudely. No big deal really but I have to say I am a bit surprised, I really am. Rob

  9. #29
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    I would like to see evidence that store management did not mind, and even encouraged removal of grocery carts from their property to be completely on board with this idea.
    Isn't lack of enforcement by ITSELF the evidence? Just like the grocery store was hiring someone to collect the carts, the grocery store could have instead puts locks on carts, hire security to monitor carts etc. (look near everyone has private security these days), done video monitoring of carts etc.. Did they even put up a sign (in spanish): "Please don't take carts" But all that cost more than hiring someone to round them up? I have no idea, but if so isn't that a business decision then? And maybe strict enforcement loses them too many paying (for the food, not the carts) customers and the carts are mostly not actually being stolen for good (or people could hide them in their dwellings and not leave them lying around to be collected again) but borrowed and it was a better idea to collect them? Again a business decision. But the cops should spend their time chasing down cart theives (the pettiest of priorities as even car thefts are seldom pursued). Um yea sure because the main role of cops is to subsidize business. Ok sometimes it is but it shouldn't be.
    Trees don't grow on money

  10. #30
    Simpleton Alan's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by gimmethesimplelife View Post
    Cathy, Thank You for seeing that this was handled rudely. No big deal really but I have to say I am a bit surprised, I really am. Rob
    Rob, I'm sorry you take this line of discussion as being rude, as it was not intended that way. I take it more as an attempt to understand how the misappropriation of private property was ever considered legal, as I'm not aware of any tenant of law allowing people to convert someone else's property for private use.

    My comment about the entitlement mentality had more to do with the idea that private property could be treated as communal, with a nod to an increasingly popular ideology that no one could really own anything because "you didn't build that", which some in the far left espouse, including a high profile freshman Senator from MA and our sitting President. I think the eventual enforcement of the rights to private ownership that you referred to as "becoming illegal" is the natural response to that ideology in practice.

    As I noted earlier, I find the entire discussion fascinating. I'm sorry you feel picked on.
    "Things should be made as simple as possible, but not one bit simpler." ~ Albert Einstein

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