Just saw a GREAT question about ethics

[True Dough]

Why is it that ethics questions are always phrased, "Is it ethical to steal bread to feed your starving family?"

Instead of: "Is it ethical to hoard bread when families are starving?"

[bottomofthehill]

1. It is an interesting question

Understanding that ethics are not laws but most think it in ethical to break the law. It is not ethical to hoard bread but it is not legal to steal bread. And like all the things, where do you draw the line. How much force are you willing to use to take what you need. Along with food you need shelter. After taking my bread, are you going to take my home. …..

[paleotn]

4. Thus, we have governments. Which are really just us banding together for the common good

The concept of demand sharing. Each of us can give something, no matter how small, so other's may survive. Letting members of the band, tribe, clan or nation starve is not good for anyone, since it weakens us collectively and one day it might be us. The basis of the modern insurance model. But really, that's as old as dirt. There's evidence for that in our Neanderthal cousins as well. The band takes care of members who can no longer provide for themselves, either for a short time or permanently.

That does bring up another ethical dilemma though, freeloading. If one can contribute to the group, but refuses, can we withdraw support? The basis of the "welfare queen." Another concept as old as dirt. Our ancestors policed that pretty effectively. In a vastly more complex society, that's more difficult. Personally, I don't care if there are a few free riders, as long as the greater number of people who need the aid get it. Republicans would starve everyone just to ensure those few freeloaders don't get what they don't deserve.

[bottomofthehill]

6. Ah the beloved Ronald Regan welfare queen

Three sets of food stamps, luxury apartment, Cadillac driving woman of the 80’s. With all that info, I always wonder why they never caught her. I am old enough to be a Humphrey believer, “The moral test of government is how that government treats those who are in the dawn of life, the children; those who are in the twilight of life, the elderly; and those who are in shadows of life, the sick, the needy, and the handicapped.”

In every society, there is a point that some can not contribute, that is what society should be there to help

[paleotn]

10. Totally agree. The sign of a civilized, functional society.

Funny thing is, no one back then ever bothered to do the math on welfare queen. Welfare and food stamps don't equal luxury apartment and Cadillac. If she did have such things, government assistance was icing on her cake. She was fully engaged economically. Maybe not by legal means, but she was fully engaged.

[CuriousCelt]

8. Justice?

When I was a kid, sitting up at the dinner table on a Sunday reading the papers, I came across an article about a poor indigent person who had been convicted by a city court and sentenced to a term in prison for stealing bread to feed her child.

Not long afterwards there were two scandals in my town, both concerning upstanding members of society.

In one case a person who was treasurer of the town's Credit Union was discovered to have embezzled the Union's funds.
In the other a local businesman was found to have been forging loan applications on behalf of his customers where they had paid in cash and pocketing the loaned money.

Neither spend a single day in prison.

So what is Justice anyway?

[OldBaldy1701E]

11. It is not the two-tiered system we have these days, I can tell you that. (n/t)

[KS Toronado]

13. Welcome to DU!

[LetMyPeopleVote]

19. Welcome to DU

[malaise]

2. And yet they have the opposite view on violence

That is all

[odins folly]

3. The best description of ethics

I have ever come across was:
Doing the right thing even when no one is looking.

[yellow dahlia]

16. Hear hear!

[thesquanderer]

5. OTOH the people who have the bread are probably not "hoarding" it.

Now, if you're using "bread" as a metaphor for needs of all sorts, the conversation can go in other directions. But ethical questions usually depend on the specifics, and this common question is specifically about bread (which for the most part I think kind of neatly side-steps the hoarding argument).

I wonder if this was a common ethical question before Les Miserables...

[Patton French]

7. Is it ethical to assume anyone who has bread is hoarding it?

[yagotme]

9. Let's not forget who gets to define "hoard", and how.

2 loaves in the pantry could be a "hoard" for a single person who occasionally has a slice of toast, but a family of six? Not so much.

[paleotn]

12. Depends on how much bread.

Do you have a couple billion loaves like Elmo? Having vastly more loaves than you could possibly eat in many lifetimes does weird things to our brains. That's well studied and the "hoarders" are a serious problem for a functioning, human society. We're seeing that play out right now.

Not surprising. We're not far at all physically from our hunter gatherer ancestors who did not evolve to live that way. Money makes us do destructive things we wouldn't ordinarily do.

[Patton French]

15. I agree 100% that hoarding can be destructive, depending on the circumstances.

But unless it’s a metaphor, the OP is talking about food and it’s difficult to hoard food at the levels you describe because it will go bad and have to be thrown away. If I have some food in my pantry that I haven’t eaten yet, I don’t believe I’m hoarding it such that its theft is justified. If bread is a metaphor for anything one needs to survive, that’s a different conversation and would depend on what and how many of them you’re talking about. For example, is owning a second home unethical?

[hunter]

20. Absolutely unethical if you support a political system that is unable to provide homes for everyone.

Any society that can't provide healthy food, clean water, and comfortable shelter to all its members is a failure.

If you are fortunate enough to own a second home and you support government housing programs with your political activism, taxes, and your vote, then good for you.

If you're an "I've got mine, all you homeless people can go to hell..." sociopath then owning a second home is clearly unethical.

[Buzz cook]

14. Well said

.https://imgflip.com/i/9fpyo2

[KentuckyWoman]

17. People get ethics and legality mixed up.

I remember when Katrina came and people in the zone were picking the Walmart shelves empty. Walmart told the local police just let them take it. Food and medical supplies went first. At some point I saw a pic of someone floating a TV out of Walmart. I'm guessing to be pawned or traded.

A flat screen is not food and theft is "unethical", but I am not going to run out front and condemn someone taking anything from a flooded Walmart that might help them survive today or next month or even next year.

Ethics gets into murky territory sometimes.

[Ping Tung]

18. An old French Socialist joke.

Socialisme (cop) is walking his beat and in an alley he sees a raggedy old man going through garbage cans looking for food. The gendarme arrests him but is seen by another guy who chides him, "How can you arrest a poor man just taking some food from a garbage can?" The Gendarme answers, "I assure you, monsieur, If I saw a rich man stealing food from a garbage can I would arrest him too."

“Socialism never took root in America because the poor see themselves not as an exploited proletariat but as temporarily embarrassed millionaires.” John Steinbeck

[odins folly]

21. Interesting concept

Consider the law that would have the cop arrest a person for taking food from a garbage can, in other words discarded, would have been created to “prevent” the homeless or destitute from surviving without a home or job.

Same law the makes it a crime to provide thirsty people water, whether it be crossing a desert or standing in a line in the heat. These laws are designed to prevent people from doing the things that make them thirsty.

Don’t leave your country of origin due to crime or death squads, suck it up or figure out a way to join the team or exploit others so you too can be in the ruling class.

Don’t stand in a long line to vote, join the “right” team and live in a better district or figure out ways to exploit others so you too can be one of the ruling class.

Steinbeck was describing every single ginger jesus follower…. You too can be a billionaire if it wasn’t for the democrats giving all YOUR money to “them”….

[Ping Tung]

22. Yep. And this. "The comfort of the rich is dependent on an ample suppy of the poor." Voltaire.