Thursday, September 01, 2011

Dude, that's so uncool.

Stealing from the Salvation Army? Really?

You know, these are the people you need to watch out for if the Civilization Light is ever turned off, no matter how briefly, due to turbulence. These are the footsoldiers of the Free S#!t Army; the future members of the Golden Horde; proto Mutant Zombie Bikers.

If they will drive up (in a newish Cadillac, in one case!) and loot the donation trailer for the Salvation Army in broad daylight on a sunny summer Sunday afternoon, imagine what they will do with a foot of water in the streets and the cops on the other side of town? Or after dark with a couple of city blocks aflame?

When someone has no sense of ethics other than "You Owe Me My Fair Share", the only thing keeping them in line is the fear of getting caught, because there is obviously no internal compunction keeping them in check, nor will they face any community opprobrium for their actions.

26 comments:

Joanna said...

I'm reminded of Sally Brown's letter to Santa. "To make things easier on yourself, just send money. How about tens and twenties?"

cj said...

I used to live in a spot in California where a Goodwill and Salvation Army had manned drops right near each other. They specifically had signs telling people not to drop things off after hours (which people did anyway), and the majority of any after hours dropoffs were picked through much like this. I don't recall the blind grabbing everything, but they definitely took anything that was worth much.

Bubblehead Les. said...

LOTS of these Scum Bags floating around, which is why Bolt Actions and Revolvers won't be enough for the Golden Horde, because they'll be Too Damn Many of Them!

Kristophr said...

Bubblehead: with enough discipline, a small group with single-shot rifles can hold off thousands.

Rourke's Drift comes to mind.

Brandon said...

There's a Goodwill drop box in a parking lot near where I live, and I can't tell you how many times I've seen a nice, late-model car parked next to it while some asshole loads the trunk. Some people have absolutely no shame.

BGMiller said...

Kind of makes a person want to take good, hi-res pictures of the hyenas and rent space on a billboard.

Hyena of the week if you will.

BGM

Anonymous said...

"Kind of makes a person want to take good, hi-res pictures of the hyenas and rent space on a billboard.

Hyena of the week if you will.

BGM"

Or at least forward the photos on to the Goodwill/Salvation Army/etc to pass on to the police.

Anonymous said...

Local super trooper informs me most of the loot stolen from donation boxes ends up being sold at yard sales and flea markets.

Is it possible to shame a hyena?

Gerry

Lewis said...

Calling 'em that is an insult to the Golden Horde.

Odysseus said...

With discipline you get Rourke's Drift without it you get Ishandwana granted I'm not sure M-4s would have saved the Brits from that Charlie Foxtrot.

theirritablearchitect said...

"When someone has no sense of ethics other than "You Owe Me My Fair Share",

Kinda makes me think of Barry and his ilk, probably with his full blessing too.

Hah, a cheap character in a nice car, with no morals, taking shit that isn't his, so he can line his own pockets. That's Barry, alright.

BGMiller said...

Gerry,

I'm actually not all that comfortable calling them hyenas. Ol' Fisi provides a valuable service to his little bit of the world and earns his take. And if Mother Nature played a bit of a mean spirited joke with him in the design phase he still gets the last laugh.

I was leaning more toward leeches or lampreys but the imagery just didn't fit.

Either way, if shame doesn't work I'm sure escalation of tactics wouldn't be too terrible difficult.

BGM

WV: untype - key in the upper right corner of my keyboard.

hektor said...

Sometimes the fear of getting caught is the only thing preventing some of us from perforating some of them. It works both ways.

Johnnyreb™ said...

One of the eye opening lessons learned during the Katrina Debacle™ cleanup in New Orleans, is that there are human predators. This behavior was kinda inconceivable to a midwest country boy. You correctly nail what these characters would be doing during a catastrophe.

This infuriates me especially since i have a sweet spot for the Savation Army. After seeing both the Salvation Army and The Red Cross in action in K-Ville ... The Red Cross won't get another dime from me.

greg said...

That's like a guy out here in Washington I ranted about last week who embezzled over 100K from The Ronald McDonald House...families of kids with terminal illnesses. There is illegal, then there is just plain low...there needs to be a way to figure that in to prison sentences.

Henry Blowfly said...

+1, Johnnyreb. I was astonished at the speed that normal human decency degenerated into "dog eat dog" after Katrina.

I had a serious re-think about my personal End of the World survival scenario when I saw how little anyone should expect of their fellow humans. I will never forget the scenes of NOPD officers looting shops.

Art said...

community opprobrium
That's what's engraved on my Mossberg 500!

the pawnbroker said...

Meh...might as well cut out the middleman.

I avoid lugging my crap across town to the "donation station" by just putting it out the night before trash pickup. A lot of times it's decent junk that has been replaced or is no longer needed, and I and some of my neighbors in our fairly upscale neighborhood will even clean stuff up and kind of display it next to the regular trash to be sure it is seen and taken.

One might like to think that the takers are people who need and will love and use the castoffs, but that is naive; these are the same "entrepreneurs" as the ones in Tam's linked story, and it'll all be in the flea market or a yard sale the following weekend. Still, it's easier for me, because whatever the pilferers don't take the trash guys will.

And if somebody is going to make a buck off my junk, I'd rather it be the hustlers outside the doors of the Salvation Army than the ones inside. Yeah, I have a pretty low opinion of the large SA operation in my Fla county, and I could write a whole chapter about why... including stuff that might come as a shock to many. Some other time.

Hat Trick said...

We had a case here a few years ago of a couple raiding the charity drop boxes to stock their own for-profit secondhand store. I never heard what they got for a sentence.

Drang said...

BGMiller said...
Kind of makes a person want to take good, hi-res pictures of the hyenas and rent space on a billboard.
Be cheaper to post 'em to a blog...

Ausprepper said...

Please don't talk ill of my future fertilizer.

John B said...

I wonder if they all got shot mid loot, if the cops would investigate with additional zeal?

That pond scum had rights damn it!

Montie said...

I don't know if anyone else noticed, but I'm pretty the first vehicle making off with loot is a fairly new Cadillac CTS. Considering their price tag I find that a tad ironic - no?

Montie said...

Oops left out "sure" but you get the gist.

A Horse Thief said...

I always figured scum like this would be the first to get shot in a SHTF scenario.

Justthisguy said...

Stupid blogger wanted me to have images turned on for the captcha.

Owhell, what I think I meant to say, was that a few days ago I spent considerable time on my roomie's bicycle ( he's too sick to ride it) in the rain, to wait 3 hours to be vetted by some creepy Charismatics before I could spend 3 minutes picking us out a coupla bags of canned food.

We must be doin' it wrong, or something.