The Act of Stealing
According to formal definition from oxford, stealing means:
“take (another person’s property) without permission or legal right and without intending to return it.”
and
“move somewhere quietly or surreptitiously.”
and also
“a bargain”
But in reality, when we do something, it will lead to another thing and so on, this in some scenario will affect people negatively.
Taking something from someone without their permission
Imagine someone took your car key, left a message for you and drove away your car,only after a few hours later would they return your car to you, with no scratch nor dent on it. How would you feel and does it seems trivial? The authority will not entertain your report and it is not breaking any law, does it? This is a form of stealing away your ownership to your property for a limited time, imagine that you need the car to go out to get meals for you and your family. How much inconvenience it causes you.
Imagine someone has access to your mobile phone, and read most of your messages without you even knowing it, how would you feel about it? Do you feel like your privacy was not respected? Do you feel that your privacy had been invaded? Does it feels good at all? This is a form of stealing away your right to keep your messages private.
Imagine someone accuse you of something, and refuse to give you any chances to explain or defend yourself, this is a form of stealing your basic right to fairness. Do you think this is fair?
Imagine someone not telling you the truth or lying to you, this is a form of stealing someone’s right to the truth, if we were to argue that everyone has the same rights that small or non-trivial things like this are violating that right every single time you do them, sometimes people do the subconsciously while some do it intentionally, either way, it is no excuse to be made.
As you see from the example above, taking something from someone without their permission, be it legal or not within jurisdiction of law does not matter, and it does not matter even if you intend to return it later.
And to take a little more extreme example, a person killed in an accident could also be seen as a form of stealing that person’s life, and if that person is the father of your family, that it is also stealing a father, a husband, a child of someone away from their lives, and it also means to steal away the right of a person to live his/her life on earth as we do.
Inspired by The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini
