The first encounter with the causal thievery that occurs in the city was with the house helper of a neighbor. With a bevy of plants growing outside the house, including green onions, lemons, calamansi, malunggay, among others, there have been plenty of neighbors who have asked if they could have some. With the simple request, it is almost always an affirmative, there’s sometimes too much for the household to consume, so it’s no problem giving it away to people kind enough to ask.
One occasion, however, happened to see out the window the house helper from the neighbors across the street was picking at the malunggay plant and grabbed a large bunch of branches. Getting outside, she was already across the street and chatting with the other house helper – perhaps bragging about the “free malunggay” she just acquired. Later in the week, spotted her working outside their home and pointed her out as the thief from the other day. Today, the tree is high enough that the lower branches are cut regularly and the leaves are retrieved at the top form the balcony – out of reach of the thief.
Another neighbor from across the street has reported other people trying to steal while away from the home – thankfully, he has been able to confront some of them when caught in the act.
Later, another instance arose when a child was spotted, probably around her early teens, picking a lemon from the yard. Rushed to the front door as she tried to run away, towards her waiting father who was a few feet down the street. Confronted her and asked why she would take something that did not belong to her and her response was, “There was nobody around.” Apparently, she takes after the cliché, “If a tree falls in the forest and nobody is around to hear it, did it make a sound?” Accompanied by her father, can only assume the attitude is something learned within her household because he did not seem too concerned about her actions.
Most recently, while parked behind an idling sugar trucks outside a Roman Catholic church in Barangay Bata for Sunday mass, watched as a boy ran up and stole sugarcane from the truck. He proceeded to cross back across the street where his father, a bibingka seller, was waiting – it would seem he was encouraged by his father.
Is it local culture that suggests stealing is fine? These individuals were not of similar socio-economic status and were of varied ages; it would seem it is a wide-ranging belief that taking what does not belong to them is not a problem. It’s, again, a strange circumstance for a culture that claims to be so God-fearing – “Thou shalt not steal,” but, as revealed by the young teen, it’s OK as long as nobody is around.
According to Princeton professor Sheila Kohler, she wrote in a 2014 issue of Psychology Today, “Socrates says that no one knowingly commits an evil action, evil is turned into good in the mind.”
“The thief, like the pedophile, who convinces himself the child really wants to make love to him, convinces himself that he has a right to the object he desires,” she explained. “He needs it more than the other does; it is rightfully his.”
This entitlement attitude is something that has sprung up before when discussing the local psyche, in the way that many people refuse to wait in line and force themselves to the front before others or the multitude of locals walk around as if they were enclosed in some bubble, where consideration for others is completely abandoned. They see themselves as superior to others, in a way, and believe they deserve everything they desire, even if it is a burden or inconvenience for others.
According to the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, they looked at the problems that arise with casual stealing – particularly among the youth. They note, stealing is a “major concern,” as in one that requires psychological help, when there is “an older child that steals and does not feel bad about it” or when it is “a child who constantly steals.” The teen who stole the lemon did not feel any remorse until she was confronted and, given the kid stealing the sugarcane was being encouraged by his father, there is no telling how many times he has committed the act before.
David DiSalvo wrote a piece for Forbes in 2013 where he discussed the factors that make people steal, where he explicitly points out, “It’s not necessarily about being poor or not having enough food or money.”
He cites New York University assistant professor Adam Alter, who discussed ‘transient ‘new’ moral standards,’ where just the feeling of financial deprivation can trigger a change of morals in individuals.
“It’s this human proneness to shifting moral standards that makes deciphering the motivations of questionable behavior less than crystal clear,” the article read. “Our justifying brains are busy working out a skewed calculus to rationalize our behavior even if we’re not consciously thinking it through.”
The article also pointed to a study by the Association for Psychological Science (APS), which looked at the link between happiness and stealing. Which harkens back to Presidential Spokesperson Ernesto Abella touting the recent SWS poll that found over 90 percent of Filipinos considered themselves “happy.”
According to Cornell University researcher Lynne Vincent, “Happiness may actually lead people to steal, particularly because happy people have an easier time justifying their own immoral behavior.”
Every person has the right to their property and stealing should never be tolerated – no matter how minor. What more civilized individuals have done is simply ask if they can have or borrow something, rather than steal and more times than not the transaction was amicable. There is a strain in the local culture that compels people to take thing that do not belong to them and, given some of the behavior is encouraged by parents, it’s a problem that has the potential of growing./WDJ