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> I don't think there's a difference between ~10,000 residents independently complaining about theft, and Facebook (who hires ~10,000 Menlo Park residents) mere

> I don't think there's a difference between ~10,000 residents independently complaining about theft, and Facebook (who hires ~10,000 Menlo Park residents) merely collating them. With respect - if you don’t see a difference between stealing an individual citizen’s bike and stealing one from a fleet owned by a company worth half a trillion dollars, perhaps you should be the one working on critical thinking skills instead of lecturing others.

ngold 7y ago
If they like their bikes, secure them.
jeromic 7y ago
Legally, I see no difference. It's a matter of equality under the law. Everyone, including corporations, has the same property rights as everyone else, all theft is illegal. This is beneficial for decreasing instability and corruption in a society. I would guess your underlying contention is the wealth disparity, but that is a different issue with better solutions than weakening property rights for rich people or corporations. And prefacing your comment with 'with respect' does not excuse accusing those who disagree with you of having inadequate 'critical thinking skills'.
- fzeroracer 7y ago
  Legally doesn't mean anything in this scenario. What you should be doing is looking at how the police execute these things in practice. Which is that typically the police don't give a single shit about stolen bikes or anything like that unless you're rich or, apparently, Facebook. The poor already have weaker property rights than the rich, because if they were to report their bikes as being stolen the police would scoff at them and continue doing jack shit. Or worse, if you're a minority. And generally speaking, Facebook encouraging confrontations with the police which are historically very dangerous for minorities even if they've done absolutely nothing wrong is probably a bad idea.
  - ccvannorman 7y ago
    This ^ ^ It's important to understand that yes, legal pedants are correct in "theft is theft", except that the police asymmetrically enforce it against the poor, no matter which side of the theft the poor is on.
    - knzhou 7y ago
      Elsewhere on this thread I'm being told by the asme poster than we need more policing of theft -- apparently, having less policing of theft in poor communities is the problem, because that means the rich get better police service. This is the thing I can never understand in these debates: I never have the slightest clue whether the people I'm talking with want more policing or less. It seems to switch every few minutes.
  - LurkersWillLurk 7y ago
    While I agree with the general premise that the police pay more attention to property crime affecting businesses rather than people, most people that own bikes don't 1) paint them in very identifiable colors, and 2) have GPS trackers built into them to aid recovery. It's substantially easier for the police to find Facebook's bikes than a regular, unmarked bike; conversely, it's exceedingly difficult to recover a bike that has no tracking or special identifying features.
  - knzhou 7y ago
    > Which is that typically the police don't give a single shit about stolen bikes or anything like that unless you're rich or, apparently, Facebook. The poor already have weaker property rights than the rich, because if they were to report their bikes as being stolen the police would scoff at them and continue doing jack shit. Or worse, if you're a minority. This is just totally wrong. Police have scoffed at all property theft I've ever reported to them, and it wasn't due to malice, it was because doing anything about it was basically impossible. I suppose I could have demanded they spend 10 hours a week scanning Craigslist for my stuff, but that is a waste of time for them. The same applies to everybody I know who has had stuff stolen. Facebook's bikes are different because they very obviously belong to Facebook and are clearly, visibly being used. It's like cattle branding, it makes it much easier to recover property.
knzhou 7y ago
I prefer to focus on the concrete actions that individuals do. In this news story, Facebook is not exerting any influence beyond what 10,000 residents of Menlo Park would have (in fact, probably far less), so there is no need to bring in extra narrative structure. I mean, I can play this game too. When I have my bike stolen, I report it to the police and just have to buy another one. But when a few overworked HR people have their 10th bike stolen of the week, they report it to the police and in turn get smeared in hit pieces without any opportunity to defend themselves, by an media industry worth $1 trillion. Why is the little guy getting crushed by these corporate behemoths? The point is, if you play with narrative like this, the little guy can be whoever you want it to be. That's why narratives are fundamentally dishonest.

ngold 7y ago

If they like their bikes, secure them.

jeromic 7y ago

Legally, I see no difference. It's a matter of equality under the law. Everyone, including corporations, has the same property rights as everyone else, all theft is illegal. This is beneficial for decreasing instability and corruption in a society. I would guess your underlying contention is the wealth disparity, but that is a different issue with better solutions than weakening property rights for rich people or corporations. And prefacing your comment with 'with respect' does not excuse accusing those who disagree with you of having inadequate 'critical thinking skills'.

fzeroracer 7y ago
Legally doesn't mean anything in this scenario. What you should be doing is looking at how the police execute these things in practice. Which is that typically the police don't give a single shit about stolen bikes or anything like that unless you're rich or, apparently, Facebook. The poor already have weaker property rights than the rich, because if they were to report their bikes as being stolen the police would scoff at them and continue doing jack shit. Or worse, if you're a minority. And generally speaking, Facebook encouraging confrontations with the police which are historically very dangerous for minorities even if they've done absolutely nothing wrong is probably a bad idea.
- ccvannorman 7y ago
  This ^ ^ It's important to understand that yes, legal pedants are correct in "theft is theft", except that the police asymmetrically enforce it against the poor, no matter which side of the theft the poor is on.
  - knzhou 7y ago
    Elsewhere on this thread I'm being told by the asme poster than we need more policing of theft -- apparently, having less policing of theft in poor communities is the problem, because that means the rich get better police service. This is the thing I can never understand in these debates: I never have the slightest clue whether the people I'm talking with want more policing or less. It seems to switch every few minutes.
- LurkersWillLurk 7y ago
  While I agree with the general premise that the police pay more attention to property crime affecting businesses rather than people, most people that own bikes don't 1) paint them in very identifiable colors, and 2) have GPS trackers built into them to aid recovery. It's substantially easier for the police to find Facebook's bikes than a regular, unmarked bike; conversely, it's exceedingly difficult to recover a bike that has no tracking or special identifying features.
- knzhou 7y ago
  > Which is that typically the police don't give a single shit about stolen bikes or anything like that unless you're rich or, apparently, Facebook. The poor already have weaker property rights than the rich, because if they were to report their bikes as being stolen the police would scoff at them and continue doing jack shit. Or worse, if you're a minority. This is just totally wrong. Police have scoffed at all property theft I've ever reported to them, and it wasn't due to malice, it was because doing anything about it was basically impossible. I suppose I could have demanded they spend 10 hours a week scanning Craigslist for my stuff, but that is a waste of time for them. The same applies to everybody I know who has had stuff stolen. Facebook's bikes are different because they very obviously belong to Facebook and are clearly, visibly being used. It's like cattle branding, it makes it much easier to recover property.

knzhou 7y ago

I prefer to focus on the concrete actions that individuals do. In this news story, Facebook is not exerting any influence beyond what 10,000 residents of Menlo Park would have (in fact, probably far less), so there is no need to bring in extra narrative structure. I mean, I can play this game too. When I have my bike stolen, I report it to the police and just have to buy another one. But when a few overworked HR people have their 10th bike stolen of the week, they report it to the police and in turn get smeared in hit pieces without any opportunity to defend themselves, by an media industry worth $1 trillion. Why is the little guy getting crushed by these corporate behemoths? The point is, if you play with narrative like this, the little guy can be whoever you want it to be. That's why narratives are fundamentally dishonest.