You are well on your way to being one of my wife's clients. If it aint yours, it aint yours to ride.

Wow, now you've gone to making up ridiculous stuff out of whole cloth! Way to go 'it's human nature so take it' fella!

considering that's what you've done in your past 4-5 posts in regards to me, I'm just trying to catch up. I suppose if I kill an ant or place a mousetrap out, it's only a matter of time until I kill a person too. Way to be smug and superior over EVERYONE! Goodjob I guess when you're always right, it's hard to come down from your pedestal, eh?

I live in Tokyo of all places and I constantly see very nice and expensive things being totally abused and misused and free locked for Chr!st's sake. The cyclist in me says "Liberate those pure parts from those jack@sses, give 'em a good home." The Chicagoan in me says "F' that sell that ***** on craigslist." The sensible side of me says, "Stop and take a pic for some Jack@ss thread on the internet." OP, honestly, do what you want. In my opinion, common sense says leave it alone. But if you do perceive it to be abandoned or justify taking it. Just remember that there are consequences. Just like when we do anything wrong or right, understand that there are always consequences. Whether good or bad and if you feel that you can accept those consequences, do what you want. This isn't rocket science. Just think, if your GF comes home one night a literal bloody mess because the bike you decided to liberate was recognized by the owner and assumed that your GF was the thief and "justifiably" beat the crap out of her and called the police. Is this an acceptable consequence? It could be, especially if you guys have a nasty breakup beforehand because she was justifiably running around and several guys decided to liberate what was not being properly used

if the OP can afford a girlfriend, he can afford to buy a Pista, not steal it...

but who would want a Pista anyway?

OP is a troll.

I relate to the OP, I at any given time am monitoring the decay of several bikes nicer than my own in my neighborhood... I have seen ******bags twice looting bikes in the middle of the day for specific parts. I got the idea that they, like me had known just how long they had been sitting there to die before they came to "harvest" the parts.

Even when I was riding a much crappier bike, I could not bring myself to do it. Karma is real.

You are an idiot. Obviously the owner doesn't want his bike stolen if he locked it with a Kryptonite NY lock.

On an environmental note, if you take the frame rather than buying a new one, you are helping to reduce the amount of "trash" going to the landfill, right?

Reduce, reuse, recycle.

The owner was most likely murdered anyway.

Murder, obviously.

I'd guess the metal scrappers would pull the frame long before it would reach a landfill. At least where I live, they dig through alleyways and dumpsters for metal well before the trash trucks show up. Metal = cash.

ive picked up several frames from the scrap metal yard. but thats another complicated moral issue...

The issue being the new attitude toward salvaging crappy frames from the dumpster?

This is really still going?

It may stem from my inexperience with the 'message board' community, but it completely blows my mind that a bunch of grown adults who have never met/will never meet each other in real life can go on and on arguing with each other on the internet to the point of insulting one another over an issue that may as well not even exist.

"If you take the frame, it's morally wrong. Jesus will get angry and you'll go to hell!"
"If you don't take the frame, it will sit there and rot and the 'soul' of the bike will die an unhappy death and we wouldn't want that!"
"What about 'Karma' and all that other made up hippie stuff?"
"If there's no Easter Bunny, where did all these colored eggs come from?"


The OP should do what he wants to do instead of getting a bunch of anonymous people riled up into an overly-opinionated frenzy. Why waste your time asking a bunch of people...whose opinions you could care less about in the first place...what to do?

Take the damn thing. Or not. If you feel crappy about your decision...whatever it may be...live with it and move on.

That may be true, but the OP posted the thread, which implies that he was either seeking our opinions on it, looking for validation, or trying to argue his point. He came to us, and if he doesn't like our response then that's his problem.

Are we STILL on this topic?

No one has mentioned religion or their religious beliefs, so what are you talking about?

If you dont like this thread, then dont participate. And this is called a "discussion forum" for reason -- people talk about stuff and hear differing opinions than the ones they already hold.

In other words, GTFO.

You would be surprised how persistent people can be when they're trying to rationalize doing something immoral and illegal.

Looks like this has been going on for far to long already but thought I would put in my 2 cents. Most people here are raving against taking a stripped frame locked to the rack on moral grounds. Fair enough but I would like to point out that there are actually city ordinances in some areas that prohibit leaving a bike locked to public rack for an extended amount of time. This is common on college campuses where abandoned bikes can become a real problem. Those bikes take up space which is needed and become and eye sore once they are stripped down and rusting. So around here if you leave your bike locked some where for a long time the authorities will make a note of it and they will later take your bike impound it and then sell it or give it away. So I don't think taking an abandoned bike frame is a serious crime that anyone should get all fired up about. If the owner had any respect for their belongings they would come and take care of it properly.

Also you should not be using a hack saw since that is doing it the hard way.

Who said I didn't like anything? I was simply generalizing (and exaggerating), as the majority of you people are within this thread.

My most sincere apologies for trying to keep peace by saying it's worthless to argue and insult one another. I guess your opinions are valid here in this rather public "discussion forum", while mine are not.

I don't recall saying anything negative about you personally...why must you directly lash out at me?

So... I think we have the answer now:

Most people believe that it would be wrong to take the bike.
Some others have justifications for taking it.

The original poster will do what they want regardless of what we say here.

The discussion here seems to be over. I invite you all to the post-Post party at my house for cocktail wieners and dark beer.

Cool, then we can ride home drunk and MSPaint the carnage.!

Oh of course foodstamps I forgot...

As easy as it is to say oh well just go get foodstamps... It isn't always that easy. If a single mom with one child who lives in NY makes $15,000 a year she very well might not be eligible for food stamps because she makes above the poverty threshold. However, she probably doesn't live above the living standard. So why is the poverty line below the living wage? Because the system is ****ed and doesn't isn't designed to help out poor people. So, before you go around saying that stealing can't be justified, think about how many people fall between those two thresholds that don't allow for them to get federal aid.

Also, what's the harm in a person who can't afford to feed themselves or their family to steal from a place like say Wal-mart? I would rob wal-mart dry if I had the opportunity.

I think it shows doubt in someone's personal ethics if they have to post an internet discussion justifying theft as a moral activity.

Okay, since everyone wants to talk about ethics here. And since you are all so well educated you must know about all of the famous philosophers, John Stuart Mill, Jeremey Bentham, Peter Singer, who are all utilitarian thinkers. Now I know everyone here knows what utilitarianism is, the idea that utility is morality. So ethically speaking in those regards it would be immoral and unethical to let that bike sit there and not be utilized. Hey, some deontological thinkers would say it was his duty to take the bike.

Don't talk about "ethics" and "morals". Because my point is that they are completely abstract and relative, you can use ethics and morality to justify anything. Morality doesn't exist, it is a word used to put fear in people. And yeah, maybe I'm a nihilist.