Well if one were to believe it was abandoned then taking it no longer is stealing and just becomes a little project on how to get the frame. So the whole thief/stealing thing goes out to window if you believe the owner has thrown it away. If I find something in the street here in NYC I assume it is no longer the owners and is now owned by no one. Taking it is not stealing and the only concern is the quality of the object and how to get it home. The question really is, is the frame abandoned? If someone determines that it is they suddenly are no longer having to wrestle with the moral problem of stealing.

If it is not abandoned and the question is do you deserve more than owner? Now that question does involve being a thief and stealing.

If someone wanted to abandon it intentionally for someone to take it, I doubt they would have locked it with Kryptonite. There is more to this story. The fact that we don't know the rest of the story doesn't mean it's yours for the taking.

My car has been sitting in an airport parking lot for 4 months, and I haven't abandoned it (although I may wish I had when I see the parking bill in a few weeks!).

The question is, how do you *know* it is abandoned? You don't.

I lived in Tokyo for 3 years in the early 80's and I was always shocked by the hundreds of abandoned bike in a huge pile by my station. I was going to grab one and a cop stopped me and asked what I was doing. I told him that I thought they were abandoned and I wanted to ride one to work. He said that they are abandoned but they don't belong to me. He said that they will be crushed and made into cars.... Reason enough to take one but I didn't want to go to jail.

I ended up buying a used scooter from an Aussie who was heading home and after about a year it started to crap out (after a ton of abuse) and I rolled it into a shop to see if they could fix it. The mechanic said that they throw them away because it is cheaper. I rolled it down the sidewalk, parked it, left the key in the ignition and abandoned it. About 8 months later I came out of a restaurant with some friends and we were walking down the street and there was my scooter in the exact same spot! With the key still in it! I thought it was hilarious but my friends thought it was normal. The best part was that I jump started it and drove home and used it for another year. Maybe it just needed some rest time?

It's not your bike. Yet. You are not in Japan, grab a battery powered angle grinder!

vjp

All that is required is the person who takes the frame to determine before hand in their head that it was abandoned or not. It is almost impossible to have all the facts for most decisions we make in life and it some point with the information you have you make a judgment call.

If they decide that someone meant to keep it because it's locked but take it anyway because they deserve it more or any other reason they are knowingly stealing.

If they decide without a doubt in their mind that it was abandoned based on the facts they have and they take it will be stored in their brain for the rest of their life as that time they took the free frame someone abandoned and not stole.

If someone took something they thought was abandoned and they were incorrect I would not label them a thief, just stupid.

How about this:

There has been a boat in the back my apt parking lot for 7 months (Atlanta, GA). It hasn't moved. Has flat tires on the trailer. Dusty, dirty cover on it. I know it hasn't moved because I park next to it occasionally. Guess what? The owner pulls it out and washes it this week. Now he's gone fishin'. I wonder what would have happened if I had claimed his unlocked "neglected" boat.

It's ridiculous that people think that they can actually change another's person mind in this thread. It's ethics and morality. We all have are own.

Sage this thread.

Is that how you bike theives get away with it?

BIGGEST TROLL THREAD EVER.

This ****s on craiglist
 

So Ive been looking round to buy a pista, and was checking craiglist a couple days ago when I ran into something a bit odd. Its this frame and wheel exactly, on sale for $400. Makes no sense whhatsoever haha, just seems like a scam.

http://newyork.craigslist.org/mnh/bik/1216884995.html

it sounds legitimate.

Whoever made that Craigslist ad is a funny b@stard. HAHAHA!

So I guess ******* aren't really ******* either as long as they *think* the girl wants it. And if they are wrong, well, they are just "stupid".

I UNDERSTAND NOW.

Devil's haircut has a point; **** and stealing a bike are pretty much the same thing.

Not saying **** and stealing are the same. I am saying that justifying something (anything ... theft, ****, murder, whatever) in your head doesn't make it true or even right.

Just because someone *thought* a bike was abandoned and took it, doesn't mean they cease to be a thief. Can you imagine it? "Officer, I thought that Camry was just sitting there because its driver no longer wanted it, so I figured, why not help myself?!?"

The point being made, though, is that the less serious the crime, the more moral leeway there is; the more open for interpretation.

If you see a quarter on the ground, do you feel like a thief for picking it up? It's not yours, after all. You could turn it in to the proper authorities. Maybe someone left that quarter there and was planning to come back for it. After all, why would you even want to spend a quarter you didn't earn?

If you see a $20 bill on the ground, do you feel like a thief for picking it up? It's not yours, after all. You could turn it in to the proper authorities. Maybe someone left that $20 bill there and was planning to come back for it. After all, why would you even want to spend $20 you didn't earn?

If you see a $100 bill on the ground, do you feel like a thief for picking it up? It's not yours, after all. You could turn it in to the proper authorities. Maybe someone left that $100 bill there and was planning to come back for it. After all, why would you even want to spend $100 you didn't earn?

If you see a wallet filled with credit cards and ID's on the ground, do you feel like a thief for picking it up? It's not yours, after all. You could turn it in to the proper authorities. Maybe someone left that wallet there and was planning to come back for it. After all, why would you even want to go on a shopping spree with credit cards you didn't earn?

If you see an abandoned bike frame on the ground, do you feel like a thief for picking it up? It's not yours, after all. You could turn it in to the proper authorities. Maybe someone left that bike frame there and was planning to come back for it. After all, why would you even want to ride a bike you didn't earn?




I'm guessing most of us would start to feel guilty somewhere between the $100 and the wallet filled with credit cards. Some people might feel bad about the $20. I don't think the quarter is gonna weigh on anyone's conscience.

You can't say stealing is wrong on principle if you're willing to accept picking up that quarter, or that $20, or that $100. You can say the individuals moral gradient is off, and that that a bike frame should be well above their threshold, but that's about it.

So wrongness is dependent on the severity of the crime? This is (obviously) a grey area. This is wholly dependent on the individual at what point they feel what they are doing is wrong. Certainly mentally ill serial killers don't feel remorse or guilt over their actions. I can accept this argument, but it means you also have to consider the amount of certainty you have over your actions. That is, say you find a quarter lying on a well-trafficked public sidewalk. Given the circumstances, you can be *relatively* certain it is lost and will never be recovered. The circumstances in question aren't as clear. The Pista (a relatively expensive bike) was locked (with a secure u-lock). Knowing this, it seems reasonable to conclude the owner did not want it taken. That something hadn't been touched by its owner for a while alone isn't really good supporting evidence that the bike was no longer wanted. I've seen cars parked in my office's parking garage for months at a time, but I don't assume they are mine for the taking or that the owners no longer want them. Anyhow, obviously situations are grey, but as such it's really impossible to give a definitive answer.

I will, however, say that I think it's very bad judgement to angle grind a locked bike free so you can take it and give it to your girlfriend.

this thread is still going?!

Nope, no one has posted in this thread for nearly a week.

How you FEEL about it has no bearing on whether it is stealing or not. THERE IS AN ESTABLISHED PROCESS FOR CLAIMING ITEMS THAT ARE LOST/ABANDONED.

Yes, there is.
- You turn said item over to the police.
- Wait a pre-defined amount of time (like 30 or 60 days) to see if anyone will claim the missing item.
- If they don't, it's legally yours.


Abandoned bikes are gathered by police ALL THE TIME. They are then auctioned in the police auctions.

You can twist this stuff anyway you want.

If I joke with you, and you are extremely offended you may think I was making a verbal attack on you think I was an ******* from your perspective. From my perspective I was just joking around with you.

What are the facts? Am I an ******* verbally attacking you with jokes? Or are you just easily offended and can't take a joke?

My point is I personally believe the intent of ones actions do matter.

In the extreme case of a ****, I guess you could say if it was a mentally disturbed person who was mentally handy capped and lacked the ability to do much reasoning, I would think of them differently than someone who KNEW they were doing something wrong. Know what I mean? But stuff like this DOES actually happen all the time. Another scenario could be a guy and a girl who were drinking and or doing drugs, they have sex and the guy thinks shes into it because they are both so wasted, but can't remember much the next mourning. She wakes up the next day in bed and thinks, hey I think this guy ***** me I don't think I would have let him sleep with me? And the guy is like, well I thought you were into it? It can be difficult to say who is right without being there watching with a clear head and having 100% of the facts. That would be a pretty different situation than stalking someone and grabbing them with a knife and telling them to get naked, right?

Not twisting what you said, nor am I offended.

Just saying, being convinced you are in the right doesn't make it so.

Someone else being convinced it is wrong doesn't make so either.

Seeing as how it seems to be a gray area I am willing to let the person taking the frame determine if they are playing the role of thief or not since the owner does not seem to be around.

When they locked I am sure they wanted to keep it.

As much time has past and many parts have been taken off the bike and it has still been neglected by the original owner and time still continues to pass with no sign of care from the original owner it becomes less clear if the owner has just abandoned the bike or not. I can see how someone could easily to the conclusion its abandoned OR still owned by the original owner depending on your perspective.

So I take it you've never picked up a quarter off the street? Or read a newspaper someone else left on the subway?

We all know there are laws and regulations in place for these kinds of things, and those laws apply just as much to a quarter on the street or newspaper on the subway.

What is in dispute is the objective value at which it ceases to be ethical to skip these rules and regulations.

For me, I think the "finders keepers" ethic is perfectly reasonable up to the $100 bill, but for the wallet and bike frame official channels are the way to go. The OP seems to think the "finders keepers" ethic includes a bike frame, but he'd probably stop short of claiming a 'seemingly abandoned' BMW. Maybe you and Devilshaircut turn in every wayward penny to the police for auctioning.

This thread is about the ethics of claiming abandoned goods, not the letter-of-the-law regulations which ostensibly govern them.

I would consider having to cut a lock off something to take it a moral line in the sand for me.

Obviously YMMV.