When we are growing up, we think that most adults are actually quite mature and reasonable. And then you start working in an office and realize that thirty-year-olds can be just as ridiculous as random teens. Unfortunately, this means that many workers need to start taking more extreme measures to protect one’s space, peace and even snacks.
A woman shared how she dealt with some office thieves who would not stop stealing the snacks she brought to work. We reached out to the employee in the post via private message and will update the article when she gets back to us.
Office-thieves are a strange, but unfortunately common problem for some people
Image credits: osseous / flickr (not the actual photo)
A woman started locking up her snacks, much to the chagrin of folks who wanted to steal them
Image credits: bialasiewicz / envatoelements (not the actual photo)
Image credits: throwaway58393849
Many of us have gotten too complacent and conflict-averse
There are a great many good things about modern humans, but the truth is that quite often, we are also very, very conflict averse. The result is that in a professional setting, like an office, when one has clearly been robbed, the first instinct isn’t to go on the warpath but just chalk it up to “one of those things that just happens.” A snack can be a pretty important part of just getting through the day, finding it stolen is a surefire way to have your entire mood destroyed.
It’s important to point out that this absolutely isn’t just “one of those things that just happens.” If you saw your friend regularly stealing from a store, your thoughts might waver between “they must have a good reason for this” and “wow, I need to find more friends.” However, stealing in an office is arguably worse. Imagine showing up to a new job and being told “yeah, some of the folks here are thieves.” Most would walk out on the spot. Taking from a company is one thing, but in an office setting, you are very literally taking from your coworkers who spent their own time and money cooking or purchasing food.
These anti-social employees get away with it because the vast majority of people don’t feel comfortable enacting a Medieval village-scene, seeing a pickpocket, pointing and shouting “stop, thief!” Even in this story, we see how the thieves (and liars, if we are counting sins) are so offended when someone “dares” call them out. This is not “fun” to do in an office, but it at least has a chance to get results.
As we see, these folks regularly would just make up lies to justify actions to the woman’s coworker, which does suggest they do know what they were doing was wrong. As humans, we still do care about our self-perception, so people will do their best to “cover” the fact that they are literally stealing.
Beating office thieves is easier said than done
In other words, despite asking the internet if she was wrong to do this, there is basically no question, locking up your snacks is absolutely a normal thing to do in the face of theft. Even more shocking is that some of the thieves tried to play dumb and asked “why are these things locked up” as if there wasn’t a very clear answer.
Perhaps they thought that they were the only ones taking and they stole in such small amounts (in their heads) that no one would notice. Setting aside that this doesn’t make sense, once you add a few more thieves to the mix, it’s pretty easy to see just how visible the banditry had become.
Similarly, just because a person has shared in the past doesn’t mean that one is now entitled to their things for the rest of time. Taking someone’s stuff when they aren’t around and haven’t told you it’s ok is just theft, plain and simple. After all, what if this was an after work snack? What if she brought in a birthday cake for a later event and they just took it? This is not how life works.
So this leads to the question, what should one do? Locking the snacks or food items up is a great solution, but let’s face it, many brought-in lunches need to be refrigerated. Not something one can just “protect” as easily. One can always go to HR, which might help, but this means the literal thief is still lurking around. Going out for lunch is another option, but it’s the absolute opposite of frugal.
There are, for example, products online that can make one’s lunch look less appealing, but this means more costs and, at the end of the day, won’t really trick anyone, because who brings a moldy sandwich into work? At the end of the day, the one thing that helped this woman is also the key for everyone else. Some normal humans stepping up against theft and calling people out for being terrible.
Most folks immediately sided with the woman
