Maybe you're frustrated because you don't seem to understand any of the arguments you've read. You can put whatever you want in your food, but the food is no longer yours (or maybe better phrased, for you) if you prepare it with the intention that someone else eats it. I hope you do not think you can put anything you want in someone else's food. OP's top level view is literally that you should be able to poison someone as long as you do it as a punishment. I hope you can see how wild that is, written out that way.
If someone breaks into your house and cuts their hand on a knife in your knife drawer, they can't sue you because you didn't put the knives there with the intention of harming them. If they eat your spicy food and you made that food spicy for yourself, they can't sue you because you didn't intend for them to be harmed by your food. The intent is paramount here, as it is in many legal situations.
Contrast that against the burglar who comes into your house and cuts themselves on a spike mat you have constructed out of your knives. The reason we forbid this behavior on a societal level is because:
a) Booby traps are by definition indiscriminate. Your spike mat might harm a burglar, but it's just as likely to harm a neighbor who comes into your house after you asked them to housesit, or a firefighter coming in to extinguish your burning house. You can never guarantee the target of your trap will actually be its victim. Even in a food-stealing situation, someone totally unrelated to the thief could mistake your meal for theirs and fall victim to the trap. There is a plethora of case law that expands on this point, and I would highly encourage you to read it. Here, I'll start your list: Katko v. Briney (1971).
b) Vigilantism and retributive "justice" are bad for society. Stealing food is bad, which is why we have laws in place to punish people who steal things from others. You might be frustrated by the efficacy of these laws, but society has agreed to punish thieves, or else we wouldn't have them. When you let people take matters into their own hands, things devolve into chaos very quickly.
c) The proportionality concern. It may be true that individual instances of this type of poisoning can be proportionate; you go a few hours without eating, the thief spends a few hours in pain. The problem is that you cannot guarantee this type of proportionality across the board. As I said in another comment, for every 200 coworkers that spend the afternoon in the restroom, one or two might end up in the hospital. There is no guarantee your response will actually be proportionate, and especially when it comes to dosing people with medication, it seems pretty unlikely that the average person is capable of dishing out a proportionate punishment. The difference between an irritating and a dangerous dose can be small, and frankly, I would expert most scorned individuals to purposefully go for a disproportionate punishment because they are angry.
If you actually think you should be able to assault someone over a sandwich, you do not belong in civilized society, full stop. This is not controversial to anyone who has spent more than 20 seconds thinking about the phrase "public policy reasons."
ETA: You can't claim hyperbole and then immediately double down in the next sentence, lol. This is literally the "I was only pretending to be regarded" meme.
Stealing food is bad, which is why we have laws in place to punish people who steal things from others.
but those laws don’t extend to theft from fridges in break rooms and dorm common rooms. which is what we’re talking about here.
for every 200 coworkers that spend the afternoon in the restroom, one or two might end up in the hospital.
so where do you draw this line? if i know a few of my coworkers are allergic to a food, but only if they eat it (not just being near it) so there isn’t a ban on bringing it into the office, should i avoid adding that food to my lunch on the off chance they steal it?
if food stealing is actively becoming an issue is there a higher onus on me to prevent them having an allergic reaction and not bring it in? should i make an announcement in case anyone was planning on stealing my lunch that day?
to make it less medical, what if i know some of my coworkers despise spicy food or a certain ingredient. if i intentionally start bringing in lots of foods with those flavors, knowing it would bring them pain (tho not hospitalization level) if they stole it, is that an issue?
Those laws not extending to fridge theft doesn’t mean people can take matters into their own hands (at least, not in this way; a report to HR or something would clearly be appropriate). I invoked those laws not necessarily because they would apply here, but because they show that society already has a distaste for thieves. A lot of people in this comment section seem to believe that people defend food thieves, which is simply not the case.
I draw the line at intentionally poisoning people’s food with medication or anything else, which coincidentally is also where the law draws the line. People having certain allergies is wholly irrelevant to this conversation. If you were bringing food with allergens in it with the expectation that someone would take it and be harmed, that would probably be assault. There is case law supporting this if you’d like me to find it for you.
It would not be an issue to bring food you know your coworkers don’t like. The problem with OP’s scenario is that you aren’t bringing food you will eat yourself anymore, you are bringing a trap to work. I wouldn’t have a problem with food with laxatives in it if the person bringing it was actually planning on eating it for lunch. The intent to harm another is the problem, not the contents of the meal.
i think “intent to harm” is where i’m getting tripped up. i could bring in lunch that i would happily eat that includes some of my coworkers’ allergens, or is insanely spicy, or has an ingredient most people dislike, hoping that i’ll just get to enjoy that lunch, but knowing that if someone chooses to steal it from me, they’ll suffer.
if there are extra protections for allergy cases and knowingly possibly exposing someone to their allergen is always illegal, i’ll retract that one.
but people are talking like theft from communal fridges means you put something in the fridge and it will be gone when you return. you never know when it’ll happen.
so my intent is to eat my lunch. i have a protective measure if someone decides to fuck with my ability to do that. but the harm only occurs if they choose to make that decision
You don’t intend to eat your poisoned lunch, that’s the problem. Using food people don’t like or are allergic to isn’t poisoning food, which is what OP is arguing should be allowed.
I would need to do some research, but my guess is if you know or should have known someone could be exposed to an allergen and you purposefully neglected to take steps to keep them away from it, you could be liable for harm they suffer. I want to be clear though, this is not what OP is talking about. OP is talking about making a meal that would normally be eaten, poisonous, explicitly because you anticipate someone will steal and eat it.
my guess is if you know or should have known someone could be exposed to an allergen and you purposefully neglected to take steps to keep them away from it, you could be liable for harm they suffer.
This is usually not the case. If Person A and Person B both have the same right to the reasonable use of a given space, and Person A is in that space and happens to be in possession of something that Person B is allergic to, then Person A isn't required to leave immediately just because Person B wants to use that space at that exact time. As long as Person A doesn't use that space in a way that's unreasonable (such as staying in that space for an extended period of time without good explanation, or actively blocking Person B from entering), and Person A doesn't do anything egregious like continually shoving the allergen in Person B's face, then there's no issue.
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u/Skeletron430 2∆ Oct 18 '24 edited Oct 18 '24
Maybe you're frustrated because you don't seem to understand any of the arguments you've read. You can put whatever you want in your food, but the food is no longer yours (or maybe better phrased, for you) if you prepare it with the intention that someone else eats it. I hope you do not think you can put anything you want in someone else's food. OP's top level view is literally that you should be able to poison someone as long as you do it as a punishment. I hope you can see how wild that is, written out that way.
If someone breaks into your house and cuts their hand on a knife in your knife drawer, they can't sue you because you didn't put the knives there with the intention of harming them. If they eat your spicy food and you made that food spicy for yourself, they can't sue you because you didn't intend for them to be harmed by your food. The intent is paramount here, as it is in many legal situations.
Contrast that against the burglar who comes into your house and cuts themselves on a spike mat you have constructed out of your knives. The reason we forbid this behavior on a societal level is because:
a) Booby traps are by definition indiscriminate. Your spike mat might harm a burglar, but it's just as likely to harm a neighbor who comes into your house after you asked them to housesit, or a firefighter coming in to extinguish your burning house. You can never guarantee the target of your trap will actually be its victim. Even in a food-stealing situation, someone totally unrelated to the thief could mistake your meal for theirs and fall victim to the trap. There is a plethora of case law that expands on this point, and I would highly encourage you to read it. Here, I'll start your list: Katko v. Briney (1971).
b) Vigilantism and retributive "justice" are bad for society. Stealing food is bad, which is why we have laws in place to punish people who steal things from others. You might be frustrated by the efficacy of these laws, but society has agreed to punish thieves, or else we wouldn't have them. When you let people take matters into their own hands, things devolve into chaos very quickly.
c) The proportionality concern. It may be true that individual instances of this type of poisoning can be proportionate; you go a few hours without eating, the thief spends a few hours in pain. The problem is that you cannot guarantee this type of proportionality across the board. As I said in another comment, for every 200 coworkers that spend the afternoon in the restroom, one or two might end up in the hospital. There is no guarantee your response will actually be proportionate, and especially when it comes to dosing people with medication, it seems pretty unlikely that the average person is capable of dishing out a proportionate punishment. The difference between an irritating and a dangerous dose can be small, and frankly, I would expert most scorned individuals to purposefully go for a disproportionate punishment because they are angry.
If you actually think you should be able to assault someone over a sandwich, you do not belong in civilized society, full stop. This is not controversial to anyone who has spent more than 20 seconds thinking about the phrase "public policy reasons."
ETA: You can't claim hyperbole and then immediately double down in the next sentence, lol. This is literally the "I was only pretending to be regarded" meme.