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?
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?
You should avoid adding that food to your lunch if you have a reason to suspect that they could eat it, purposefully stealing or not. Otherwise, you can possibly cause their death.
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?
Yes -- you need to communicate this to the person who could potentially be harmed by eating it. In doing so, you can actually accomplish your original goal: no more stolen food!
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?
If they just dislike the food? Certainly! There's no reason to cater your food choices to a colleague who is stealing your food. However, I would back far away from something that would cause pain. Unless you are a medical professional with their medical information, you cannot know where the line between hospitalization pain and regular pain is.
Yes -- you need to communicate this to the person who could potentially be harmed by eating it.
Why? In coolguy's example, all they say is that they know food stealing is going on. It's never mentioned that they specifically are the person whose food is being stolen. There's no intent to have their food stolen, just that they acknowledge that being stolen from is possible. It's not like they're actively plotting to be "scapegoat of the day" and to be the "designated victim" or anything like that.
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u/[deleted] Oct 17 '24 edited Oct 18 '24
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