by Justine Sharrock
11.15.04

oosting, racking, ganking and gaffling; whether we liberate, lift or fence, most of us have done it: The five-finger discount is not new, nor is it rare. Everyone has a story. Bring it up at your next work party or family reunion; shoplifting is one of the few crimes that most people will admit to having engaged in at least once. Unlike so many other crimes, shoplifting is highly accessible to most people. It doesn't require the kind of criminal connections, know-how, equipment or risk involved in, say, hacking, credit card fraud, tax evasion, vault cracking or breaking and entering. The main technique of the shoplifter is to act like a shopper—something we're all trained to do. Research shows that "shoplifting rates vary little across sex, age, ethnic background and so forth," according to Kerry Segrave, author of Shoplifting: A Social History. Rates of getting caught, of course, are another story. Stereotypes of criminality become self-perpetuating, as store security personnel target people they think are likely to be shoplifters, catching those who fit the profile while those who don't walk out with their loot undetected.

These ideas have been remarkably successful at making some thefts punishable criminal offenses, and others rites of passage or even jokes. When a poor African American man takes something from a liquor store, it's called stealing (and, if he gets caught, he will likely be arrested). When a middle-class white teenage girl takes something from Hot Topic, it's called shoplifting (and, if she gets caught, she will likely be punished by her parents). Winona Ryder's shoplifting charges led her to a lucrative advertising gig and a tongue-in-cheek Saturday Night Live appearance. Clearly, these distinctions act to protect our notions of class and criminality: Housewives are not felons; rich kids should not have permanent records.

But perhaps the simplest explanation for shoplifting's prevalence is that it's fun. It's a bit like capture the flag (the strategy of eluding of an opponent, a dash for the finish line), along with an element of hide and seek. It's also a literal and grown-up version of cops and robbers: a way of seeing what you can get away with. Scouring the aisles for blind spots, keeping an eye out for security guards and cameras, getting creative with techniques and hiding spots—anyone who has been a little kid knows the glee involved in being sneaky and mischievous. There aren't many adult avenues for that kind of fun. Many shoplifters report getting off on the rush. Leslie, a middle-aged self-described yuppie, reports, "I did it for the thrill. I like that I'm getting away with something." Valeria, a 14-year-old high-schooler, echoes the sentiment. "I came out of the store and felt like I was on a high; at that moment I realized I could steal," she says. "And that was awesome."

Americans have long been seduced by their outlaws: From Robin Hood to Bonnie and Clyde, people who live outside the law are highly romanticized. Shoplifting lets people flirt with criminality without commiting to a life on the lam. "Shoplifting is attractive because it's something you're not allowed to do, and you're doing it anyway," notes Travis, a 29-year-old bike messenger from Orange County and a frequent shoplifter. "There's a whole mystique and romance to it. You're living beyond the law." Only a handful of my interview subjects identified themselves as criminals or thieves, even after speaking with me for hours about their stealing. One lifter I interviewed explained it forthrightly: "Since I shoplifted today, today I am a shoplifter; tomorrow, I might not be." (It's worth noting that this comment speaks loudly to both the trivialization of shoplifting and how easy it is to shoplift and still hold onto a mainstream noncriminal identity.)

While excitement may be paramount for some, for others shoplifting is more straightforwardly economic. "I was a professional shoplifter for five years. I got no joy or thrill out of it. I did it solely for financial reasons, as a way to pay the bills," explains one 49-year-old who resold the items she stole from designer clothing stores. "I shoplifted everything I ate for almost two years," reports Garrigan, a 33-year-old former homeless teen. "I had no money, and I was hungry." Among those who make enough—or barely enough—to get by, shoplifting can be a way to stretch the dollar: Buy the produce and steal the vitamins; buy the t-shirt and steal the barrettes. "Money is tight—I have it, but shoplifting makes it easier," explains Bennett, who works as a janitor.

It only makes sense in our consumer-obsessed culture that people shoplift. More important than who we are or what we do is what we own, use, eat, wear and drive. "There is nothing trivial about consumption in contemporary societies.... Cultural capital can play a significant role in structuring social mobility.... [It] can help denote membership of higher-status communities and facilitate negotiation of the formal and informal boundaries to opportunity," explain several sociologists in a 1999 Urban Affairs Review article called "Cities and Consumption Places."

America's class system differs from that of other capitalist cultures in being based on consumption more than any other status symbol. An education, a prestigious lineage, a respected occupation—none of these are important if you don't own the objects to match. An underpaid high-school teacher doesn't have the same status as a BMW-driving, suit-wearing stockbroker. The mythology of the American dream argues that this focus on ownership rather than less tangible trappings of status translates into greater movement between classes: Anyone can get rich, even if she was born poor. Although we recognize the fallacy of that claim, it does lead to the fact that in the US, the way you go about accumulating wealth is less important than how much you get. "The American dream refers to a commitment to the goal of material success.... The importance of using the legitimate means is de-emphasized relative to the importance of attaining the desired cultural goals," write Richard Rosenfeld and Steven F. Messner in 1994's Crime and the American Dream: An Institutional Analysis.

While this drive to get stuff, whether legitimately or illegitimately, has a direct and obvious correlation to widespread shoplifting, the class connection can be taken a step further. More than just a means of acquisition, shoplifting allows people to immediately experience a higher class status through the very act itself. For most of us, shopping is a delicate balance of temptation, desire and gratification—we are often seduced by offerings of what we don't have, lured by the promise of having them and reminded of what we cannot afford. However, the experience of skilled shoplifters is similar to that of the very rich: You can go into a store and know that anything on its shelves can be yours; money is no object. In much the same way that credit cards allow you to feel like you have more spending power than you actually do, shoplifting gives you full range as a consumer—a very empowering experience in a culture built on the pursuit of things. "I saw all these stores and felt disappointed that I didn't have the ability to walk in and buy something useless just because I could. I think I [shoplifted] because I felt like I was in control, in control of the stores' money, in control of what I wanted and what I couldn't have. When I dropped the necklace in my bag, in those two seconds, I owned everything," explains Valeria.

This relation to consumer capitalism is what really explains why shoplifting is so common—and so easy. Shopping is America's national pastime. After 9/11, we were told to "shop for America" in order to express patriotism and pull our nation out of national disaster. Many of us spend our free time at malls. People go shopping on vacation and take dates to megastores. We are a nation of shoppers, and it is shoppers who become shoplifters. (Historically, when most shoppers were middle-class women, so were most shoplifters. As the activity of shopping began to be marketed more widely, shoplifters became more diverse.) Moreover, since those stealing from stores are also those providing the profits, store owners are by necessity reluctant to fully guard against or incriminate shoplifters for fear of alienating potential customers.

There is another, entirely different view of shoplifting, which not surprisingly has been overlooked by the mainstream press and most academics: that it can serve as a political tool. Along with squatting, dumpster diving or hopping freight, shoplifting can be a way to get by while minimizing your participation in consumer capitalism. Shoplifters who view it this way stress the fact that their stealing is not gratuitous; they steal only what they need to survive. "I steal every time I go grocery shopping," says Marina, an activist in her mid-20s. "Otherwise, I'd have to devote a lot more time to my soul-sucking money job instead of working for more important things."

Other shoplifters see their stealing as a tool of protest in and of itself. They steal from corporate chain stores and other capitalist institutions in order to disrupt the economy and protest the very ideas on which our consumer-based society is built. One shoplifter I interviewed referred to it as "a form of redistributing the wealth." This view was popularized in the 1970s by folks like Jerry Rubin and Abbie Hoffman, who called for people to shoplift as a way to free America. Items were "liberated" from stores and people were called upon to "place the dynamite that will destroy the walls...not [just] to fuck the system, but destroy it." Hoffman noted that his Steal This Book

calls on the Robin Hoods of Santa Barbara Forest to steal from the robber barons who own the castles of capitalism. It implies that the reader...understands corporate feudalism as the only robbery worthy of being called "crime," for it is committed against the people as a whole.... Our moral dictionary says no heisting from each other. To steal from a brother or sister is evil. To not steal from the institutions that are the pillars of the Pig Empire is equally immoral.

That kind of call to action is still around today. Any web search of shoplifting how-to provides a wealth of information situating shoplifting as a political tool. As J. Andrew Anderson's How to Steal Food from the Supermarket puts it, "Unless you are shoplifting from a genuine mom-and-pop operation (which I strongly discourage), you're not hurting anyone. Steal food from supermarkets and don't feel guilty about it. Those weasels have been stealing from you since you were weaned, and believe me, they aren't missing any sleep over it."

There are also many who simply hew to a code of ethics: Much like responsible shoppers (coffee drinkers who refuse to patronize Starbucks and readers who won't set foot inside a Barnes & Noble), they believe it's important to be socially responsible thieves. "I'm not going to steal from the independent businessman; that kind of defeats the purpose," explains Travis. "If I go into Safeway and once a week steal a fifth of bourbon, the only way they're going to notice is maybe over a year or something—but small business owners, they don't get all that much money, so when you steal from them, they are going to feel the brunt of it." Though they articulate it differently from those who are overtly political, these shoplifters are often motivated by a similar anticapitalist mentality. Bill, who has been shoplifting regularly since he was a kid, explains that he was indoctrinated at a young age. "My uncle was a real pro," he says. "He'd tell me that shoplifting isn't wrong. He would say that corporate America was ripping us off. Here's our chance to rip them off."

While these shoplifters don't see their stealing as an expressly political tool, the very recognition of being a socially responsible stealer situates shoplifting within the realm of political action. With the realization that multinational corporations wield more power than governments, there has been a shift in political movements. Activists like Anita Roddick and consumer-activist groups like Global Exchange seem to imply that we are more powerful as consumers than were are as citizens. They urge people to consume responsibly, boycott companies that use sweatshop labor and unsustainable production methods and become voting stockholders (of course, the latter is financially inaccessible to most people). Much like boycotts, shoplifting has a direct impact on businesses. Statistics on shoplifting's costs vary widely, but it's clear that shoplifting costs US retailers billions each year.

But is shoplifting a legitimate and effective protest against capitalism? On the "yes" side, it does create a financial drain. On the "no" side, stores just hike their prices to counter losses. Shoplifting has a minimal effect on stores—and the focus on chain stores can simply be a self-serving justification. Even some politically motivated shoplifters agree. "The trivial amounts that I could steal are not going to hurt the large corporations that much," admits Travis. However, this very same argument is made by apathetic would-be activists everywhere—my one vote can't possibly have an impact. No one hears my voice or pays attention if I attend a rally. My boycott of Taco Bell isn't going to actually change anything for tomato farmers. Yet we all know that it's the power of the numbers of individuals that make political movements.

But even if everyone were dedicated in their commitment to shoplifting from chain stores, it still wouldn't be an effective political tactic. Shoplifting has no structural impact on the stores or the institutions of capitalism. It's ineffective as protest because, to the naked eye, the shoplifter is the same as the shopper. The whole point of shoplifting is to keep the action hidden: Every aspect of the ordinary consumer experience is mimicked, minus the cash transaction. In his book Weapons of the Weak, anthropologist James C. Scott's analysis of the limitations of everyday forms of resistance—work slowdowns and minor sabotage—apply equally well to the political potential of shoplifting. "By virtue of their institutional invisibility, activities on anything less than a massive scale are, if they are noticed at all, rarely accorded any social significance," he writes. "Open insubordination in almost any context will provoke a more rapid and ferocious response than an insubordination that may be as pervasive but never ventures to contest the formal definitions of hierarchy and power."

For all public intents and purposes, shoplifters are supporters of the stores they're stealing from—they spend time in the stores, use the stores' items and place value on the stores' merchandise. Particularly with clothing chains, which depend on the visibility of their brand more than almost anything else, financial loss at one location is outweighed by the benefit of public display of their merchandise. If you see someone wearing a Gap t-shirt, she's a walking ad for the Gap whether she paid for the item or not. In contrast, boycotts, in addition to their focus on financial consequences, seek to build awareness; organizers announce their message publicly, clearly and in a targeted way. Shoplifters, on the whole, act independently, privately and without organization.

In addition to the problem of surreptitiousness, shoplifting also reinforces the primacy of consumption. Even if we obtain our goodies by illegitimate means, we're still consuming. And the significance of a commodity is even greater if someone is willing to take the risk to steal it. While some people argue that they only take necessities, even more report that they take things they wouldn't buy—useless crap, overpriced items and expensive luxuries. Winona Ryder may have stolen her Marc Jacobs sweater, but wearing it in the courtroom still added legitimacy to the power of the commodity.

The very fact that shoplifting has been normalized and trivialized as a commonplace form of delinquency speaks to the fact that it poses no significant threat to capitalism. Would something truly subversive or dangerous ever become normalized in that way?

Is it possible to envision a mode of shoplifting that could be a widely used, organized and visible political anticapitalist tool? What if I shoplifted a Gap t-shirt and wrote on it, "I stole this t-shirt from the Gap. You should steal one, too?" Activist groups like Yomango use shoplifting within their larger framework of political action in a way that does have an effect. Founded in Barcelona, Yomango, Spanish slang for "I steal," is a "marketed lifestyle" that encourages "the promoting of shoplifting as a form of disobedience and direct action against multinational corporations." Yomango's actions are highly publicized and are part of a larger movement. They combine their shoplifting with art shows, dinners serving only shoplifted food and protests outside of stores. The mass media portrays them as vandals and looters, but they maintain a platform that both educates the public and makes it clear to their targets exactly what their actions are about. Moreover, Yomango is specifically anticonsumption in addition to being proshoplifting: "Yomango is not the propagation of private property through other means. It does not propose accumulation," says one manifesto. This distinction is essential in their ability to provide a critique of consumer marketing and capitalism.

Re-code.com, currently being sued by Wal-Mart, is another example. They disseminated barcodes that could easily be attached to products in stores to change the prices charged at the register. With videos and an extensive website, Re-code.com sought not only to spark a relatively widespread stealing effort, but, more important, they vocalized their political intent.

In contexts like these, shoplifting can play a role within a greater framework of organized political protest. Without that, the five-finger discount can help individuals get by without having to give in too much—but it can't do more than that. Stealing from Wal-Mart does nothing to promote fair wages for those who stock the shelves or produce the goods on them. Stealing from Safeway does nothing to protect strawberry pickers from pesticides or keep genetically modified corn out of the cornflakes. You may have the smug knowledge that you didn't pay your part, but no matter how you dress it up, shoplifting is still a way to get what you want. You are performing a covert act that has no intelligible message.

It's not that I don't condone shoplifting. I'm all for it, actually. Go out there and take what you want. Steal from the chain stores. Rip off the corporations. Get away with whatever you can. But, hey, I'm also for vandalism, pranks and jaywalking. That doesn't mean I think they're the road to revolution. There needs to be more.

I'll admit it: I no longer shoplift. Maybe that gives validity to the argument that my days of stealing were just a teenage rebellion. Maybe I've become a complacent middle-class bo-ho organic-produce shopper because my paycheck is enough that stealing just doesn't seem worth it any more. Maybe supporting my local worker-owned collective grocery store is more useful than ripping off Safeway. Maybe I've just gotten lazy and scared of getting caught. But really, I like to think that I've found better ways to undermine capitalism.

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