Them and us fishes, photo Suzanne Beishon

Them and us fishes, photo Suzanne Beishon   (Click to enlarge: opens in new window)

Shoplifters…

A police force plans to tackle shoplifting by giving away free underwear and hygiene products.

Cambridgeshire Police have watched a rising trend of young people stealing essentials like knickers and sanitary products. Endless poverty is forcing growing numbers to shoplift just to achieve basic dignity.

This follows Italian judges ruling that stealing small amounts of food is not a crime if you are destitute and hungry. Italian daily La Stampa approvingly reported that the “right to survival prevails over property.”

The real crime is a system which consistently drives people into such desperate situations. It is private property – specifically, capitalist ownership of industry and distribution for profit – which maintains this.

The Socialist doubts the tops of the police and judiciary will look as kindly on a mass movement which wants the economy switched from being bosses’ property into workers’ property.

… £1,000 Shop

While poverty forces workers and young people to steal to survive, the 1%’s answer to the pound shop is due to open in Mayfair.

The ‘£1,000 Shop’ will offer ‘discount’ jewellery, watches and fashion to the capital’s elite. Everything is knocked down to the low, low price of £1,000.

Poverty is not a joke for the super-rich to play silly little games with. It is the toxic by-product of the outdated capitalist way of organising society, heaped on those who make the capitalists’ profits for them.

The bosses mock us at their peril.