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The Steal: A Cultural History of Shoplifting
A history of shoplifting, revealing the roots of our modern dilemma. Rachel Shteir's The Steal is the first serious study of shoplifting, tracking the fascinating history of this ancient crime. Dismissed by academia and the mainstream media and largely misunderstood, shoplifting has become the territory of moralists, mischievous teenagers, tabloid television, and self-help gurus. But shoplifting incurs remarkable real-life costs for retailers and consumers. The "crime tax"-the amount every American family loses to shoplifting-related price inflation-is more than $400 a year. Shoplifting cost American retailers $11.7 billion in 2009. The theft of one $5.00 item from Whole Foods can require sales of hundreds of dollars to break even. The Steal begins when shoplifting entered the modern record as urbanization and consumerism made London into Europe's busiest mercantile capital. Crossing the channel to nineteenth-century Paris, Shteir tracks the rise of the department store and the pathologizing of shoplifting as kleptomania. In 1960s America, shoplifting becomes a symbol of resistance when the publication of Abbie Hoffman's Steal This Book popularizes shoplifting as an antiestablishment act. Some contemporary analysts see our current epidemic as a response to a culture of hyper-consumerism; others question whether its upticks can be tied to economic downturns at all. Few provide convincing theories about why it goes up or down. Just as experts can't agree on why people shoplift, they can't agree on how to stop it. Shoplifting has been punished by death, discouraged by shame tactics, and protected against by high-tech surveillance. Shoplifters have been treated by psychoanalysis, medicated with pharmaceuticals, and enforced by law to attend rehabilitation groups. While a few individuals have abandoned their sticky-fingered habits, shoplifting shows no signs of slowing. In The Steal, Shteir guides us through a remarkable tour of all things shoplifting-we visit the Woodbury Commons Outlet Mall, where boosters run rampant, watch the surveillance footage from Winona Ryder's famed shopping trip, and learn the history of antitheft technology. A groundbreaking study, The Steal shows us that shoplifting in its many guises-crime, disease, protest-is best understood as a reflection of our society, ourselves.
274 pages, Kindle Edition
First published June 1, 2011
14 people are currently reading
707 people want to read
About the author
Rachel Shteir
7 books6 followersRachel Shteir is associate professor, The Theatre School, DePaul University, and author of Striptease: The Untold History of the Girlie Show. She lives in Chicago.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 56 reviews
May 11, 2012
This book has an arresting cover design, a "sexy" topic, and solid research that incorporates everything from English common law to the latest in loss prevention gadgetry. Author Rachel Shteir even cannily opens and closes her book with the new face of shoplifting, Winona Ryder--describing the star's famous videotaped spree and its aftermath. With all that going for it, then why, oh why, did I never connect with this book? Is there such a thing as too much objectivity in a reporter/writer?
After muddling through this comprehensive look at shoplifting (and dozing off more than a few times) I could only surmise that the author lacked a solid point of view. Shteir is not squishy and forgiving of thieves, nor aghast and punishing. She's just listing facts. And when it comes to sin and moral failing, I prefer someone who picks a side and sticks with it.
After muddling through this comprehensive look at shoplifting (and dozing off more than a few times) I could only surmise that the author lacked a solid point of view. Shteir is not squishy and forgiving of thieves, nor aghast and punishing. She's just listing facts. And when it comes to sin and moral failing, I prefer someone who picks a side and sticks with it.
February 28, 2015
I typically don't write book reviews, but this book was so bad that I felt compelled to write one. This book was awful. Awful. If I could give it zero stars, I would. And I typically love non-fiction. (The entire time I was reading this book, I wished that Mary Roach had written it.) It read like an undergraduate's final term paper for Criminology 101. I had to read sentences two or even three times in order to decipher what the author was saying. The author's arguments and analyses were poorly organized and unclear. I even found a glaring error: the author claimed that Howard University is in the southeastern quadrant of Washington, D.C., but it is actually in the northwestern quadrant. Did anyone proofread or fact check this book?!
I'll leave you with two of my favorite quotes from the book:
"...but he died at the hospital, where diabetes and traces of crack cocaine were found in his blood." Diabetes was found in a person's blood? Really?
"Swirling around the room was the masculine feeling one notices when one has the misfortune to be in the same room with men watching a sporting event." Super lame attempt at humor.
I'll leave you with two of my favorite quotes from the book:
"...but he died at the hospital, where diabetes and traces of crack cocaine were found in his blood." Diabetes was found in a person's blood? Really?
"Swirling around the room was the masculine feeling one notices when one has the misfortune to be in the same room with men watching a sporting event." Super lame attempt at humor.
October 17, 2011
The Steal is a slim book with unrealized potential, it's just not at all worth taking. This “cultural history of shoplifting” spans from Hogarthian depictions of English and French mercantile mayhem through candid camera snaps of modern-day mall mauling. (As a bit of digression, that last sentence was self-indulgent, but oh-so-much-fun to write.) From there, it surveys the recent history of anti-theft technology and jumps to a few bare field anecdotes before skipping lightly over post-Freudian pathology and post-Yippie protest sociology to reach an unnecessarily empty conclusion. The tone is matter-of-fact, neither sensationalized nor dry, yet sadly devoid of argument.
Shteir cites statistics showing a rising trend in shoplifting in the US and abroad and concludes that “a serious study of shoplifting should not be content to bemoan the crime’s ubiquity,” but should observe that “Consumers are now suspects.... An investigation of where shoplifting comes from and why people do it exposes important truths about our markets, our courtrooms, and our identities.” (p. 219) Since the author seems to have left these truths implicit if not out of her book entirely, I'll arrogate the right to connect the dots for her.
Whether you view shoplifting as a trivial matter or a scourge depends much on your views about economics, politics, and your place in the world at large. First and foremost, “shrink” (inventoried products which get damaged or go missing instead of sold) has a significant impact on modern retail. In 2009, a University of Florida survey found the annual cost of goods lost to theft and error as nearly $12 billion, with Consumer Reports finding consumers forking over $450/year as a retail-imposed “crime tax” (p. 8). What’s more, these costs don’t factor in anti-theft expenses such as locking cases, guards, and security cameras. However, if shoplifting is increasingly common, it’s also one of those crimes whose origins and causes are difficult to pigeonhole, rendering it therefore nearly impossible to thwart.
The modern shoplifting stereotype, at least for me, is a sticky-fingered punk in a pillowy jacket loitering around the local strip mall, pillaging small-sized items like razors, candy, watches, phone cards, etc. He or she can be any age, but is always a two-bit grifter, a slightly seedy and a bit skeevy outsider. I probably come by this view from repeated exposure to grainy, hidden-camera store videos and mugshots as promulgated by CNN and local news. (As an aside, why is the picture quality of these images always so poor in today’s high-tech fishbowl? *Sigh.* I know, I know, never ascribe to conspiracy what can be chalked up to plain incompetence.) Naturally, this stereotype has as much to do with reality as other reality TV. In the real world, thieves have no archetype. This creates an unsolvable dilemma for merchants. Products must be displayed to be sold. Exposure, availability equates to vulnerability. While some shoplifters are predators, most are just opportunists. And opportunity knocks at least once for everybody.
Outside the world of strip malls and department stores, the meaningfulness of distinguishing ‘shoplifting’ from other forms of theft and fraud is open to question. Consider some examples straight out of Hollywood: a street urchin snatching fruit from an apple cart; a hobo plucking a peach from an orchard; a bag lady grazing Waldorf salad from beneath the sneeze shield while dolloping mac-and-cheese onto a plate at a supermarket or restaurant. Are looters who smash-and-grab appliances from an electronics boutique shoplifters? What about internet pirates who rip and share books, movies, music, and software without paying for them? Is the corrupted teamster shoplifting when he offloads racks of fake furs in an alley to kids in Keds or is his act more akin to that of the burglar who jimmies the window of a vacationing family for pumped-up kicks? Cars, shopping carts, and bicycles wander away from their respective lots... does the pricetag define the act? Developers divert the flow of creeks and dam rivers; competing industrialists siphon one another’s gas lines; speeders violate the tithes of toll booths. What to make of land barons and squatters? Theft wears many costumes, but is always ultimately defined as such by the victim’s power. No one “steals” from the weak; property is merely redistributed. (Urban umbrellas like coffee shop pennies, common property making the rounds of absent-minded commuters via public transportation.) And what is property anyway? What does it mean to have ownership as opposed to mere temporary possession?
If Shteir’s contentions that there are to date few to no comprehensive published studies of shoplifting are true, then despite her years of field and library research, The Steal comes across as a pretty intellectually lazy work. Explaining shoplifting as something apart from theft isn’t even necessary unless you insist on compartmentalizing it as theft of packaged goods. Ronald Clarke, a Rutgers University “situational criminologist” distills the crime to “hot products” which are “concealable, removable, available, valuable, enjoyable, and disposable” (CRAVED! at p. 93). I like that, but it strikes me as odd to type behavior exclusively by the attributes of stolen objects. While the author doesn’t choose to recognize it, a pattern nonetheless emerges from her chronicle, which is that by and large, taking stuff has always been about anonymity, availability, and opportunity in the face of immediate perceived need. Period. Everything else is rationalization and window-dressing.
If you’ll indulge a little existential philosophy, from what I’ve gleaned so far (and not from this book) everything just *is* (Joe Tautology). We, not existence, define our relationship to everything else, and so property and ownership are socially constructed ideas, not things that live independently in nature. By extension, stealing is a personally- and socially-constructed act and – people being apt to change their minds and moods – definitionally subject to constantly-shifting terrain. Thus, appeals to reduce the incidence of theft by morality (the shaming of Thou Shalt Not Steal), by threat (from fines to hand-lopping), and by therapy (as though kleptomania was more illness than repressed behavior) are ultimately doomed, as each falsely assumes post-hoc agreement of the meaning of an act that the actors – in the now-passed moment – are not necessarily inclined to view as wrong (if they stopped to consider it at all).
As a subset of theft, shoplifting is not a psychology problem, it is an economic and political one that owes its very existence to shape-shifting societal recognition. Far from having many pathologies, it has none.
So, much ado about nothing? Depends on your point of view, obviously. We can't all live in communes or caves. One kindergartner's sharing is a tycoon's unique form of unilateral barter. Excuse me for a moment, I think that's Winona Ryder. Can I help you? You're finding everything okay, I take it?
Shteir cites statistics showing a rising trend in shoplifting in the US and abroad and concludes that “a serious study of shoplifting should not be content to bemoan the crime’s ubiquity,” but should observe that “Consumers are now suspects.... An investigation of where shoplifting comes from and why people do it exposes important truths about our markets, our courtrooms, and our identities.” (p. 219) Since the author seems to have left these truths implicit if not out of her book entirely, I'll arrogate the right to connect the dots for her.
Whether you view shoplifting as a trivial matter or a scourge depends much on your views about economics, politics, and your place in the world at large. First and foremost, “shrink” (inventoried products which get damaged or go missing instead of sold) has a significant impact on modern retail. In 2009, a University of Florida survey found the annual cost of goods lost to theft and error as nearly $12 billion, with Consumer Reports finding consumers forking over $450/year as a retail-imposed “crime tax” (p. 8). What’s more, these costs don’t factor in anti-theft expenses such as locking cases, guards, and security cameras. However, if shoplifting is increasingly common, it’s also one of those crimes whose origins and causes are difficult to pigeonhole, rendering it therefore nearly impossible to thwart.
The modern shoplifting stereotype, at least for me, is a sticky-fingered punk in a pillowy jacket loitering around the local strip mall, pillaging small-sized items like razors, candy, watches, phone cards, etc. He or she can be any age, but is always a two-bit grifter, a slightly seedy and a bit skeevy outsider. I probably come by this view from repeated exposure to grainy, hidden-camera store videos and mugshots as promulgated by CNN and local news. (As an aside, why is the picture quality of these images always so poor in today’s high-tech fishbowl? *Sigh.* I know, I know, never ascribe to conspiracy what can be chalked up to plain incompetence.) Naturally, this stereotype has as much to do with reality as other reality TV. In the real world, thieves have no archetype. This creates an unsolvable dilemma for merchants. Products must be displayed to be sold. Exposure, availability equates to vulnerability. While some shoplifters are predators, most are just opportunists. And opportunity knocks at least once for everybody.
Outside the world of strip malls and department stores, the meaningfulness of distinguishing ‘shoplifting’ from other forms of theft and fraud is open to question. Consider some examples straight out of Hollywood: a street urchin snatching fruit from an apple cart; a hobo plucking a peach from an orchard; a bag lady grazing Waldorf salad from beneath the sneeze shield while dolloping mac-and-cheese onto a plate at a supermarket or restaurant. Are looters who smash-and-grab appliances from an electronics boutique shoplifters? What about internet pirates who rip and share books, movies, music, and software without paying for them? Is the corrupted teamster shoplifting when he offloads racks of fake furs in an alley to kids in Keds or is his act more akin to that of the burglar who jimmies the window of a vacationing family for pumped-up kicks? Cars, shopping carts, and bicycles wander away from their respective lots... does the pricetag define the act? Developers divert the flow of creeks and dam rivers; competing industrialists siphon one another’s gas lines; speeders violate the tithes of toll booths. What to make of land barons and squatters? Theft wears many costumes, but is always ultimately defined as such by the victim’s power. No one “steals” from the weak; property is merely redistributed. (Urban umbrellas like coffee shop pennies, common property making the rounds of absent-minded commuters via public transportation.) And what is property anyway? What does it mean to have ownership as opposed to mere temporary possession?
If Shteir’s contentions that there are to date few to no comprehensive published studies of shoplifting are true, then despite her years of field and library research, The Steal comes across as a pretty intellectually lazy work. Explaining shoplifting as something apart from theft isn’t even necessary unless you insist on compartmentalizing it as theft of packaged goods. Ronald Clarke, a Rutgers University “situational criminologist” distills the crime to “hot products” which are “concealable, removable, available, valuable, enjoyable, and disposable” (CRAVED! at p. 93). I like that, but it strikes me as odd to type behavior exclusively by the attributes of stolen objects. While the author doesn’t choose to recognize it, a pattern nonetheless emerges from her chronicle, which is that by and large, taking stuff has always been about anonymity, availability, and opportunity in the face of immediate perceived need. Period. Everything else is rationalization and window-dressing.
If you’ll indulge a little existential philosophy, from what I’ve gleaned so far (and not from this book) everything just *is* (Joe Tautology). We, not existence, define our relationship to everything else, and so property and ownership are socially constructed ideas, not things that live independently in nature. By extension, stealing is a personally- and socially-constructed act and – people being apt to change their minds and moods – definitionally subject to constantly-shifting terrain. Thus, appeals to reduce the incidence of theft by morality (the shaming of Thou Shalt Not Steal), by threat (from fines to hand-lopping), and by therapy (as though kleptomania was more illness than repressed behavior) are ultimately doomed, as each falsely assumes post-hoc agreement of the meaning of an act that the actors – in the now-passed moment – are not necessarily inclined to view as wrong (if they stopped to consider it at all).
As a subset of theft, shoplifting is not a psychology problem, it is an economic and political one that owes its very existence to shape-shifting societal recognition. Far from having many pathologies, it has none.
So, much ado about nothing? Depends on your point of view, obviously. We can't all live in communes or caves. One kindergartner's sharing is a tycoon's unique form of unilateral barter. Excuse me for a moment, I think that's Winona Ryder. Can I help you? You're finding everything okay, I take it?
May 6, 2021
One of a kind this book is.
Though the author Rachel Shteir, by and large works the narrative of this book in the American milieu, the intrinsic message does have a global appeal.
This book shows you how shoplifting has been a peccadillo, a misdeed, an acknowledgment of sexual subjugation, a howl of grief, a political yelp, a sign of depression, a badge of identity, and a back door to the ‘American Dream’.
The act mirrors our collective individuality, reflects our shifting moral code, and reveals the power that consumption holds over our psyches.
The techniques shoplifters use may change; how stores catch the crime and how the law punishes it may change. But shoplifting, whether we find it creepy, or sinister, or even exhilarating, will always ripple through our culture to torment and attract us.
Inside stores, these thefts appear when we least expect it.
Even in our effusive age, shoplifting produces squirming. Stores dislike talking about it. Retail security experts are reticent about their techniques for various reasons, including “giving the secrets to bad guys,” although most secrets can be gleaned from the Internet.
One magazine that had assigned the Shteir, a narrative on ‘luxury shoplifting’ decided in the end that publishing it would alienate advertisers. An Orthodox rabbi declined to talk about what shoplifting, if any, existed in his congregation, since doing so, he reckoned, would be “bad for the Jews.” Shoplifters were unreliable narrators and “badly brought up,” Shteir was told. Philosophers explained to the author that the crime was not evil and was therefore not worthy of study.
A doctor claimed to be “fearful” that the public would “misunderstand” his research to “cure” kleptomania. But the wisest psychiatrists and psychologists that the author of this book encountered, understood that any “cure” for shoplifting would require refashioning both social arrangements and the human psyche.
What’s new about shoplifting today is that it has become a cultural trend—a quiet pandemic, driven by pretty much everything, in our era. Some academics connect it to traditional families’ dissolution, the American love of shopping, the downshifting of the middle class, global capitalism, immigration, the substitution of independent stores with big chains, and the lessening of faith’s hold on conduct.
Shoplifting gets tangled up in American cycles of spending and saving, and boom and bust, and enacts the tension between the rage to consume conspicuously and the intention to live thriftily.
The most recent suspects include the Great Recession, the increasing economic divide between rich and poor, and an incompetent response to the brazenness of white-collar impostors: the shoplifter as the poor man’s Bernard Madoff.
Yet many shoplifters see themselves as escape artists, stealing out of enigmatic cravings and unexamined cravings. Having lost their old solaces, people shoplift as an anodyne against sorrow or to avenge themselves against irrepressible forces or as an act of social aggression, to hurl themselves away from their identities as almost-have-nots.
Whatever form shoplifting takes, it is as difficult to stamp out as oil spills or alcoholism.
Shoplifting is further misunderstood since the line between crime and disease has blurred. Although most estimates put the number of kleptomaniacs among shoplifters at between 0 and 8 percent, some experts believe that the disease is far more prevalent. Others contend that so-called shoplifting addiction has replaced kleptomania altogether.
There is no single reason for shoplifting’s rise, as Shteir says. In our world, where greed and consumerism are encouraged, where social and economic inequality are swelling, and where rogues like Robin Hood are admired, the crime will continue to grow. But a solemn study of shoplifting should not be contented to bemoan the crime’s ubiquity; it should examine that every time you walk into a store, the cost of the crime is reflected in the artillery of antishoplifting devices around you as well as the elevated prices of the items you’re buying.
Consumers are now suspects.
And, indeed, a looming issue for the retail industry is transparency. Maybe in the future stores will make public the details of how they deal with shoplifters just as governments are publishing their secrets. But thus far, no Julian Assange has appeared to reveal the secrets of Bergdorf’s, Loehmann’s, and everything in between. That is not even taking into account the cost of shoplifting in human and social terms.
To accept the crime as an immutable part of the global landscape means to accept that we can’t always predict who is shoplifting. It is to accept that trying to get something for nothing is considered by many people the best way to survive—even flourish. Yet if we know we can never eradicate the crime, we can try to take a hard look at the costs.
An investigation of where shoplifting came from and why people do it exposes important truths about our markets, our courtrooms, and our identities. It reminds us of the secrets that shoplifters and stores want to hide.
Grab a copy. You’ll surely like it.
Though the author Rachel Shteir, by and large works the narrative of this book in the American milieu, the intrinsic message does have a global appeal.
This book shows you how shoplifting has been a peccadillo, a misdeed, an acknowledgment of sexual subjugation, a howl of grief, a political yelp, a sign of depression, a badge of identity, and a back door to the ‘American Dream’.
The act mirrors our collective individuality, reflects our shifting moral code, and reveals the power that consumption holds over our psyches.
The techniques shoplifters use may change; how stores catch the crime and how the law punishes it may change. But shoplifting, whether we find it creepy, or sinister, or even exhilarating, will always ripple through our culture to torment and attract us.
Inside stores, these thefts appear when we least expect it.
Even in our effusive age, shoplifting produces squirming. Stores dislike talking about it. Retail security experts are reticent about their techniques for various reasons, including “giving the secrets to bad guys,” although most secrets can be gleaned from the Internet.
One magazine that had assigned the Shteir, a narrative on ‘luxury shoplifting’ decided in the end that publishing it would alienate advertisers. An Orthodox rabbi declined to talk about what shoplifting, if any, existed in his congregation, since doing so, he reckoned, would be “bad for the Jews.” Shoplifters were unreliable narrators and “badly brought up,” Shteir was told. Philosophers explained to the author that the crime was not evil and was therefore not worthy of study.
A doctor claimed to be “fearful” that the public would “misunderstand” his research to “cure” kleptomania. But the wisest psychiatrists and psychologists that the author of this book encountered, understood that any “cure” for shoplifting would require refashioning both social arrangements and the human psyche.
What’s new about shoplifting today is that it has become a cultural trend—a quiet pandemic, driven by pretty much everything, in our era. Some academics connect it to traditional families’ dissolution, the American love of shopping, the downshifting of the middle class, global capitalism, immigration, the substitution of independent stores with big chains, and the lessening of faith’s hold on conduct.
Shoplifting gets tangled up in American cycles of spending and saving, and boom and bust, and enacts the tension between the rage to consume conspicuously and the intention to live thriftily.
The most recent suspects include the Great Recession, the increasing economic divide between rich and poor, and an incompetent response to the brazenness of white-collar impostors: the shoplifter as the poor man’s Bernard Madoff.
Yet many shoplifters see themselves as escape artists, stealing out of enigmatic cravings and unexamined cravings. Having lost their old solaces, people shoplift as an anodyne against sorrow or to avenge themselves against irrepressible forces or as an act of social aggression, to hurl themselves away from their identities as almost-have-nots.
Whatever form shoplifting takes, it is as difficult to stamp out as oil spills or alcoholism.
Shoplifting is further misunderstood since the line between crime and disease has blurred. Although most estimates put the number of kleptomaniacs among shoplifters at between 0 and 8 percent, some experts believe that the disease is far more prevalent. Others contend that so-called shoplifting addiction has replaced kleptomania altogether.
There is no single reason for shoplifting’s rise, as Shteir says. In our world, where greed and consumerism are encouraged, where social and economic inequality are swelling, and where rogues like Robin Hood are admired, the crime will continue to grow. But a solemn study of shoplifting should not be contented to bemoan the crime’s ubiquity; it should examine that every time you walk into a store, the cost of the crime is reflected in the artillery of antishoplifting devices around you as well as the elevated prices of the items you’re buying.
Consumers are now suspects.
And, indeed, a looming issue for the retail industry is transparency. Maybe in the future stores will make public the details of how they deal with shoplifters just as governments are publishing their secrets. But thus far, no Julian Assange has appeared to reveal the secrets of Bergdorf’s, Loehmann’s, and everything in between. That is not even taking into account the cost of shoplifting in human and social terms.
To accept the crime as an immutable part of the global landscape means to accept that we can’t always predict who is shoplifting. It is to accept that trying to get something for nothing is considered by many people the best way to survive—even flourish. Yet if we know we can never eradicate the crime, we can try to take a hard look at the costs.
An investigation of where shoplifting came from and why people do it exposes important truths about our markets, our courtrooms, and our identities. It reminds us of the secrets that shoplifters and stores want to hide.
Grab a copy. You’ll surely like it.
August 20, 2011
This historical text reads like a dry PhD dissertation published before someone with wit could get a hold of it.
June 27, 2024
It's really hard to imagine a scenario where we overcome capitalism without breaking or taking anything that the law says doesn't belong to us. So then it comes down to a question of tactics: When is it helpful and when isn't it? But then for me at least the question becomes: Who gets to say? Is there some central authority that can dictate what are appropriate revolutionary tactics? On what basis? (71)
Many shoplifters talk about the crime like a love affair. (125)
Memory is a luxury that only those who are straight can afford, she said.
I WANT to feel guilt or shame, Alice protested. (156)
It is the secrets that make us sick. (158)
Think about some state of mind that is unbearable, but the person doesn't think "I'm in unbearable state." They have a prior state of entitlement... They're stealing something that belongs to them. Originally belongs to them. With socialization it becomes, from the outside, stealing. But symbolically it is a restorative story. There's a prior state of entitlement in anybody who steals. And I assume that impulses become compulsive. If there's trauma. (166)
If you boil off the sauce, you get a reduction. That's what I'm left with. (206)
Many shoplifters talk about the crime like a love affair. (125)
Memory is a luxury that only those who are straight can afford, she said.
I WANT to feel guilt or shame, Alice protested. (156)
It is the secrets that make us sick. (158)
Think about some state of mind that is unbearable, but the person doesn't think "I'm in unbearable state." They have a prior state of entitlement... They're stealing something that belongs to them. Originally belongs to them. With socialization it becomes, from the outside, stealing. But symbolically it is a restorative story. There's a prior state of entitlement in anybody who steals. And I assume that impulses become compulsive. If there's trauma. (166)
If you boil off the sauce, you get a reduction. That's what I'm left with. (206)
September 11, 2022
was really excited about this but just could NOT get into it. felt like it teetered way too much into pathologizing and shaming rather than exploring other reasons people may steal from businesses. walked away feeling meh. not for me.
June 5, 2012
Rachel Shteir once again looks at society through the slightly skewed prism of those on the border. Well researched and written, hits the high points of the crime of shoplifting (which didn't begin, of course, until there were shops--before that it was just theft), the punishments for it and the views of the chattering classes toward it. Is shoplifting a compulsion, perhaps a rebellion toward the patriarchal social superstructure (most shoplifters are women) or a political act against an exploitative economic system? It is also and mainly a way to get stuff that people can't or don't want to pay for.
Lots of less scrupulously researched but intriguing information on loss prevention attempts by store management and the constant war between lifters and store cops with each new security device being solved by those who make a living by beating them.
Like her other books, highly recommended.
Lots of less scrupulously researched but intriguing information on loss prevention attempts by store management and the constant war between lifters and store cops with each new security device being solved by those who make a living by beating them.
Like her other books, highly recommended.
March 11, 2012
Having read Shteir's "Gypsy: The Art of the Tease," I was well prepared for Shteir's style. I really enjoyed this book. I mean, it is completely historical and journalistic, so if you aren't looking for that I don't recommend this book. But if you do like reading history books (as I do), this would be an excellent read. Stealing isn't really something that I have found a lot of books on, I really haven't been looking, but Shteir has opened my eyes to the interesting topic of shoplifting. Shteir covers a lot of information in her relatively small book.
February 14, 2015
Interesting topic that I'd not previously considered - rather than offering conclusions or advice, this book lays out the subject of shoplifting and expands upon it in an informative, fairly engaging way.
I was especially intrigued by the consideration of shoplifting as an impulse-control disorder, though some of the reported stories seemed a little hollow to me. Perhaps I'm jaded, but somebody really wanting something and resorting to stealing it doesn't quite equate to kleptomania or an impulse-control problem.
Solid book with good coverage of the subject matter - I enjoyed the read.
I was especially intrigued by the consideration of shoplifting as an impulse-control disorder, though some of the reported stories seemed a little hollow to me. Perhaps I'm jaded, but somebody really wanting something and resorting to stealing it doesn't quite equate to kleptomania or an impulse-control problem.
Solid book with good coverage of the subject matter - I enjoyed the read.
April 9, 2012
This was an education. The author really did her research, interviewed thousands of shoplifters, experts, lawyers and tradesmen. The history of the crime was intriguing. I had to revise more than a few misconceptions I've had about shoplifting, its statistical demographics, participants and causes.
November 5, 2014
I enjoyed the read. I never realized the extent of shoplifting and
the way it percieved in society. Merry old England was not the place
to using "the five finger discount" as they did'nt slap your hands
they hung you. A 10 year olds stealing anything over 5 shilling was enough get strung up. I like the way the author Racheal Shteir writes will read her other works
the way it percieved in society. Merry old England was not the place
to using "the five finger discount" as they did'nt slap your hands
they hung you. A 10 year olds stealing anything over 5 shilling was enough get strung up. I like the way the author Racheal Shteir writes will read her other works
November 21, 2011
Fascinating read about the history of pilfering....went from a crime committed by the hungry, to a mental illness, to a revolutionary act, to a very organized crime today. Theft rings today even take orders for items! We all pay for this crime through higher prices....fascinating read...
April 1, 2023
The publication date of this book is over ten years ago and technology advancements make this decade seem far longer. Although it was an enjoyable read, it read more like an elongated Sunday newspaper feature than a history book. Prior to reading I was not aware of how US centric the book would be and this is certainly something any possible readers should consider.
August 27, 2011
Well-written, engaging look at a subject that I haven't seen written about anywhere before, even though shoplifting costs businesses and taxpayers millions of dollars every year. Shteir starts off with the infamous Winona Ryder incident at Saks, then looks back at famous shoplifters from the fictional Moll Flanders to the pin-up girl Hedy Lamarr. She talks to "freegans" who shoplift to make a statement but only steal from the big-box stores, never from the Mom-and-Pop businesses, and anonymous shoplifters who regularly steal for a variety of reasons: thrill-seeking, coveting, anger. Some stories are fairly tragic, like the young woman who is so addicted to shoplifting that no amount of intervention, jail time, rehab, or meds seem to help her for long. You also get an inside look at how even the most technologically-advanced loss prevention devices have failed to solve the shoplifting epidemic, and what we can expect to see in the future.
Want to read
March 7, 2016menurut saya sih, ini buku menarik.
subjectnya dan cara melihatnya baru.
bagaimana suatu fenomen "ngutil" bisa dipersoalkan?
ngutil itu rasanya biasa saja.
tapi, ternyata, kebiasaan [atau penyakit atau perilaku menyimpang?] ini terbentuk belum lama. paling tidak pada masa ketika revolus industri dan ketika tingkat konsumsi dijadikan tolok ukur kemajuan masyarakat.
buku ini mencoba melacak ke belakang, untuk mendapatkan gambaran bagaimana awal terjadinya tindakan ngutil itu.
di amerika, negeri yang ekonominya tergantung pada konsumsi masyarakatnya berkepentingan benar untuk mengetahui motif-motif apa yang ada di balik tindakan yang merugikan ekonomi ini. buku ini tidak sendirian, sebab sudah ada banyak penelitian yang dilakukan mengenainya.
jadi,
dengan cara lain, buku ini seperti mau cerita mengenai sendi-sendi masyarakat konsumtif yang mereka hidupi, tapi dari kacamata penyimpang, yakni mereka yang mengambil tanpa ganti ini.
---
segini dulu deh...
subjectnya dan cara melihatnya baru.
bagaimana suatu fenomen "ngutil" bisa dipersoalkan?
ngutil itu rasanya biasa saja.
tapi, ternyata, kebiasaan [atau penyakit atau perilaku menyimpang?] ini terbentuk belum lama. paling tidak pada masa ketika revolus industri dan ketika tingkat konsumsi dijadikan tolok ukur kemajuan masyarakat.
buku ini mencoba melacak ke belakang, untuk mendapatkan gambaran bagaimana awal terjadinya tindakan ngutil itu.
di amerika, negeri yang ekonominya tergantung pada konsumsi masyarakatnya berkepentingan benar untuk mengetahui motif-motif apa yang ada di balik tindakan yang merugikan ekonomi ini. buku ini tidak sendirian, sebab sudah ada banyak penelitian yang dilakukan mengenainya.
jadi,
dengan cara lain, buku ini seperti mau cerita mengenai sendi-sendi masyarakat konsumtif yang mereka hidupi, tapi dari kacamata penyimpang, yakni mereka yang mengambil tanpa ganti ini.
---
segini dulu deh...
August 20, 2016
Interesting look at shoplifting as a historical and cultural phenomenon, although some sentences seemed to come out of nowhere or to be referring to something that was removed from the text. I was also annoyed that some very common things were defined in the text while other, less familiar terms and people were not, as though everyone knew about them - it made for a dated reading experience. I'm not convinced that shoplifting has actually increased, nor that the insane levels of surveillance we currently use are worth it, and I wish there wee a bit more depth here - this is straight reporting with a little overtone of moral panic - but I enjoyed it nonetheless, despite my complete lack of thrill at the thought of shoplifting.
Read
March 17, 2014Rachel Shteir, AB'87
Author
From our pages (Jan–Feb/12): "In a different take on Eve, DePaul University dramaturgy and dramatic-criticism professor Rachel Shteir writes in The Steal, quoting a security expert, that the first woman also became first shoplifter when she took the apple. Today about 27 million Americans shoplift, according to the National Association of Shoplifting Prevention. For this cultural history, Shteir talked to shoplifters, police, and storeowners to grasp why people nab items from store shelves and how cultures over time have understood the practice."
Author
From our pages (Jan–Feb/12): "In a different take on Eve, DePaul University dramaturgy and dramatic-criticism professor Rachel Shteir writes in The Steal, quoting a security expert, that the first woman also became first shoplifter when she took the apple. Today about 27 million Americans shoplift, according to the National Association of Shoplifting Prevention. For this cultural history, Shteir talked to shoplifters, police, and storeowners to grasp why people nab items from store shelves and how cultures over time have understood the practice."
July 31, 2011
A serious treatise on shoplifting... everything you always wanted to know. From Abbey Hoffman's "Steal This Book", to statistics, kleptomania, Winona Ryder and pirated music, Shteir explores causes and cures.
November 6, 2011
Easily the most interesting book I've read all year. I could barely get through two pages without wanting to look something up or do a little extra research.
March 29, 2016
Very interesting.
February 17, 2018
Fascinating history of shoplifting with all kinds of historical/sociological/psychological insight.
April 4, 2024
Start and end dates are estimated. Read in the midst of spring allergies, when my entire world was viewed through a scrim of exhaustion. I probably would have gotten more out of the book had I read it a few weeks earlier.
This is my second book by Rachel Shteir; it had the same weaknesses as her biography of Betty Friedan. Rachel certainly does her research. There is plenty of data. I just didn’t find much in the way of conclusions.
Here’s some of what I did learn:
1
—
Shoplifters tend to be women.
2
—
Shoplifters seem to get a thrill out of the act of shoplifting. They are getting away with something. They are beating the system. They take pride as their shoplifting skills increase.
3
—
Abbie Hoffman’s book “Steal this Book” put a sheen of political rebelliousness on the act of shoplifting. When “shoplifting as political theater” was first presented to me, I was an impressionable, desperate to be hip teenager. My how one’s attitude changes. Stealing books now just seems so very stupid. Do it frequently enough and you will be caught, the conviction will limit your life choices ever after, and there’s nothing hip about poverty.
Besides, I’m in my seventies now, and I long ago gave up any attempt to be hip.
4
—
There are groups treating shoplifting as an addiction, following the twelve step program structure of alcoholics anonymous. There are other groups that also “treat” shoplifting as a disease, or as something other than a crime. None of these groups seemed to work very well in preventing people from shoplifting.
5
—
There are all sorts of high to medium tech methods for preventing shoplifting. But none if these seem to work very well or for very long. It wasn’t clear to me how shoplifters outsmarted tagged items. If you walk out of the store with a tagged item, doesn’t an alarm sound as you exit? If the author explained how shoplifters manage this trick, I missed it.
6
—
The author describes watching the security staff at — the Gaithersburg (Md) Target. I know that store! I’d shopped there just a week or so before reading this book. It is a little creepy to think that staff in an airless room was watching me as I received a French press coffeemaker from the online pickup counter. Were they speculating on my honesty, criticizing my attitude, critiquing my posture?
Is this creepy enough to keep me out of Target forever?
Probably not. But I doubt I’ll use the dressing rooms. It will be easier to buy an item, try it on at home, then return it as needed. And home try-on is way less creepy.
So, oddly enough, reading this book has resulted in a minor change to my shopping habits.
This is my second book by Rachel Shteir; it had the same weaknesses as her biography of Betty Friedan. Rachel certainly does her research. There is plenty of data. I just didn’t find much in the way of conclusions.
Here’s some of what I did learn:
1
—
Shoplifters tend to be women.
2
—
Shoplifters seem to get a thrill out of the act of shoplifting. They are getting away with something. They are beating the system. They take pride as their shoplifting skills increase.
3
—
Abbie Hoffman’s book “Steal this Book” put a sheen of political rebelliousness on the act of shoplifting. When “shoplifting as political theater” was first presented to me, I was an impressionable, desperate to be hip teenager. My how one’s attitude changes. Stealing books now just seems so very stupid. Do it frequently enough and you will be caught, the conviction will limit your life choices ever after, and there’s nothing hip about poverty.
Besides, I’m in my seventies now, and I long ago gave up any attempt to be hip.
4
—
There are groups treating shoplifting as an addiction, following the twelve step program structure of alcoholics anonymous. There are other groups that also “treat” shoplifting as a disease, or as something other than a crime. None of these groups seemed to work very well in preventing people from shoplifting.
5
—
There are all sorts of high to medium tech methods for preventing shoplifting. But none if these seem to work very well or for very long. It wasn’t clear to me how shoplifters outsmarted tagged items. If you walk out of the store with a tagged item, doesn’t an alarm sound as you exit? If the author explained how shoplifters manage this trick, I missed it.
6
—
The author describes watching the security staff at — the Gaithersburg (Md) Target. I know that store! I’d shopped there just a week or so before reading this book. It is a little creepy to think that staff in an airless room was watching me as I received a French press coffeemaker from the online pickup counter. Were they speculating on my honesty, criticizing my attitude, critiquing my posture?
Is this creepy enough to keep me out of Target forever?
Probably not. But I doubt I’ll use the dressing rooms. It will be easier to buy an item, try it on at home, then return it as needed. And home try-on is way less creepy.
So, oddly enough, reading this book has resulted in a minor change to my shopping habits.
July 7, 2018
This book caught my attention at the library when I was looking for something else entirely, and I'm quite glad I picked it up. Shteir collects an intriguing host of information about shoplifting past and present and the intriguing individuals on either side of the crime. Some reviewers have complained about the early historical sections, but they were right up my alley, as were the interviews with modern shoplifters grappling with the implications of their impulses (less so the activists, though a few of them had interesting perspectives), and all of the creative (and sometimes highly problematic) means that so-called loss prevention specialists employ to stop them. While the facts are absolutely fascinating, I wasn't always convinced by Shteir's use of them. For example, she tells the amazing story of Ella Orko, who had over 50 aliases and was arrested more than 60 times throughout her long life, including an arrest at 86 years old. In court, she pushed the senior citizen angle hard, suddenly transforming into a deaf, wheelchair-bound woman in a neck brace. She got off with time served due to her advanced age (and, perhaps, the advanced age of the judge). All interesting stuff, but why is this the story Shtier uses to claim that "whatever kinds of things elderly people shoplift, their crime incites more than its share of rage and suspicion" especially since she only gives the bare bones of the case and nothing about its public reception? There are several of these disconnects between her vague commentary and the actual material. Still, I learned a lot about a subject I had never even considered researching before, and definitely enjoyed the vast majority of the tour. 3.5 stars.
October 6, 2025
3.5 ☆. Fascinating exploration into the history of shoplifting. Various people from all walks of life have done it, and we get a glimpse into the reasons why, how, and the items people steal. Societal and economic factors impact this practice, but some folks don't do it out of economic necessity, which baffled me to learn.
The measures taken to reduce shoplifting were also explored along with whether shoplifting should be classified as simply a crime, an addiction, the result of trauma, bio-chemical predisposition, or a combination of one or more factors. Very comprehensive in scope and provided valuable data and snapshots of individual anecdotes from lawmakers, doctors, advocates with varied objectives related to shoplifting, and offenders caught shoplifting- all of which were insightful.
However, a bit all over the place in presentation and the writing style or perhaps the multitude of angles and ideas made it difficult for me to remain fully engaged. That said, I would certainly recommend this book for those interested in this topic (even though a bit dated since written in 2011. I'd be curious to see how this issue has developed over the past 14 years).
The measures taken to reduce shoplifting were also explored along with whether shoplifting should be classified as simply a crime, an addiction, the result of trauma, bio-chemical predisposition, or a combination of one or more factors. Very comprehensive in scope and provided valuable data and snapshots of individual anecdotes from lawmakers, doctors, advocates with varied objectives related to shoplifting, and offenders caught shoplifting- all of which were insightful.
However, a bit all over the place in presentation and the writing style or perhaps the multitude of angles and ideas made it difficult for me to remain fully engaged. That said, I would certainly recommend this book for those interested in this topic (even though a bit dated since written in 2011. I'd be curious to see how this issue has developed over the past 14 years).
September 24, 2019
I typically love longform dives into any topic and thus was happy to delve into this tome. A lot of the history and background info was interesting and but I was incredibly dismayed at the author's analysis of the effects of shoplifting. It seems like her only reference points were the ridiculous bits of propaganda put forth by major corporations. Shoplifting obviously costs businesses money but to assert that shoplifting is the reason why employee wages can't be higher totally ignores the exorbitant bonuses paid to VPs and CEOs and the myriad other ways big business deliberately undercuts the people that actually make their businesses function. I hate to insult any hardworking author but was hoping for a more trenchant analysis from a book that aims to be an authoritative work on a topic and not just something that rehashes the same whack lies seen in the videos you're forced to watch when you start working somewhere like Walmart or Kroger. I recommend "Nickeled and Dimed" as a good counterpoint to this part of the book.
February 17, 2019
Although the subject matter is quite interesting and Shteir richly decorates her book with all possible kinds of literary references, interviews, facts and statistics, I would not recommend this book. Shteir's writing style is sometimes rich but cluttered and at other times very shallow and resorting to clichés. Some segments seem to come from magazines you'd find in a doctor's waiting room. Some chapters are very interesting (especially the ones on shoplifting history and pathology), but others are really a struggle to get through.
In general, this is a very unevenly written book with an interesting subject but a cluttered and unclear structure and not really any 'points' to make.
In general, this is a very unevenly written book with an interesting subject but a cluttered and unclear structure and not really any 'points' to make.
June 24, 2023
Shteir goes back to Elizabethan England when a thriving retail industry made shoplifting possible (I assume that's as far back as we have references), then follows it forward to the 21st century. Why do people who can afford the purchase steal? Is it for kicks? Kleptomania? A blow against rich corporations, as many shoplifters claim (a common argument is that stealing from small mom-and-pop stores is unethical, unlike ripping off Wal-Mart)? How can stores stop the thefts?
3.5 stars. Interesting.
3.5 stars. Interesting.
March 26, 2019
2.5 stars.
this book is well researched, and dives deep into a lot of history, and current issues, around shoplifting. However, as many other readers have pointed out, it is very VERY dry. It reads more like a textbook, and unfortunately i probably won't retain a lot of what i read because it just overwhelmed me.
this book is well researched, and dives deep into a lot of history, and current issues, around shoplifting. However, as many other readers have pointed out, it is very VERY dry. It reads more like a textbook, and unfortunately i probably won't retain a lot of what i read because it just overwhelmed me.
August 28, 2021
Didn’t finish. Stopped on pg 21. Boring
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