Goggles

Today’s ethical dilemma: Is taking something from the lost & found that isn’t yours REALLY stealing?

EXAMPLE! Let’s say… and I’m totally just pulling this example (which has absolutely NO basis in reality) out of my ass… that someone paid $15 bucks for a pair of swimming goggles, and promptly lost them—possibly at the public swimming pool. Let’s also say that this same not-actually-a-real-person person goes back to the swimming pool, and asks if anyone has turned in the missing goggles. The completely hypothetical (and totally hot) swimming pool person says, “Hmm… I dunno, let’s check,” and pulls out a HUGE (again hypothetical) Tupperware tub filled with maybe 50-100 swimming goggles, and then asks the (not a real) person to describe them. The not-a-real person says, “There they are!” picking out a set of obviously superior goggles to the ones he/she originally purchased and lost. The hypothetical person then takes them, and hypothetically goes swimming.

ON A SCALE OF ONE-TO-TEN (TEN BEING MOST UNETHICAL), HOW UNETHICAL WAS THIS PERSON?

You are invited to discuss the varying ethicalities of this non-existing person’s totally hypothetical course of action in the comments below.

Goggles
  • Goggles

Bang bang, choo-choo train, let me see you shake that thang. Wm. Steven Humphrey is the editor-in-chief of the Portland Mercury and has held the job since 2000. (So don’t get any funny ideas.)

6 replies on “THE BLOGTOWN ETHICIST: Lost & Found & MINE!”

  4. WSH is right, I don’t think anyone actually reads your posts: “On a scale of one-to-ten, how unethical was this “person”?

    My answer: 3

    First of all, by “stealing” a better pair of goggles, you’re really teaching the hot swimming pool person a lesson. Everyone knows that they’re suppose to ask you to describe your lost item *before* they let you look at the lost-and-found box. As an ethical and semi-aquatic human being, it’s your affirmative duty to teach this ne’er-do-well a lesson. Q.E.D.

  5. The ethical dilemma is on the person who bought the cheapo “Made in China” $15 goggles…that’s only 7.50 an eye! Who came up with that number, the US government? Ethical conundrum: If the “person” wears those goggles and slams their head into the wall because the expensive goggles are perscription and I REALLY NEED THEM BACK…anyway if they slam their head because they can’t see the wall…then am I, I mean is the swim attendant responsible for damages?

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