Elderly Lady Steals From Shops

So I was reading an article online this week about an elderly lady that had been caught shoplifting on numerous occasions and had been summoned into court to explain herself. Wow, I thought to myself, I imagined reading down the article and seeing another case of someone being too poor to put dinner on the table, heat their home and basically survive. I felt that this lady would have been completely embarrassed and mortified if she knew that she had been caught trying to take items from shops to survive and was just struggling like a lot of other people have done in tough times. Nope, I was completely wrong...turns out this lady was stealing from shops, not stealing things that she wanted or needed but was stealing out of BOREDOM of being old. Now correct me if I am wrong but quite a lot of people had commented on this article saying "Aw poor little old lady she must be so lonely" and other such comments and I felt a bit outraged at the sympathy - surely I am right in opposing that sympathetic view? Well, I felt compelled to write this blog post to say I do NOT condone her behavior one bit! I have been brought up to know that stealing is wrong, there is simply no excuse for doing it. My view is that this lady (who has family that are alive by the way) could fill her days doing anything that she wished to do, that she would still have the ability to do. If she was mobile she could exercise or go dancing, if she still has her sight then she could read, she still has family so they could visit her, she could go out for meals with other people, she could find out about facilities in the area that bring lonely people together, she could basically do a lot better than stealing pointless items for no reason. I think she was ordered to pay some fines and a little bit of money towards the shops that she had stolen from but her selfish act was leaving stores out of pocket because she simply did not care about keeping her self-respect and dignity and finding other ways to communicate and interact with others. There is a saying: 'If you can't do the time, then don't do the crime' and I think she should have been punished heavily with a jail sentence to show an example to all ages that stealing is unacceptable. Harsh but fair I think.