Rise in crime becomes daily fact
La Presse’s Maxime Bergeron was witness to the blatant theft of a bottle of booze at an SAQ, upon which the workers did nothing. Useless to call the police, they tell him, because they won’t come. Police tell Bergeron they’re overwhelmed, and a lot of the people they pick up are disturbed in some way, so they bring them to hospital, from which they simply leave. The crimes he describes are individually mostly not a big deal but they’re on the rise.
Ephraim 10:19 on 2024-07-24 Permalink
I wonder how long until many things are sold like the store is an automat. You pay and it is dispensed
Walked into a pharmacy in the US, about 80% of the store was under lock and key
daniel 10:53 on 2024-07-24 Permalink
Really? 80%?
Nicholas 12:34 on 2024-07-24 Permalink
Yup, some stores are really locked down.
I’m sure the management of the SAQ would love to automate, given the negotiations with the union.
Ian 13:50 on 2024-07-24 Permalink
The LCBO has armed security in many urban stores. I think that might be cheaper than developing, installing, and maintaining automats.
Ephraim 13:55 on 2024-07-24 Permalink
Yup. It’s shocking… https://i.redd.it/ymvfbmfffv2c1.jpg for an example. Shampoo, body lotion, everything.
Janet 15:18 on 2024-07-24 Permalink
A few years back, the SAQ on Laurier had an attractive Christmas display of Veuve Cliquot right by the door. I witnessed someone pick up a whole case of the stuff and walk out with it. The cashier admitted it was a problem but that there was no using trying to stop it.
Joey 19:27 on 2024-07-24 Permalink
There’s a lot to learn from the fact that the introduction of the SQDC, with its Consumers Distributing customer service approach, didn’t result in a moment’s reflection about how we sell and buy booze.
Chris 19:28 on 2024-07-24 Permalink
As usual, it’s way worse in the US, where you have:
towns threatening to fine stores for reporting thefts
basic/cheap items behind lock and key
retail staff assaulted / killed
Just yesterday, the NYT wrote about how even California is looking to rollback some of the recent insanity. This stuff is (part of) why normies don’t want ‘defund the police’ btw.
Linking back to the other thread, it wasn’t like this before Trudeau and Biden. And even if they aren’t the cause, and even if it’s not rational, people just remember things being better before them, and thus want rid of them.
walkerp 19:52 on 2024-07-24 Permalink
There was no shoplifting before Trudeau and Biden?
Ian 07:28 on 2024-07-25 Permalink
No, never ever. I heard Trudeau invented meth and homelessness and frowning. It’s so nice to have people here willing to speak truth to power, wake up, sheeple! /s
In seriousness though, I had no idea theft at the SAQs was so blatant. I wonder what the official policy is on shoplifting or if it’s outlet-by-outlet.
Chris 09:36 on 2024-07-25 Permalink
>There was no shoplifting before Trudeau and Biden?
I’m trying very hard to interpret your comment in the most charitable manner, but you sure don’t make it easy…
It’s not binary. There has always been shoplifting (duh), and now there’s more. i.e. it (the amount of shoplifting) literally wasn’t like this before Trudeau and Biden. This is just a fact. It is *not* a statement of causality. But many of the masses will see it as causal regardless, and I’m arguing this is part of why there is such a strong sentiment in the populace of ‘out with the old, in the with new’.
Hopefully that’s clearer?
As to the actual causality, I have not read deeply on the topic, but I’d wager it’s probably mostly because of inflation. And why is there inflation? Covid pandemic mostly, which of course was largely out of our leaders’ control. But one could make the argument that stimulus spending contributed to inflation too, and that was a policy choice by them.
Ian 09:49 on 2024-07-25 Permalink
The problem with your off-the-cuff analysis is that your statement is unsupported, partisan, and full if holes – and is based on the assumption that unverified correlation = definitive causation.
That’s me being charitable.
walkerp 11:59 on 2024-07-25 Permalink
It’s not a fact. It’s some info you are getting from the news media, with statistics coming from who knows which biased source (the big one in the U.S. is the retailer’s association who love to blame crime on all kinds of policies they put in place that often have nothing to do with crime).
And whatever actual “truth’ there may be about shoplifting in Montreal, it gets distorted and amplified by propaganda in social media, where we have now many people who believe (or want to believe) that San Francisco and Stockholm are unlivable warzones.