INCIDENT AT THE SUPERMARKET.

This morning, collecting our two daily papers, being Friday, there was a queue, due to punters buying their lotto tickets; hoping by next week to be millionaires, and others stocking up on cigarettes. Retailers with a large floor area now have to keep tobacco out of sight, to deter young folk from developing the habit. All the author can glean from this, is that the older folk now purchase in bulk.

However, it was not that which left the writer disturbed, but a simple piece of theft by a boy of around thirteen years of age. He and his mother were standing just ahead of me, both appearing to be perfectly respectable, well shod etc., awaiting our turn. As the boy approached the counter, he started to play furtively with a pack of chewing gum in a multipack container, the containers were arranged in twos, accept for the one he was manipulating under his mother's nose. I can't imagine what my mother would have said to me had I been touching anything that didn't belong to me. His mother, nevertheless, took not the slightest notice. When his mother paid for her legitimate items, and they departed, I noticed that the odd pack of gum had disappeared.


WHAT HOPE IS THERE FOR A SOCIETY THAT ALLOWS SUCH ACTIVITY?