Because the next guest may find some comfort in it, and it costs ianzin nothing to allow them that comfort. Now, you and I may think that person is finding comfort in lies, delusion, or falsehoods–but so what? Why deprive her or him of what joy they can find in a world that’s mostly crap?
Not so much deface it, but there ws this church and school in the next town over that had all sorts of signs and such up about pro life and all the associated horse shite, and the house across the street which was zoned for doctors office and such light industry [as I believe it is called, even though it isnt industry per se]
I had the damnedest desire to have won a lottery and put in a women’s health consultation office [sort of like a private version of Planned Parenthood] and advertised all sorts of free choice things … like small sign offering free condoms with each consult, coupons for the pill, or IUDs or whatnot [if I won the lottery I could make up certificates to pay part of stuff, like a private grant]
I am prolife, though I fully admit that I detested having an abortion and if I had been able to carry I would never had one, but I preferred to remain alive and above the sod, and not having one would have planted us both in a grave. Well, to be honest, I am going to be cremated … so we could have shared the same jar on mrAru’s mantle. I just dont believe that anybody has a say in someone elses coochie - whether it is abortion, or renting it out for fun & profit. I actually dont think that the sperm provider has anything further than a ‘i really wish you would keep it and not abort’ and definitely cant force a nonabortion on some poor female.
The next person will not be out a Bible. Damaged or missing Bibles are replaced by housekeeping, just like all the other take-out menus and brochures. I believe this is the third time I’ve pointed this out.
I only skimmed through the thread so I may easily have missed it, and you do have a point. I still contend that, since the Bible in the hotel room does me, you, and ianzin not a scintilla of harm, there is no reason to destroy it.
I believe the Bible to be a Bronze Age myths, of poetry of varying quality, and of moral instructions alternately simplistic, wise, and evil. I don’t turn to comfort to it in times of woe. But my wife does; so does my son’s sister. When my brothers were coming home for my mother’s funeral, I am told, they stopped at a hotel en route and were comforted to find a Bible there. Given that the life of man is, as you may have noticed, nasty, brutish, and short, I see no reason to deprive people of comfort even potentially.
Because he can be a big, tough Rebel. Without anybody really finding out. They might say something mean to him…
Next on his program: Order sushi & not pay!
If I found something in a hotel room that was so offensive to me that I wanted to throw it out, then I would bring it to the front desk and them them I didn’t want it in my room. Or call down and ask them to send someone to take it away. Or perhaps if I felt really indignant then I would pack my things back up and then tell the front desk I don’t want to stay there anymore and please cancel the charge on my credit card.
But if I can’t be bothered to actually take my issue to the front desk or whoever is actually paid to deal with complaints, then I wouldn’t leave my personal statement behind for the cleaning staff to deal with. It’s just a courtesy, if you actually use something in the room that’s fine but you don’t just throw stuff out because you feel like it. IMHO.
The pizza place down the street has a box just inside the door filled with colourful printed pizza menus, obviously free for the taking by the public. I rather imagine that they would not be happy if you were to walk in, look the manager right in the eye, and take all of the menus out of the box, shred each one, and stuff them one by one into the garbage - though your logic would suggest there was nothing wrong with doing exactly that.
I have no idea what the legalities of the matter are, but surely it is a species of childish jack-assery to willfully destroy something that is being provided free - to those who want to take it and use it for its intended purpose. The obvious implication is that if you do not wish to use it, you leave it for someone who does; though they have no way of policing that other than individual goodwill (which makes it more like wilful jack-assery to destroy 'em, not less).
I think are several significant differences between these things and bibles in hotel rooms.
(1) I’m not necessarily familiar with the contents of the CDs you refer to, so I can’t come to an informed view about them. I can reach a very well informed opinion about the bible and I believe it constitutes hate literature that spawns division, abuse, violence and prejudice.
(2) There are well established rules of ownership, property and rights concerning the goods on display in a retail environment or the books purchased by a library, whether private or public, and I would respect these rules. I am not aware of any rules or laws that say if I find a piece of hate literature left lying around in a hotel room, I am not allowed to dispose of it along with the other garbage (such as an empty soap wrapper).
(3) The CDS and religious works to which you refer: no-one leaves these, free of charge and unbidden, in a public environment or a room I have hired. Access to them is restricted and protected (e.g. I can’t have the CD until I pay for it, I can’t access the items in the library unless I join the library and agree to abide by its rules). Access to these bibles is not restricted. They are left lying around, unsolicited and free.
There would be no problem if the gideons simply left a stack of bibles with the hotel and said ‘guests can have one if they want one’. But if they choose to leave one in a room that I have hired, then I think it’s my decision what I do with it. I didn’t ask them to leave it there.
I would make what I think is a useful distinction between the property of the hotel, and the bible left by the gideons, which I do not believe either legally or otherwise has the same status. I always respect the terms of my contract with the hotel, which of course involves not damaging the hotel’s property and othrwise behaving in a civilsed way while I stay there. But I think it’s interesting to discuss what contract, if any, exists between myself and the people who left some hate literature in my hotel room without my asking them to do so. I think I’m entitled to put it in its rightful place with the rest of the trash. If the Gideons have a problem with this, they can ask me about it, and I will point out that they didn’t have to leave their garbage in my room, and I didn’t ask them to.
No, I don’t. I think I’m picking up a piece of hate literature and putting it in the garbage where it belongs.
I do not accept that putting a piece of hate literature into the bin constitutes ‘intolerance’. I don’t think that if you found a piece of KKK propaganda shoved through your letterbox, and you crumpled it up and put it in the garbage, that you would feel you had branded yourself as ‘intolerant’.
I doubt they would care, actually, but we aren’t talking about a public storefront, we’re talking about what gets left in a private hotel room.
What if it’s something patently offensive? Is it jack-assery to throw a free copy of Mein Kampf or The Turner Diaries into the trash?
Who is the alleged victim of this jack-assery? The hotel? No. The hotel doesn’t pay for the Bibles, doesn’t own them and has no vested interest in them at all.
The next guest? No, the next guest will get a shiny new Gideon Bible right along with the clean towels and crisp new Chinese take-out menus.
The Gideons? No, they’ve already voluntarily abandoned the property. They will never even know that somebody threw one in the garbage.
So who’s the victim?
It takes nothing away from the next person. Can we please put that to rest? The next person will still get a Bible.
Incidentally, if I take a Gideon Bible out of the room and then throw it in the garbage at home, is that any different than throwing it away right there at the hotel?
If I do take one home (as the Gideons say they want), how long do I have to keep it before I’m allowed to throw it away?
You don’t think the manager would care that you are deliberately destroying the store’s advertising?
I think “public storefront” is a reasonably good comparator to a hotel room - both are spaces owned by someone else that you are allowed to enter on certain terms.
If the Gideons mailed the thing to you, then sure, throw it out. But if it is left in your hotel room, then … no.
If you are going to a hotel which has copies of Mein Kampf as bedside reading, isn’t your choice of venue more the issue?
To my mind, the fact that I find (say) a particular chain of pizza stores “offensive” doesn’t give me the right to destroy their advertising.
In both cases - hotels with Mein Kampf, pizza stores whom I hate - the “solution” is the same – to wit, not to step foot in the place. The “solution” isn’t to go in and destroy free stuff left for those who actually want it.
Who is the victim?
Same as if I burn a pile of pizza ads.
The pizza store may in fact never know they were burned, but rather than reaching X number of the public with Y ads, they now reach X number of the public with (Y + how many I burned) ads.
Although they leave “free” copies for you to take, those ads (and those bibles) are not, in fact, “free” to produce and distribute. They have a cost. By destroying some, you add, however marginally, to that cost. The fact that they will never know that you have, through willful vandalism, added to the cost doesn’t in fact mean that you have not done so.
At the very least, you are wasting resources - whatever went into printing the book you destroyed.
I’m not saying they will not. The jack-assery here isn’t dependant on someone being deprived of a bible, in spite of your repeated insistance that it does.
Again, the fact that the hotel or the Gideon society will never know of the fact of vandalism makes zero difference. The significant thing is that “you” (not you personally, but a person taking a bible with no intention of actually using it, but on the contrary with the intention of destroying it) have no actual use for it, and are in fact going out of your way to add costs for no other purpose than to add costs.
It is a question of goodwill. A person may take a pizza menu from the shop, vaguely intending to refer to it in the future, only later to use it as a handy note-pad or paper airplane; that is one thing. It is quite another to take a whole stack of menus for the express purpose of destroying them because you hate the pizza chain, and wish to cause it harm.
I always thought they put the Bible in the hotel room *specifically **for *me to take. So I take it. I just don’t read it, I trash it. If for no better reason than it should cost them more money to peddle ignorance. But hey, they got it into my hands so I was that much closer to salvation! I’m sure it warms their blessed little hearts.
Speaking of money … as a teenager, I crossed out In God We Trust on plenty of our currency.
No. A hotel room is a temporary domicile. It’s a private space, not a public one.
Incorrect. If they leave it my hotel room, they have abandoned it to the guest. It is not hotel property, it is not Gideon property, it’s abandoned property, which makes it the proeprty of whoever rents the room. One more time They are intended as gifts for the guests.
Irrelevant to the question.
Sure it does. Do you really think you have no right to destroy a pizza menu that gets left in your hotel room? Are you kidding me?
The pizza store analogy is nonsense. You aren’t going into their space, they’re coming into yours and leaving garbage. Do you really think you have to treat all advertising litter left in your hotel room as holy and sacred?
Where are you getting a “pile” from. The analogy is to no more or less than what the pizza joint has voluntarily left in your hotel room.
Who gives a shit? Nobody is forcing them to leave their ads in hotel rooms. If people throw them away instead of ordering the pizza, that doesn’t make them victims, and they are free to stop leaving ads in that hotel. Once you voluntarily abandon property, you lose all right to say what the finder can do with it.
Boo fucking hoo. Nobody’s forcing them to waste their resources that way. They’re free to stop any time they want.
No, THEY are wasting resources by manufacturing garbage to put in my hotel room. By your logic, you are victimizing internet spammers by filtering spam, because it takes money to create and distribute spam.
Well, you can’t seem to identify any victim at all, can you?
It’s not vandalism if it’s your own property. Bibles abandoned in my hotel room are my property. The spammers who left it there have surrendered any right to tell me what to do with it. They have chosen to abandon it. It’s not my problem that they spent money on it.
Is it ok to throw away a pizza menu left in your hotel room, yes or no? If the answer is yes, then explain the difference between trashing a free pizza menu and trashing a free Bible.
There is no “stack of menus” here. There is only what has been voluntarily abandned in your private rented space.
If someone decides it would be neighborly to leave you an issue of Honcho magazine in your room, do you feel you have the right to throw it away, or do you feel you have a responsibility to treasure and preserve it for the next guest.
I don’t get often get the urge, mainly because it feels like it would be the equivalent of trying to empty the Pacific Ocean with a spoon. Besides, I don’t want to touch it.
Which would prompt get torn down or vandalized. Just like putting a “Darwin Fish” on your car is a good way to get it vandalized.
Gideon Bibles do have one good use for travellers in need. Bible pages make decent rolling papers.
You don’t want to touch it? What, are Bibles MAGIC or something? :rolleyes:
Dio, upon further thought I have decided that I am persuaded by the cold logic of your argument; it is indeed the privilege of a person renting a hotel room to dispose of a Gideon Bible left there, as said Bibles are left with the express license for the renter to take them away.
But I still think it’s jerkish to do so. I realize that you said you wouldn’t do it yourself, so I obviously am not aiming this comment at you–but really, what is the point of depriving the next renter of something they might find desirable and comforting?
I do this all the time with Scientology crap, does that count? Whenever I go into a public place, and I see a pile of Dianetics cards or personality tests or whatever, I swipe the whole pile and put it in the nearest trashcan.
I’ve also gone through a whole stack of free weekly newspapers, pulling the Scieno flyers from each one.
I blame this thread for making me want to deface a religious notice today.
I saw a flier listing all of the religious organizations at my university on a bulletin board, and when my eye landed on “Messianic Jews”, I felt a sudden urge to grab a pen and scratch it out.
I didn’t, though.
You know, if they’d just call themselves Christians, I wouldn’t give a shit, but I find “Messianic Jew” to be incredibly irritating.
Whenever I find it. I have no problem with people preaching Christianity. But when people preach Christianity and claim it’s Judaism, I get pissed. I trash J4J pamphlets. I shout down J4J speakers. I give their headquarters the finger whenever I pass it.
This past Passover, I noticed a stack of fliers advertising a seder (the ritual meal celebrating the release from slavery in Egypt). I looked closer and saw ‘A Messianic Congregation’. I took the whole stack and dumped them in the trash.
While in a local pizzeria, I was examining the bulletin board. Among the standard ads for apartments, goods and services was a flier for Messianic ‘Judaism’. Without asking permission to remove it, I tore it down, ripped it to pieces and deposited it in the trash. None of the staff said anything to me.
I’m proud to remove and dispose of religious propaganda probably 3 or 4 times per week. While I am an atheist, the religous aspect of it doesn’t really factor into my descision. My typical routine is to collect all of the street spam on public property that I pass on the last mile or so of my jog and then throw it in the trash when I get home. Inevitably, about 40% is church ads and the rest is diet scams and “I buy houses” crap.
I’m no fan of any of that urban blight, but the religious stuff tends to set me off a little more. Shouldn’t churches respect the beauty of the natural enviroment instead of just throwing up another piece of future litter on a telephone pole or stop sign? Is the product they’re selling so slimy the only way to attract people to them is to innudate them with neon pink fliers? I would think that the churches themselves would be loathe to advertise themselves in the company of all of those other con artists, but to each his own I guess. To me it’s all the same; cheap, obnoxious, tacky crap that someone puts up because they (presumably)don’t live nearby and have to see it every day. Good riddance to bad rubbish.
I don’t have a huge problem with what ianzin does with the bibles in his hotel room. I just think it would be more effective if he held his breath and stomped his feet.