Timeline for What is the difference between stealing and robbing?
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
26 events
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| Dec 21, 2023 at 1:23 | comment | added | gotube♦ | @MonroeMann "common usage of English doesn't make it 'right'". The only arbiter of what's right in English is common usage. Legal terminology one arbitrary jurisdiction does not determine what's correct in common usage anywhere, including within that jurisdiction. Even if you, due to your legal experience, would say something like, "it was stolen via robbery" on the street, that doesn't mean it's how we should be teaching English learners that it's the natural way to express it, because it's not. | |
| Dec 19, 2023 at 19:53 | comment | added | mattdm | @Vicky To me (Am Eng), "working in the library" sounds kind of strange in either sense. I think we'd mostly say "working at the library", whether I am employed there or using it as a quiet place to log into wifi or do research, and figure out the rest from context. | |
| Dec 19, 2023 at 19:50 | comment | added | mattdm | @MonroeMann — there is no authoritative arbiter of correctness of English other than common usage and understanding. And, uh, that common understanding says that you are wrong about moral support -- and "morale support" extremely uncommon. You may also want to consider "moral victory". "Moral support" is support which (at least to the person offering) seems good, right, and virtuous. | |
| Dec 19, 2023 at 19:21 | comment | added | Vicky | As an aside from the point about robbing and stealing - to me (Br Eng), "working at the library" means I am employed by the library, for example as a librarian. "Working in the library" means I am doing my work, whatever that may be, in the library building. Is the same true in Am Eng? | |
| Dec 19, 2023 at 4:12 | comment | added | Monroe Mann | Note: common usage of English doesn't make it 'right'. 95% of the population do not know the difference between the words moral and morale. Key point: most people think the phrase for getting supportive encouragement is 'moral support. That is patently incorrect. You're not asking for help making ethical decisions. You are seeking help with your mood, i.e. your morale. The correct phrase thus is 'morale support', and yet most people stupidly continue to write and say, 'moral support'. Logically, when you think about it, you realize how stupid that sounds! | |
| Dec 19, 2023 at 4:09 | comment | added | Monroe Mann | @Divizna It depends. If a pickpocket is able to take the wallet without touching me, and without me knowing what is happening, it may still be classified as mere theft. But if the pickpocket makes it known what is happening and/or touches my body while removing the wallet, that could be considered robbery. It could also sometimes be considered robbery if 'force' must be used to remove the wallet, i.e. unsnapping a button on the pocket, or having to use force to pull the wallet from the pocket, or of course, pulling the wallet from ones hand. Every jurisdiction is slightly different. | |
| Dec 19, 2023 at 4:03 | comment | added | Monroe Mann | @TonyK Lawyers do not speak the same way you do on the streets. Something 'stolen via robbery' is legally and technically correct. It was a) stolen, and b) by way of robbery (as opposed to theft). The manner in which something is stolen is a legal distinction: was it theft, or was it robbery, or was it theft by way of burglary, i.e. stolen via burglary. However, the way I speak as a lawyer is also how I speak on the streets, so if I am robbed, and someone takes my wallet, and someone asks me what happened to my wallet, I'd say, "it was stolen via robbery". :D | |
| Dec 18, 2023 at 22:19 | comment | added | JimmyJames | @Divizna I'm mostly sure I agree with you. My point is that 'had her purse robbed' is obviously (to me) meant to tell you that someone stole from her purses while she wasn't looking. Washington D.C. was the closest major metropolitan area to me growing up, so I'm wondering if there's a regional aspect to this, but the phrasing is unambiguous to me. It does occur to me that the passive 'had' might be confusing but it's completely idiomatic to me. I didn't even notice it until now. | |
| Dec 18, 2023 at 22:03 | comment | added | Divizna | @JimmyJames Oh no, I wasn't speaking legally or formally. I think the issue here is that the verb "rob" has a much wider use than the noun "robbery". When someone picks a pocket, it's theft, not robbery, and the person who did it is a thief, not a robber. But the verb is different: it's used as a direct equivalent of "steal from". So when the victim finds their wallet missing, they say they have been robbed. But, counterintuitive as it may be, it's only the verb that can be used in this situation, not the derived noun. (I guess there's probably some meaning shift history behind it all.) | |
| Dec 18, 2023 at 17:59 | comment | added | JimmyJames | I don't think the quote implies the purse was stolen. It implies it had contents taken from it. If I say 'my car was robbed', it means someone broke into it, stole things from it and left the car. It's a very different meaning from saying 'my car was stolen'. | |
| Dec 18, 2023 at 17:34 | comment | added | JimmyJames | @Divizna Maybe formally/legally that's true but it's completely idiomatic for someone to exclaim "we've been robbed!" if they find their home has been burglarized. This isn't a legal site and I'm not sure why these legal distinctions are being made. | |
| Dec 18, 2023 at 17:31 | comment | added | JimmyJames | @Dúthomhas That's not really the case, at least not e.g. the US. The money in the tellers' drawers doesn't belong to any particular person. | |
| Dec 18, 2023 at 17:27 | comment | added | JimmyJames | @DavidGelhar You can also 'rob a grave', 'rob a nest', 'rob a house', 'rob a train', 'rob a country/nation'. And by adding 'of <something>' you idiomatically say things like, "excessive heat robs an engine of power". | |
| Dec 18, 2023 at 11:35 | comment | added | Zach Lipton | Someone who goes away on vacation and comes home to find their place cleaned out might say "I've been robbed" even though nothing was taken off their person. That wouldn't be a robbery in the legal sense, but people use the term robbery in a more expansive way. | |
| Dec 18, 2023 at 6:18 | history | edited | gotube♦ | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
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| Dec 18, 2023 at 0:05 | comment | added | Divizna | By your definition, "taking something off of someone's person, with or without violence or violent threats", picking someone's pocket counts as robbery. I'm pretty sure it doesn't. Robbery is defined by use of force, not stealth. | |
| Dec 17, 2023 at 22:32 | comment | added | Dúthomhas | I think this is one of those weirdness with the English language. We aren’t robbing the bank. We are robbing people of their money from the bank. | |
| Dec 17, 2023 at 21:32 | comment | added | barbecue | @DavidGelhar A human being is a "natural person." A bank is a person, but not a natural person. Banks and other businesses are legally persons. That's why they have first amendment rights. | |
| Dec 17, 2023 at 20:23 | comment | added | David Gelhar | Legal definitions aside, "You cannot 'rob' a thing. You can only rob a person." does not really hold true in general usage. You can "rob a bank" etc. And, regardless of legal defintions, breaking into the bank at night to make off with some money would be commonly referred to as "robbing the bank" not "burglarizing the bank" | |
| Dec 17, 2023 at 20:08 | comment | added | Hearth | @Dúthomhas That mostly agrees with my (native AmE speaker, 30ish, no legal experience whatsoever) usage, except that you can still call it theft even if it's also robbery or burglary--I conceptualize robbery and burglary as types of theft, which is a broader category. | |
| Dec 17, 2023 at 18:27 | comment | added | Dúthomhas | Regardless of the examples, the second paragraph does define all of the terms correctly, including for common usage. Robbery requires the presence of the person being deprived of their property. Burglary requires some kind of intrusion into a protected space without its person(s) present. Theft is taking what is not yours when the other two don’t apply. AFAIU. | |
| Dec 17, 2023 at 18:20 | comment | added | manassehkatz-Moving 2 Codidact | The traditional Jewish understanding of "Thou shalt not steal" is "kidnapping". Because in general the 10 commandments are understood to be capital crimes, and ordinary theft, or even robbery, isn't considered a capital crime (at least under traditional Jewish law) but under some circumstances kidnapping, "stealing a person" is. | |
| Dec 17, 2023 at 18:04 | comment | added | Kevin | These are technical (legal) definitions, which do not necessarily agree with common usage. When you are in court, or otherwise discussing matters of law, you have the right to say that your definitions are correct and the common usage is wrong. But this site is not about the law, it is about common usage. | |
| Dec 17, 2023 at 16:48 | comment | added | TonyK | "Stolen via robbery"? That doesn't sound like anything a native speaker would say! The natural way to say it is "she was once robbed of her purse there". | |
| S Dec 17, 2023 at 16:38 | review | First answers | |||
| Dec 17, 2023 at 18:21 | |||||
| S Dec 17, 2023 at 16:38 | history | answered | Monroe Mann | CC BY-SA 4.0 |