This is only true in the US. In Europe if you don’t return the cart you can be sure people will give you looks and think about you as an asshole
People in the US give you a look and think you’re an asshole too.
But America bad.
Around here there are definitely consequences in the form of pesky looks and headshakes. Well at least coming from me.
I’ve even helped by putting my nose in the air and saying, “that’s ok, I’ll put it away for you”
Typically parking lots are filled with cars, and I need to drive between the parked cars. If a cart is in the way it makes it harder for me to leave, just saying
Ive been to ~7 grocery stores ~80 times in the past couple weeks. Was driving instacart at night to get some bills paid I was worried about. Not once did I come across carts that were just in the parking spots/street, they always are in the cart holders that take up parking spots. I standardly pull my cart from one of those and wheel it into the store which leaves it at a net 0 move when I put it back… That said, with the number of people who are hunting for jobs right now that I know, this may be the first time I would say the store hiring someone to return carts is another employed person. Kroger really isn’t going to go bankrupt supporting the local populace with 1 extra job. Publix on the other hand has employees actively asking to take my cart before I can close the trunk. Had been pretty impressed by it. One day I went to 4 different Krogers, it is a bit interesting to see the difference in the stores based upon the people/house cost that live in the areas.
I don’t know where you are, but the Krogers by me are all way understaffed.
If your litmus test involves doing free labor for a for profit corporation you’re already fucked
Imagine how dense you have to be to think this way.
If you piss on the toilet seat, do you clean it up (free labour as you call it) or hire a cleaner?
It’s interesting to read the comments, as there are people who are like
I sometimes don’t return the cart and I attest myself to not be a bad person. Therfore the test is bullshit.
But then they behave like a dick in the comments; showing involuntarily that the test is a good metric.
So I think even a post about this test works like the test on a more meta level.
You return your cart because it’s the right thing to do
I return my cart because it gives me a sense of superiority
We are not the same
I straighten them because they annoy me lol.
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Sheep mentality, another way in which the shopping cart is the mirror of our society
I knew I wasn’t the only one.
I’ll also go fetch a couple on the way if I see some hanging out. It’s not because I’m trying to make the cart wrangler’s job easier, but because it’s not orderly and it bothers me. I have to consciously limit myself or I’d end up patrolling the whole lot.
You return your cart because it’s the right thing to do
I return my cart to get my euro back that I put in to unlock it
You guys still do that?
Mr fancy pants here with full euro coins.
I treasure my red plastic €0.50 coin replica more than my life.
You guys can use €0.50 coins?! Over here in Australia it’s either a $1 or $2 coin. I wish I could chuck a 50¢ piece in the trolley.
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I put in a 2€ and look down on other shoppers
Why not just 3D print a few more?
Why 3d print them when the same supermarket gives them out for free?
Wait, they do? Why would they do that?
Eh, 'cause otherwise people will have to exchange money for coins, sometimes people don’t have notes to exchange, etc… Seems like retaining the token is incentive enough to return the cart…
Why not just ask for another one?
Likewise if you’re a smoker - you should go directly to jail.
Look man, you can occasionally be selfish or lazy without immediately being an absolute drain on society. Is not putting the cart back ultimately a dick move? Yeah, but its also an incredibly minor dick move, and maybe I’ve already used up all of my fucks for the day.
TIL I’m mostly a good person but sometimes I am also no better than an animal and an absolute savage who will only do right when threatened. Interesting. Another thing is that I’m grateful for other savages who don’t put their carts back cause I don’t have to walk so far to get a cart.
What if you take them home to burn leaves in?
That goes for everything you can return but don’t have to. You can throw your trash away after the movie, you don’t have to leave it in the theatre.
Not all return situations are equal either. There is a difficulty factor. I’ve returned carts every time in my life except once. I was about 50 car rows deep in a massive crowded lot and I realized there were no cart corrals at all. At the back of the massive lot and much, much closer to me was a bunch of carts. I pushed a few together and added mine. The difference in this scenario was not me.
See this is an exception that proves the rule. The fact that there was no way for you to return the cart to a cart corral means that it was a noticeable and memorable event, a deviation from what should normally be the correct way of doing things. If you had been a person who’d never returned carts, this would have just been a day ending with the letter “y.”
Germany are good at this. Not great, mind you, but good.
I wonder what Japanese movie theatre’s are like
I was concerned this was going to be a comment about what I put in my shopping cart.
But I can tell I’m an individual of extreme self-discipline because after I filled my shopping cart with chocolate and vodka I return it to the carousel.
Everyone praised me.
Nope, I don’t buy it.
- An estimated one out of every 500 Americans is homeless
- Unarmed noncombatant civilian women and children are being bombed, shot, and starved to death.
- There has been a nearly 70% reduction in wild vertebrates worldwide since 1970
- The leading cause of death among children and teens in america is firearms
Privileged westerners could do something about these things, but they are sipping their pumpkin spice lattes and congratulating each other for putting their shopping carts back because, you know, it’s the ultimate test of moral righteousness. Ugh.
I agree that people should put the carts where they go, but this whole “I’m a better human because I put carts back” thing just reeks of unredeemable people scouring their existence for a single redeeming property.
