Is this a justifyable act?

[Serious]

A hypothetical scenario comes: "there is a someone who believes that any form of contraception is intrinsically evil" (does it sound familiar?), and wishes to prevent some of the attempts. He (or she) walks around in drugstores and uses a thin needle to puncture the boxes of condoms. It is a reasonable assumption that the punctured contraceptives will result in pregnancies, some of which will probably carried to term.

What is your assessment of such a behavior?

(Funny that I am allowed to create and submit a poll, but not allowed to vote in it. Obviously I would vote the second option.)

[Pfaffenhofen]

Originally Posted by Serious

A hypothetical scenario comes: "there is a someone who believes that any form of contraception is intrinsically evil" (does it sound familiar?), and wishes to prevent some of the attempts. He (or she) walks around in drugstores and uses a thin needle to puncture the boxes of condoms. It is a reasonable assumption that the punctured contraceptives will result in pregnancies, some of which will probably carried to term.

What is your assessment of such a behavior?

(Funny that I am allowed to create and submit a poll, but not allowed to vote in it. Obviously I would vote the second option.)

It is utterly wrong. You cannot guess what the condoms are used for.
For instance, a man with AIDS may need them not to infect his wife.

[Perplexity]

Lol this is like asking if it's ok to knife tires if you think driving is wrong, or ok to burn Korans if u think it would prevent Islam, plus, for all you know this will just result in more abortions.(I'm assuming you're against those)

[Katholish]

Not only would that be wrong, it would be gravely wrong, and I would argue mortally sinful because of its scale. It is not just simple vandalism. The evil of contraception comes more from the intention of those who use it, than from the physical contraceptive itself (unlike abortion in which the killing of a child is a horrific act in and of itself regardless of the intention of those who do it).

In this case, you could be helping to spread diseaes.

[seekerz]

It is wrong on several levels: destruction of personal property, theft (the person would be paying for a damaged product), deceit and reckless disregard for another's health/life (by possibly exposing them to diseases they think they are at least partly protected from). I find it disturbing that someone would take it on themselves to personally subvert another's God-given free will in this manner and it's my opinion that such behavior should be reported. This is like vigilantes taking the law into their own hands - even if the people targeted are guilty, vigilante justice is still wrong in a society with a functioning, legitimate justice system.

[amcoffee]

Clearly it is illegal and inconsiderate. Morally, to me, this is not religiously clear.The argument that someone doing this would be breaking man made laws regarding property or safety is weak at best. 1. Men made the laws, they can change them. 2. Abortion is legal according to man made law but still opposed by the church. And 3. illegal civil disobediance is considered justified in protesting at abortion sites. As a moral issue, that someone might be using condoms for STD prevention but not contraception is ONLY effective if the participants are already, by age or natural ill health, infertile, and therefore their health could be endangered but contraception is not a "side effect" or convenient excuse. Similarly, it would be wrong for someone to seek to legally ban drugs used for contraception and condoms, if they could be used for health reasons, but then what if an abortion is deemed needed for health reasons? Is this clear or gray?

[JRKH]

Originally Posted by amcoffee

Clearly it is illegal and inconsiderate. Morally, to me, this is not religiously clear.The argument that someone doing this would be breaking man made laws regarding property or safety is weak at best. 1. Men made the laws, they can change them. 2. Abortion is legal according to man made law but still opposed by the church. And 3. illegal civil disobediance is considered justified in protesting at abortion sites. As a moral issue, that someone might be using condoms for STD prevention but not contraception is ONLY effective if the participants are already, by age or natural ill health, infertile, and therefore their health could be endangered but contraception is not a "side effect" or convenient excuse. Similarly, it would be wrong for someone to seek to legally ban drugs used for contraception and condoms, if they could be used for health reasons, but then what if an abortion is deemed needed for health reasons? Is this clear or gray?

It is actually quite clear...But I'm not sure if I can clearly explain it

The OP's scenario has nothing to do with Abortion so let's dispose of that one first.
Abortion is wrong because it is murder. The death of an innocent human being. For this reason, the fight to educate and to end abortion is a civil as well as a religious moral good. The matter being discussed here is different. The damaging of condoms in the store has no effect on abortion - or - if it does it would be to increase abortions as those using the damaged condoms abort the resulting pregnancies....

Now to deal more precisely with the scenario...
The action proposed in the OP is morally wrong because it violates the Law of Love...Love your neighbor as yourself. It causes damage to your neighbor in a couple of ways.
For the store owner, it results in returns, complaints, lost business and revenues.
For the user, it could cause them to spread disease or a pregnancy that would then...
Cause harm to the child so conceived because the Child would most likely be aborted.

The scenario also violates the Law of Love by circumventing the person's free will choice to NOT be Catholic and to act on his conscience - using a method of contraception that - in point of fact - prevents conception - as opposed to aborting the conceived child as so many other, chemical, methods do.

As an adjunct to this violation of the law of Love in this way, once it is known that the condoms were deliberately damaged, it will cause the user, and many others to "blame" those "evil pro-life Christians" and make harder the task of evangelization and persuasion that Abortion is wrong in all it's forms.

I hope this helps you understand better.

Peace
James

[revert_jen]

Originally Posted by JRKH

It is actually quite clear...But I'm not sure if I can clearly explain it

Let me put your mind at rest then...

That was a GREAT explanation, thanks!

--Jen

[JRKH]

Originally Posted by revert_jen

Let me put your mind at rest then...

That was a GREAT explanation, thanks!

--Jen

Thanks Jen. I hope "amcoffee" agrees.

There really is no moral upside to the proposed action...

Peace
James

[amcoffee]

Originally Posted by JRKH

Thanks Jen. I hope "amcoffee" agrees.

There really is no moral upside to the proposed action...

Peace
James

Abortion is killing. Is all killing murder? Our laws allow, and our bible allows some killing even of innocents. The history of the church is rife with justified killing. If the full term of the pregnancy will cause the death of the mother is there a question of self-defense? If the full term of a pregnancy of twins or other multiple births will cause the death of all the babies is the deliberate in-utero death of one justified as defense of others? Is the separation of doomed conjoined twins forbidden if it it will preserve the life of one to kill the other? I just see that morality is not always clear or easy. "Thou shall not kill" is easy to say but it may directly result in the death of someone else and therefore have you killed by not killing? Catholics do not refrain from military service as some other religions do, Amish, Quakers, etc. on the basis of religious beliefs. A bomber pilot or an artillary gunner, may kill many innocents in war. It's just not simple to me.

[JRKH]

Originally Posted by amcoffee

Abortion is killing. Is all killing murder? Our laws allow, and our bible allows some killing even of innocents. The history of the church is rife with justified killing. If the full term of the pregnancy will cause the death of the mother is there a question of self-defense? If the full term of a pregnancy of twins or other multiple births will cause the death of all the babies is the deliberate in-utero death of one justified as defense of others? Is the separation of doomed conjoined twins forbidden if it it will preserve the life of one to kill the other? I just see that morality is not always clear or easy. "Thou shall not kill" is easy to say but it may directly result in the death of someone else and therefore have you killed by not killing? Catholics do not refrain from military service as some other religions do, Amish, Quakers, etc. on the basis of religious beliefs. A bomber pilot or an artillary gunner, may kill many innocents in war. It's just not simple to me.

This is an entirely different topic than what is proposed here in this thread.
I suggest that this be posted as a new thread so as not to derail this one.

Peace
James

[revert_jen]

Originally Posted by Katholish

Not only would that be wrong, it would be gravely wrong, and I would argue mortally sinful because of its scale. It is not just simple vandalism. The evil of contraception comes more from the intention of those who use it, than from the physical contraceptive itself (unlike abortion in which the killing of a child is a horrific act in and of itself regardless of the intention of those who do it).

In this case, you could be helping to spread diseaes.

This, exactly.

You haven't saved anyone from sinning, because the sin is in the intention. You haven't made anything better. If you want to stand near the condoms and try to talk people out of using them (until you get thrown out of the store), that's one thing, but to go about in a cowardly manner and secretly damage them is wrong on several levels.

--Jen

[Zundrah]

Originally Posted by Pfaffenhofen

It is utterly wrong. You cannot guess what the condoms are used for.
For instance, a man with AIDS may need them not to infect his wife.

I didn't even think about this point you made. My mind was on pregnancy.

[Zundrah]

Originally Posted by Serious

A hypothetical scenario comes: "there is a someone who believes that any form of contraception is intrinsically evil" (does it sound familiar?), and wishes to prevent some of the attempts. He (or she) walks around in drugstores and uses a thin needle to puncture the boxes of condoms. It is a reasonable assumption that the punctured contraceptives will result in pregnancies, some of which will probably carried to term.

What is your assessment of such a behavior?

(Funny that I am allowed to create and submit a poll, but not allowed to vote in it. Obviously I would vote the second option.)

I want to vote that I don't think it is acceptable. But on the pole you say "because it is wrong to tamper with store property". I believe it is wrong because no one should think they can dictate to what another persons choices are. If they want to use contraception, then let it be.

As a result you could be responsible for a child being reared in a destructive home.

[JRKH]

Originally Posted by Zundrah

I want to vote that I don't think it is acceptable. But on the pole you say "because it is wrong to tamper with store property". I believe it is wrong because no one should think they can dictate to what another persons choices are. If they want to use contraception, then let it be.

As a result you could be responsible for a child being reared in a destructive home.

Completely agree with this. I voted it is wrong, but the specific reason is only part of the issue.
It's wrong for a number of reasons...But two primary ones.
Destruction of the property of another.
Interference with the free will of another.

The second - interfering with the free will choice of another takes into account the idea (expressed by another poster) of the purchaser's intent to protect their partner from disease.

The bottom line is that the act is contrary to the Law of Love.

Peace
James