Why Are Tarot Decks High Theft Items?

Not to slip too far from the main topic, but it is true that people only believe what they have been exposed to, and what most people have been exposed to with tarot is the new age sit com character, the late night tv jokes, and the typical Hollywood "tall dark stranger" routine..... None of which is taken seriously. So anyone who buys a tarot deck is a fool in the eyes of the vast majority of the public (speaking from experience in the U$A)

thinbuddha said:

Not to slip too far from the main topic, but it is true that people only believe what they have been exposed to, and what most people have been exposed to with tarot is the new age sit com character, the late night tv jokes, and the typical Hollywood "tall dark stranger" routine..... None of which is taken seriously. So anyone who buys a tarot deck is a fool in the eyes of the vast majority of the public (speaking from experience in the U$A)

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Indeed! quite the opposite of tarot as a brain-storming tool.

I've run into self-identified Christians who hung out in the New Age secion to harrass people into not looking at the books, so I don't have a problem believing that they might steal and destroy stock to keep it out of others's hands.

Maybe the book stores should just have a shelf of sacrifical Miss Cleo decks out--perfectly valid Rider Waite variant decks!

I can't wrap my head around anybody stealing a Bible. I guess if someone steals it, they really need it.

I'm tempted to buy a bunch of Miss Cleos myself and leave them in hotel rooms...

Pagan X said:

I'm tempted to buy a bunch of Miss Cleos myself and leave them in hotel rooms...

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There should be cheap tarot decks just so we can do things like that.
I would love to leave some around school, or put them in random people's bags.

And why would people steal bibles when there are free ones in hotels and other places.

I don't understand why some of these stores don't keep a book with copy images of the cards in it for people to look through it. This way, the customer can see whether they are compatible with a certain deck or not.

It would have to be an awfully big book, though...

Unknownspirit said:

There should be cheap tarot decks just so we can do things like that.
I would love to leave some around school, or put them in random people's bags.

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That is one amazingly good idea!

And why would people steal bibles when there are free ones in hotels and other places.

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Difficult... hotel rooms cost money, so it is arguable that the Gideon's bible in there isn't really "free".

Bibles (usually King James translation) can be gotten free fairly easily, but you have to go to places where you'll get preached at usually.

My own case, when I was a teenager, was different. I stole bibles I couldn't get any other way - I had no money, and I wanted bibles in Hebrew, Greek and Latin, and other languages. I was a bible addict. I had plenty of King James translations in various editions, handed down to me or just "found" somewhere, but I wanted more, and those kinds of bibles aren't found free anywhere ;-)

Ross

Personally I would be enchanted by a tarot box left in my bag- I really think many people would find it sinister though!

Actually after a girl at work who I didn't really know left, she snuck a religious book with annotations onto my desk. Now I am not christian and normally I hate anything that smacks of recruiting- but this book was obviously specially chosen, it had a very pretty cover, there was a note in saying something like 'you seem to like reading too, I wish we could have been better friends, come along to our group if you like.'

Well, I didn't! But I still like the book (despite not agreeing with it- well, I like most books). However had it been the opposite way round- someone leaving tarot cards for a 'do not suffer a witch' type- wow that could have blown up!

Ross G Caldwell said:

Difficult... hotel rooms cost money, so it is arguable that the Gideon's bible in there isn't really "free".

Bibles (usually King James translation) can be gotten free fairly easily, but you have to go to places where you'll get preached at usually.

My own case, when I was a teenager, was different. I stole bibles I couldn't get any other way - I had no money, and I wanted bibles in Hebrew, Greek and Latin, and other languages. I was a bible addict. I had plenty of King James translations in various editions, handed down to me or just "found" somewhere, but I wanted more, and those kinds of bibles aren't found free anywhere ;-)

Ross

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Your right, bookstores have all the cool bibles anyways. I'm not religious, but I want the one with the lime green mental cover. And book stores are easier to get to then places that have free bible. I have heard that there are stores that give them away for free but I have never seen a lot of them. Just some thrift stores.

I would completely freak if I found a Tarot deck in my bag. I'd think one of my kids slipped it in there or somehow it got in there when I was in one of my usual hangouts: bookstores and metaphysical shops. I'd be driving around town asking stores if it belonged to them until someone claimed it. I would not be able to relax with merchandise I did not buy that I found in my bag. (Yeah, I'm the type that *never* shoplifted as a teen, either.)

One time when my older son was a baby, we got out to the car and when we were folding the stroller, there was a book in the bottom that I'd been looking at but decided not to buy. Even though I took it right back in, I felt terrible that I'd unintentionally taken it without buying it.

That said, one day in geometry class at age 13, my books wouldn't fit under the desk and I reached under to find out why and pulled out Richard Bach's A Bridge Across Forever, which said it was a "love story" so I took it home and read it. It talked about things I'd never heard of, like astral projection and all sorts of new age things. I took it back to school and gave it to the girl who'd written her name in the cover, but reading it really opened up my world.

thinbuddha said:

Not to slip too far from the main topic, but it is true that people only believe what they have been exposed to, and what most people have been exposed to with tarot is the new age sit com character, the late night tv jokes, and the typical Hollywood "tall dark stranger" routine..... None of which is taken seriously. So anyone who buys a tarot deck is a fool in the eyes of the vast majority of the public (speaking from experience in the U$A)

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Well, that's not quite accurate because not all people believe everything in the media is true - if so, we would all have the same opinion about Tarot! And it would certainly not explain why people would steal Tarot cards as that would become quite a complex psychological/sociological question.

However, if it hasn't been done already, it would be a very interesting study to conduct as to why Tarot Decks or any metaphysical items are targets of theft. Probably could get funding for that.....