I don't see how that's stealing

Nearly got fired. Completely stupid, I still can't even believe it happened like that, I could nearly quit just out of moral outrage, or whatever, I'm telling you, it's the biggest joke I've ever been a part of.

They got me for stealing toilet paper. Which is ridiculous, because if I sit on the toilet all day "using" it, then that's "legitimate," but as soon as I put it in my bag and take it home because there isn't a shred of the stuff in the house, suddenly that's stealing. If it's free for employees to use, I don't see why it's got to be restricted to just inside the walls of the office. I've seen people make their little cups of coffee and cups of tea and then head off home, before they've finished it. Well there you go! That's stealing, isn't it? By the same twisted logic, I mean. And yet, just because there's some kind of taboo against toilet paper, some stupid bathroom taboo where people think whatever happens in there has to stay in there or else the rest of the workspace is somehow "unclean,"--there's a stigma, is what it is. As if we all don't need toilet paper at home, like we're all super-pure creatures whose waste is carried out of them by, like, divine something, I don't even know. It's ridiculous.

I've been stealing ("stealing") toilet paper for months, and now they say something. You could've told me something the first time, pulled me aside and said "I know you're new here, but we don't steal toilet paper, that's meant for the office and so we keep it here." I would have said OK--a little weird, to be restricting toilet paper to be used only within that one tiny little bathroom--but OK, if that's the way things are done here in this office for whatever reason, I don't want to make waves or anything. I'll be good. But instead they spring this on me now, after I've done it so successfully for months, and they expect me to go back to store-bought again. I mean, I know they only caught me today, but they could have said something earlier, you know?

I don't know where they get off accusing me of stealing from the company, like I don't do anything for them. I do my work, I put in my time. And it's not like I just grab the toilet paper and go, either. 'Cause they have to make it hard. The toilet paper dispensers are one of these locking numbers, where you have to have the janitor's key to unlock the thing and change the rolls. Which is stupid and juvenile, but whatever. So I have to unroll the entire thing until I have this big lump of toilet paper, then I stick it in my bag. I mean, I do it without complaining--I thought that was just kind of the deal, you make it hard for me and I don't complain about it--but it's still pretty annoying. Just this big loose mound of toilet paper in my bag all day and when I'm on my way home I can hear it rustling. But, whatever. I'll deal with it.

And then they have the nerve to tell me that they have a grievance with me taking loose toilet paper in my bag? Ha! I am the one who should have a legitimate grievance with them, for not providing convenient rolls of toilet paper for me to take home so I have to carry it home in my bag all loose and throw it under the sink that way like a--LIKE AN ANIMAL! Like a fucking animal, I am. But do I complain? No. Because I'm just trying to not make waves and pull a little toilet paper on the side. Is that so wrong? That I should not want to pay for toilet paper, and that I should take advantage of a free source of toilet paper if one presents itself to me? I don't see how that's wrong, I really don't.

I'm just afraid of what's coming next. What happens if I accidentally slip a pen into my pocket--can I get written up for that now if I get caught? Can I still use the paper cups in the breakroom? If I can use them all day, why can't I take a stack of them home when I'm planning a party? Because cups can't leave the breakroom now? It's fucking fascism is what it is. Next they're going to tell me I can't fill a thermos with soap when I run out of soap at home, because that soap is for the whole office too. What would they have me do? Show up for work, unwashed, because I have no soap at home? Fine, if that's what they want then I won't shower with their precious company soap for a while and see if they change their tune.

I'm not giving back any of my desk chairs though. I had to roll those all the way home.