Have I wanted to snack while wandering aisles of tempting food? Sure, I’ve been hungry while grocery shopping. I’ve been pregnant three times, and although I’ve been ravenous enough at times to down an entire carton of Rocky Road ice cream in one sitting, I’ve never been to the point where I couldn’t physically make it to the cashier and hand over my credit card. Being a law-abiding adult capable of postponing personal gratification until an appropriate time, I wait until I’ve paid for the goods before using them, and maybe naively, I assume others can do the same.

I am disgusted to think that the average American, at least as implied by the writer, is capable of abandoning all notions of right and wrong for half a granola bar or a Dixie cup of apple juice.

Choices have consequences. I asked my children, 8 and 10, individually, what they thought about eating food in a store before paying for it, and both children had the same response: “It’s stealing.” From the mouths of babes.

• Lavaniya Jimenez, Orem