Good Clean Fun

I was recently switched to the crime and court beat at the Daily Herald and every day I watched as people dressed in prison garb with chains around their waist and handcuffs on their hands and feet stand before a judge and get sentenced for various crimes, most of them involving drugs or theft and I wonder where everything went so wrong?
Then I see things on facebook about how people are upset because their were cops patrolling the streets so kids don't smash pumpkins all over and how it is ridiculous to pay cops to ruin kids "good clean fun." I might mention, I do agree that cops should and do have better things to do than keep kids from smashing pumpkins but that is not the point.
While I think smashing pumpkins is silly, as far as I know, it isn't against the law. Although, I could easily see it being classified as vandalism. BUT the kids don't buy the pumpkins themselves, they steal them from other people. I actually wrote this on the facebook status as a comment and someone replied, "well they would just rot on people's porches anyways." That may be true but they are my pumpkins and it is my right to decide if the pumpkins rot on my porch or not and in the case of my mom her pumpkins were stolen several days before Halloween, so she didn't even get to enjoy them for the holiday.
Yes stealing pumpkins is a minor thing and yes they would just rot on my porch but that is not the point! We are raising kids in a society where petty theft is being considered "good clean fun."
I saw a guy get sentenced to more than a year in jail today because he stole a magazine from a convenience store. A magazine!! Granted this was his third theft, which classifies it as a third-degree felony, and I don't know the circumstances of a the other thefts but a magazine costs less than $5 and this kid is now going to spend time in jail because of it. If we are teaching our kids that is it okay to steal pumpkins than the jump to magazines or other seemingly small items can't be that far off.
If I had stolen and smashed pumpkins when I was in high school and my parents found out (which they would because they always do) I would've been grounded forever. I got in trouble when I was a little girl (like 7 or 8) for taking the pennies off my dad's dresser because they weren't mine.
The point is I learned at a very young age if it isn't yours don't take it, it seems like a pretty simple concept but apparently the message isn't getting passed along. If there are parents out there who think it is okay or even encourage their kids to go steal pumpkins on Halloween, then it is no wonder that our jails our full of people with theft charges against them.
Yes, I might be over exaggerating just a little bit because after all we are just talking about pumpkins here, but I don't think under any circumstances should it be considered okay to take other people's stuff no matter how small it might be.