In the name of friendship

I am baffled by many things.  One thing in particular has me puzzled as of late: friendship abuse.  I have many friends who are great at making deals, negotiating, bargaining, and I actually am not too shabby myself at times.  In the midst of what can be a positive attribute, however, I never want to take advantage of my friends or anyone for that matter.

One example that comes to mind is when people want to make a deal with performers.  Many of my friends are musicians and that is their profession, their main source of income.  I understand tight budgets and networking and such when you are trying to book performers (having been a booking agent), but I know that they are trying to pay their bills and put food on the table; many of them doing so for their family.  Some may be in a place financially to make a deal with friends, but many of the ones I know are not.  Even though, a few of them often will negotiate with friends, it's polite not to expect it of them.

Another example, my husband loaned a valuable piece of equipment to someone and it was stolen while in this person's possession.  I found out through his wife's facebook status that the piece of equipment had been stolen, told my husband who had no clue, and he called this person to confront him.  This guy came up with excuses as to why he didn't say anything and then offered a really low price to replace it.  A price that is actually several hundreds of dollars less than the value.  My husband said that he wanted a certain amount for it, an amount that is less than half of the value.  This person decided that he wanted to negotiate and continued to come up with excuses as to why he didn't feel the need to pay for this stolen property and said that friendship and relationship should be more important.  He also proceeded to say that his reputation far out weighs my husband's should there ever be question of that.  Interesting . . . and sad . . . and just really unfortunate that this incident is now a wedge between them.

I do believe that friendship and relationship is more important than material things, and I also believe that doing what is right and truthful and honorable is important as well.  Don't take advantage of others in the name of friendship.  Not cool.