It was Dec.16, 1976. Three masked men had been seen sneaking into the Louvre Museum through a second floor window. Right when they entered, the trio attacked two guards, raced to the Apollo Hall and snatched King Charles X’s diamond-studded sword without a moment’s notice. They left right after the automatic alarm system went off, never to be seen again.

History seemed to have repeated itself last Sunday, where four individuals had stolen $110 million worth of jewelry in nearly the exact same way. A lot of newspapers in France have been calling it the “Heist of the Century,” but if you have ever been to an art museum, you wouldn’t find that to be the case.

Take the Beach Museum as an example. It’s not nearly as fancy as the Louvre, but bear with me here. Imagine you are walking through an exhibit and you see a large ceramic vase. You take a minute to admire its craftsmanship. The glossy finish, the unique blends of colors. You wonder how long it must have taken to make such a masterpiece.

Then the intrusive thoughts come in. As you are literally standing a foot away from this thing, there is nothing in between you and the vase. You could steal the vase, move it into a different room, you could even smash it into a billion little pieces. The one thing stopping you from doing anything to the art is your self-control, which cannot be said for more impulsive museum-goers.

Security in art museums is not that secure in the first place. I’ve been to the Museum of Modern Art in New York, a much nicer museum compared to the Beach. The only difference between these is that in half of the rooms, there’s an old guy eyeing you in the corner, waiting to scream at you for being an inch too close to a painting. He is not a cop, he doesn’t have any weapons, it’s just a regular guy. The Louvre had the same type of security guards, and they all got scared away the minute the robbers started snatching stuff.

If the Louvre is to make an effort to protect their art, it needs to become a private business. It is a government owned entity that has constantly undermined their workers and lowballed the building’s budget any chance they get. None of this would be happening if these clowns in office weren’t running the most prestigious in France. But for now, all we can do is wait for another “heist of the century.”