# Note to family: Stop giving our little felon money! **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [September 5, 2007, 7:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/note-to-family-stop-giving-our-little-felon-money/418099 "2007-09-05T07:57:32Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Lockseer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/a5b964/32.png) [@Lockseer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lockseer)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2007, 7:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/note-to-family-stop-giving-our-little-felon-money/418099/1 "2007-09-05T07:57:32Z")
Don’t know who to pit more…my half-brother who stole one of my step-mom’s credit card last fall and ran up $10,000 in charges on it…or my step-mom who 1) didn’t press charges then and 2) lent him her credit card AGAIN this past month to rent a moving truck…at which point he promptly ran up another $8,000 in charges. I’d pit my dad, who gave him a check for $3,000 for community college tuition, but then called the registrar’s office to find out my half-brother wasn’t registered for classes. Then again, my dad did take on the original $10,000 in debt onto his (lower rate) credit cards so my step-mom wouldn’t be hit by astronomical interest. To her credit, she pressed charges this past time…only to find my half-brother (I refuse to claim him his a full-blood relative after all this shit) was already in a jail cell for two days after violating his probation by failing his last drug test. He’d been put on probation after being arrested for possession of marijuana with intent to distribute (and dad, of course, footed the lawyer’s bills). My dad actually made the comment about his own 18-year-old son “Is it too late to get an abortion?” Tasteless, yes. But not completely inappropriate. ---
**Author:** ![The\_King\_of\_Soup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/a87d85/32.png) [@The\_King\_of\_Soup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_King_of_Soup)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2007, 3:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/note-to-family-stop-giving-our-little-felon-money/418099/2 "2007-09-06T03:22:47Z")
Yup, kids are a trial sometimes. I was, and I bet you are. But sometimes parents feel obligated to clean things up anyhow, just as they might if they had, after eighteen years, accidentally dropped a fragile bag into which they had forced their own personal garbage without thought for the consequences for a couple of decades, and it burst open. Their efforts to clean up the mess may be inadequate and self-destructive, but that doesn’t mean their original instinct – that of taking responsibility for their offspring – is wrong. You had a different childhood, a different upbringing, a different mother than your half-brother. The money spent so far to save him (in your view) has not been yours. Judge him all you want, but refrain from spending others’ money for them – that’s what _he_’s doing that you find so objectionable. Good luck to you, but it sounds as if you’ve reached adulthood. Enjoy it, not least because it absolves you from participating directly in your immediate family’s mistakes. If it’s any consolation, they don’t get to pry into your life either. He’s not “our” little felon, because he’s not “yours” in any sense of the word. The money isn’t “yours” either. Eighty years from now, should your rancor fester that long, you can deny him a decent burial – and won’t _that_ show everyone? ---
**Author:** ![Incubus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/c68b51/32.png) [@Incubus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Incubus)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2007, 3:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/note-to-family-stop-giving-our-little-felon-money/418099/3 "2007-09-06T03:57:57Z")
I think one of the most frustrating things about stories like this is that these type of individuals are thriving on overly trusting/loving family members. I don’t see any reason why this guy shouldn’t be out on his ass. Your family should wash their hands of him. If he suffers because of it, it is because _he_ made that choice- it isn’t anyone else’s fault. ---
**Author:** ![Lockseer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/a5b964/32.png) [@Lockseer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lockseer)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2007, 4:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/note-to-family-stop-giving-our-little-felon-money/418099/4 "2007-09-06T04:31:08Z")
[QUOTE=The King of Soup] You had a different childhood, a different upbringing, a different mother than your half-brother. The money spent so far to save him (in your view) has not been yours. Judge him all you want, but refrain from spending others’ money for them – that’s what _he_’s doing that you find so objectionable. [/QUOTE] Excellent point. I just wish I could view the money they’re giving him as money that is meant to “save” him, as opposed to money that they are being bilked out of, over and over. My dad is learning, bless him…he offered to go to the registrar’s office with him to get things straightened out (my half-brother said it must have been an error in their records), and the kid threw a huge fit, complaining that he’s not trusted (GASP!) and stormed out of the restaurant, almost getting them both thrown out in the process. But, apparently Jesus visited him in jail and he’s ready to amend his ways, and wants to go back home and live with my step-mom, having changed his ways. I suggested to my dad that they all sit down and write up an agreement where my half-brother lists the “deal breakers” that would get him kicked out. How exactly has he reformed, and what is he willing to commit to? ---
**Author:** ![Doug\_Bowe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/df788c/32.png) [@Doug\_Bowe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Doug_Bowe)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2007, 5:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/note-to-family-stop-giving-our-little-felon-money/418099/5 "2007-09-06T05:02:11Z")
Okay, do we have mental problems here? If we do not, I’m very sorry, but he needs to lose it. He needs to get faced with survival without cruches. It’s Real Life. What he does in the next few years will determine where he ends up. ---
**Author:** ![Beadalin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/3be4f8/32.png) [@Beadalin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beadalin)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2007, 3:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/note-to-family-stop-giving-our-little-felon-money/418099/6 "2007-09-06T15:25:21Z")
> [@The King of Soup](#): > > Yup, kids are a trial sometimes. I was, and I bet you are. But sometimes parents feel obligated to clean things up anyhow, just as they might if they had, after eighteen years, accidentally dropped a fragile bag into which they had forced their own personal garbage without thought for the consequences for a couple of decades, and it burst open. Their efforts to clean up the mess may be inadequate and self-destructive, but that doesn’t mean their original instinct – that of taking responsibility for their offspring – is wrong. Sometimes, **The King of Soup** , you have real insight. Other times, you just come across as one sanctimonious, self-righteous jerk. Your post in this thread made me harken back to what you said in **Foxy40** ’s [thread about her thieving son](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=433625). Both families have adult sons who stole thousands of dollars from credit cards, and have parents cleaning up the mess in the way that seems best to them. Your message to **Lockseer** seems to be, “How dare you judge your family for enabling a thief?” Whereas your message to Foxy seemed to be, “You are a terrible parent! I judge you and find you wanting!” Seems more than a little hypocritical to me. For reference, here’s what you said to Foxy: > [@](#): > > Your thread title is correct, Foxy – through a combination of lazy discipline and sheer inattention, you created a monster. But at least you got something for it in return: a much easier time parenting (up 'til now, at least) than you otherwise might have had. It’s up to you to decide whether you got a good deal. I doubt that your son or your community will end up profiting by it. I wonder if your realization of this bargain isn’t an important part of your reluctance to involve the outside world (be it psychiatric, penal, or military) in possible solutions – is it that you wish to spare your son from condemnation, or yourself? > > In any event, your current efforts seem likely to produce a more resentful monster who finds it more difficult to victimize, well, only yourself. I find this to be slightly unneighborly of you. If the monster decides to find prey elsewhere, expect a visit from torch-and-pitchfork-bearing villagers. > > I offer some hope: few of us have the same personality in maturity that we did at nineteen. But one reason for this is that we are socialized by outside forces as well as by our parents. If you shield him from the former even as you decide to pick up the reins you dropped – how many years ago? – the maturation process will continue to be stifled. > > I taught my son to ride a bicycle by using training wheels. You taught yours to be a thief the same way – by making it easy, and by being there to catch him when he fell. ---
**Author:** ![pantheon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/6bbea6/32.png) [@pantheon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pantheon)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2007, 5:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/note-to-family-stop-giving-our-little-felon-money/418099/7 "2007-09-06T17:34:29Z")
Beadalin- I’m sure TKoS would have yet another set of advice if he were speaking to the perpetrator of the actions themselves, too. What you may be overlooking is that he is advising a sibling to divorce himself from the issues of his half-brother and parents, while in the other thread he is addressing a parent who has already expressed culpability in helping create the problem. I took his message to Lockseer as “judge him all you want” [direct quote] but stay out of it, and the resolution, for your own sanity. Sometimes it is hard for siblings to remember that it’s not their money being thrown at the problem, especially when they feel it would have been better spent on themselves, to advance the responsible one, rather than ‘wasted’ on the bad sheep. It’s a natural reaction to resent the bad behavior being ‘rewarded’ with more money, and sometimes it helps to be reminded that you are your own person. It can be very liberating to delineate yourself, as he sagely pointed out. ---
**Author:** ![descamisado](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e480ec/32.png) [@descamisado](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/descamisado)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2007, 6:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/note-to-family-stop-giving-our-little-felon-money/418099/8 "2007-09-06T18:30:22Z")
[QUOTE=pantheon] Beadalin- I’m sure TKoS would have yet another set of advice if **he** were speaking to the perpetrator of the actions themselves, too. . . . [/QUOTE] TKoS = she. ---
**Author:** ![pantheon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/6bbea6/32.png) [@pantheon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pantheon)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2007, 6:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/note-to-family-stop-giving-our-little-felon-money/418099/9 "2007-09-06T18:58:58Z")
Oops, sorry! My sentiments remaining regardless of the sundry plumbing of the messenger. 😉