Parental responsibility?

Great Debates
1

In order to not hijack this thread ( http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=39356 )
any more, I’ll start it up just on this

In it, a poster mentioned a parent who used thier minor child’s urine as their own in a urine test (to avoid detection of the drugs the parent was taking).

I submitted my thought, that the parent in question was “avoiding personal responsibility” and that their actions were less than what we’d hope a good parent would be. My specific statements were : “Always wondered about the wonderful life lesson going on there about personal responsibility” to which ** 2sense ** replied "It’s not like he is blaming the kid for his drug use. … and I disagree that the friend is avoiding personal responsability "

I tried replying to him specifically, and ** Asmodean ** added “The parent’s only consequense of the actions was that he had to use his sons urine. Changing the consequences of a action is not avoiding it.”
So. Rather than hijack that thread anymore, here it is:

Situation: A parent uses drugs that would turn up in a drug screen. When faced with a required drug screen, said parent obtains a urine specimin from their minor child in order to avoid the detection of their drug use.

Question: Is this parents actions justified? Morally right?

My feeling is that a parent who would use thier minor child to avoid the negative consequences of their own behavior is behaving in a morally reprehensive way. Specificaly, if you feel the drug laws are wrong and should be changed, fine. work to change them. but to attempt to circumvent the known consequence of your own behavior by using your child is wrong.

2

The parent is not avoiding responsibility. They are avoiding undesirable consequences. I see a difference.
To me it seems that avoiding responsibility would be blaming someone else for your own actions.

3

So if I avoid being caught robbing the bank, I’m not responsible for it, I’m merely avoiding the negative consequences of it? Just so long as I don’t blame some one else?

4

The funny thing is, I bet this parent actually expects his kids to respect him.

5

wring:

No.
The bank robber is responsible.
But avoiding consequences is not the same thing as avoiding responsibility.

Alessan:

Why wouldn’t the child respect the parent?
The parent isn’t lying to the child.

6

2sense - Ok, so a person could cause an accident (be responsible for it) and avoid the consequences (by leaving the scene etc.) Is THAT your point?

But, then, you see my problem is that the moral person would NOT avoid the consequences/responsibility of thier actions. And Certainly would not elicit the assistance of an innocent minor in the avoidance.

When I speak of “personal responsability” I mean the acceptance of the natural consequences of your actions. The OP here is “is this a moral act”

7

Ah, a hypothical question. I hate hypothetical questions, because they’re always so vague. (Yes, I know you started with a specific example, but it was quite generic to start with & now you’ve turned it into a hypothetical.)

Question - why did the parent have to take a urine test? Did zie* not have time to choose another means of testing clean, or was zie just too lazy and/or unmotivated to stop long enough to test clean?

Question - Why is parent using drugs? Is zie merely a recreational user, or is zie self-medicating? (Example - I know a number of paraplegics who smoke marijuana daily as an anti-spasmodic. I won’t get into the details of why they’ve chosen this medication over others - suffice it to say that their physicians agree that it is an appropriate choice.)

Question - How old is minor child? Mature enough to discuss and appreciate the difference between breaking any and all laws at random, and breaking a specific law with which you disagree? Young enough to allow parent to obtain a urine specimen without question, thereby bypassing the moral dilemma you posed between expectations of children and parents?

Question - Is ‘escaping the consequences’ in this manner somehow more reprehensible than doing so in another (say, by substituting an adult’s urine, using one of the ‘cleaning’ systems, etc.)? (Aside from the specific problem you posed of changing expectations of ‘facing consequences’ between child and parent.)

Question - Is going to jail and/or becoming unemployed, and the hardships that those situations would place on the child, worth the principle of ‘taking the consequences’? What if zie is a sole parent without family and the child in question would be dumped into the state system?

*zie - gender-neutral third-person pronoun. I get really tired of typing s/he and him/her all the time, and I don’t like choosing one over the other. IT’S TIME FOR GNPs!!! (If you get to pose hypotheticals, I get to use gender-neutrals. :stuck_out_tongue: )
I can continue coming up with questions if I haven’t made my point. :slight_smile: Which is, that to label an action as unjustified, immoral and wrong (or moral, justified and right, for that matter) without knowing the details is a risky business. Please see sig.

I believe that the US drug laws are wrong. I also believe that most drug-testing is wrong, in that it is an unnecessary and unwarranted invasion of privacy. While two wrongs don’t make a right, I don’t believe that acting to evade the consequences of what I consider an illegal and unethical system of persecution is immoral or unjustified.

On the other hand, I am a strong proponent of responsible behavior and ‘facing the consequences’. I think that teaching children that their actions have consequences and that they must consider and be prepared to deal with those consequences is probably THE most important thing you can do for them. I, personally, would not do this unless there were equally strong reasons why I had to. I can imagine situations in which someone like me might choose this option. I find it highly unlikely, but that is not the same as impossible. If I had more details, I might join you in condemning this action - but chances are that I would be condemning so many other actions of this person (such as their child-rearing in general) that this one point would be fairly minor.
For example - I have always maintained that I would refuse to cooperate with any random drug screenings at my place of employment. (I will not apply to any employer that requires them as part of their hiring process.) I can unquestionably pass such a test. I would be willing to pay for a private testing on the same day and to fight such a battle in court. I firmly believe that they have NO RIGHT to police my personal behavior on my own time. (If they have reason to believe I’m under the influence at work, more power to them. Prove that you have cause and I’ll be more than happy to cooperate. You’ll lose, unless you cheat, but I’ll cooperate.)

BUT…that was all easy to say when I was single, and the worst consequence I faced was to end up crashing on someone’s couch for a few weeks until I found another job and got my act back together. I now have other people depending on my income (not entirely, but enough that there would be a significant probability of losing property, transportation, etc.). Is my personal belief and conviction important enough to me to risk, not just my welfare, but that of my family? Hmmmm. At this moment, I don’t know which way I’d answer that - but I suspect my sense of responsibility towards my family would win out.
See why I hate hypotheticals? Don’t stone me - I can’t help it, I was born this way!

8

Aha! But this is not necessarily a ‘natural consequence’.

If this hypothetical person was stupid enough to drive under the influence and hurt someone, I would absolutely agree - it is completely unjustified, immoral and WRONG to evade the consequences, regardless of the method.

But if this hypothetical person’s hypothetical employers decided to use drug-testing as a means to harass said hypothetical employee, just because they could, then IMO it is NOT immoral or wrong to avoid the consequences, because the consequences are neither natural nor moral to begin with. Whether or not it is moral to involve a minor child would depend on the child and the situation.

And there’s any number of hypothetical situations in between. :wink:

ERK!! I knew I’d forget to check that dratted box after I referenced my sig line!

9

redtail, I specifically left out “why” the person did drugs, or is tested.

To me the situation is simple. It is perfectly fine to me, personally if individuals believe the current drug laws are wrong. Perfectly fine if you then choose to use drugs for whatever purpose (self medicating, recreational, addiction). This is a matter of personal choice. However, for me, if you make a personal choice, you should do so, being aware of and ** willing to accept ** the natural consequences of these decisions. Then, to compound the wrongness, they used their child?? bah!

You want to smoke? fine, know that you risk health issues and that you may not be welcome to do so in certain areas.

You want to do drugs? fine, know that you may risk health issues, risks to your job, legal issues, etc.

You don’t want to do drug tests? Great. Don’t hire on with an employer who may require them. Don’t get yourself convicted of a crime and need to demonstrate to a court that you are clean.

It also makes no difference to me the age of the child. So, you have a toddler who won’t notice that you’re asking for a sample of their urine. This makes it ok to USE your child to avoid the foreseeable consequences of your behavior? Not to me.

The consequence of going to jail, being unemployed is a DIRECT line from the parent’s drug use. You don’t like the end of the road? don’t start down it.
I know you don’t like hypotheticals, and anicdotal stories, BUT. I had a client who didn’t want to give up smoking dope. He accepted, as a consequence of that decision (he wouldn’t be able to pass pre employment drug screens) that his income would be reduced, his available potential employers were reduced, as a consequence of his lack of income, he had periods of homelessness etc. Fine by me.

kinda like “Don’t do the crime if you can’t do the time”.

10

Wouldn’t it be a hoot… finding that you actually failed the test after going to all that trouble.

11

wring:

Maybe we are having a semantic problem?

If a person causes an accident and flees are they avoiding responsibility?
I say that this is not necessarily so.

If justify their actions by choosing ( perhaps unconciously ) to refuse to admit to themselves that they are at fault then I would say that they are avoiding responsibility.
If they understand that they were at fault and choose not to face the music then I would say that they are not.

In the latter situation the person might be violating their ethics but they have accepted responsibility.

The above hypothetical is different from the original situation in that ( I would assume ) the parent doesn’t feel that doing drugs is wrong. Personally I don’t think it is any of my employers business whether I am taking drugs or not. I find discriminating against drug users by not allowing them to find good paying jobs to be unreasonable. I encourage people to deceive employers in this area.

12

So 2sense you make a distinction between decieving the employer and say, decieving the CJ system (so the person who’s on parole should have to use their own pee?)?

I understand your point about the employer. Don’t necessarily agree, but understand it. I see the employers’ side in SOME cases. If you’re sitting at a desk it shouldn’t matter if you smoked dope last night. But:

If you’re driving a school bus, it matters if you got high last night. (or remember Princess Diana who may have been alive today had her driver not been drunk)

If you’re operating a press or heavy machinery, you may subject yourself and others to injuries if you’re under the influence.

Employers have to pay worker’s comp insurance, worker’s comp insurance pays for injuries that happen on the work site. Both, I think, have a valid point in wishing to reduce their potential pay out for circumstances that may have been prevented had the employee not been wasted the night before.

The other DOES seem to be a matter of semantics - if I read you correctly - that the person who admits responsibility but avoids the consequences is not behaving in an ethical manner.

OT but, Regarding, too the issue of “if I smoke dope last weekend, does that really mean that I was culpable in the accident I had today?” In the case of MJ which can stay long periods of time probably not. In the case of cocaine, heroin etc where the drug stays detectable for anywhere from 24- 48 hours, perhaps. Don’t have evidence on either side of that. I know that when my son was on pain killers for an accident that happened at school, I didn’t let him go to driver’s ed until at least 48 hours after his last pill, just to make sure. I would be in favor of testing system that would deterimine current level of intoxication vs. recent use FOR the purposes of accidents/employer type issues. But for folks in the CJ system, sorry - if your order says to not drink or do drugs, then either stay away or go back to jail. MHO anyhow.

13

Os if they just drive away, don’t help the victims, and refuse to pay restitution for damages they caused - as long as they feel guilty, they’re responsible people.

My opposition to your OP comes from the knowledge that parents teach by example, and your hypothetical parent has been teaching his kids to be liars, cheats and hypocrites. If you don’t see a problem with that, then we don’t really have much to talk about.

Oh , and by the way - I don’t think that parents to children should use drugs at all. Their primary responsability is to their kids, and they have no right to fuck up their lives.

14

wring:

I think that we agree here. I am saying that as long as a person doesn’t lie to themselves about their actions then they are accepting responsibility. Whether or not their actions were morally reprehensible is another matter.

I also agree that testing to determine if a person is under the influence of drugs, at this moment, is justifiable due to safety concerns. Whether or not I smoked weed 2 weeks ago does not affect my performance today.

Alesan:

As long as they accept responsibility they are ( by definition ) responsible people, yes.
Responsible people aren’t necessarily good people.

I’m not certain about your moral code is but for me there are many worse things for a parent to be. I think that lying is not automatically wrong, particularly under duress. Should the parent tell the truth and lose his job? This would somehow be to the child’s advantage?

And how exactly is the parent being hypocritical?

Your reasoning here is flawed. Can you prove that using drugs must fuck up a person’s life?
No, you can not.
I know this because my parents used drugs when I was growing up. You seem to assume that drugs are evil.
This is untrue.

15

RE: using drugs in dangerous work situations.

Fact is, there HAVE been systems marketed that would test immediate ability to do the job in question. They took about two minutes. These tests would not ONLY eliminate safety problems due to screenable drugs, but in addition would prevent safety problems caused by other sources.

Employers won’t use them. The vast majority of employer drug testing is NOT about safety, it’s about politics. In the current political climate, the hoopla about ‘dangerous machinery’, etc., is mostly just that - political hype. It’s obviously MUCH more important to catch someone who smoked a joint two weeks ago than to actually increase safety in the workplace. :rolleyes:
Well, wring, on some things we disagree. I don’t admit that unnatural and idiotic laws are a ‘natural consequence’ of my behavior. I don’t agree that political and popular hysteria is a ‘natural consequence’ of my behavior. I don’t think that employer drug testing for no real point is a ‘natural consequence’ of my behavior. I may have to deal with the those situations, but they are NOT ‘natural consequences’ of my behavior.
As far as the minor child (and as long as we’re talking hypotheticals)…what if a ‘child’ one month short of legal majority, extremely responsible and mature in judgement, who understood the medical nature of the parent’s drug use, OFFERED FREELY?

“No, son, it’s much better that I lose my job, that we lose our house and go live on the street. I’m afraid you’re not going to be able to start college, at least for a while. But, after all, I decided to smoke marijuana just because I couldn’t find any other drugs that were effective for me and that I could take. It hasn’t actually had any impact on my job performance, but my employer says that if I use, I lose. The law is the law, after all, and obviously anyone in authority is always right.”

BAH yourself.

16

So, that explains it. I see. :smiley:

I’m just kidding 2sense, you know I love ya. :slight_smile:

17

2 sense, we seem to agree, since you see a lack of ethics.
and for safety testing, timing is an issue.

redtail. Perhaps instead of the word “natural” consequences, I should have said “predictable” consequences?

If some one’s on probation, and knows that during said probation, they may be tested at any time for drug use, then the negative consequences of drug usage would be a predictable eventuality. If you choose to walk down that road, you will find yourself there. Don’t want to be there? don’t go down that road.

If you work with heavy machinery, presses, drive a school bus etc, and know that if an accident occurs, you will be tested, you should take that into consideration when choosing your off time activities, or chose a different job.

Tests that take 2 minutes and show current intoxication? must be new. Bear with me. I’ve been around the CJ system for 20 + years, and date back to the time that urinalysis tests were not simply accepted as proof. When they first came out, there were procedural questions, reliability questions etc. I spent lots of time in the witness seat testifying about procedural stuff back in the late 70’s.

I would tend to believe that if quick tests were available that the reasons they aren’t being currently used would have to do with things like : cost, relative unknown reliablity, or perhaps the manner of testing. Do they take a blood sample? urine sample? barf?

At the point where a easy, reliable, quick, CHEAP alternative is found, I’d bet the insurance co’s and employers would lead the pack. I know the CJ system is now at times using a patch which measures ALL usage for a period of time like a week.

(disclaimer for the following : by using “you” I mean whoeveer the hypothetical person is)
And again, frankly it doesn’t matter to me if the person is/isn’t a child - if you’re attempting to wriggle out of the predictable, expected consequences of your behavior, I’d have a question about ** your ** ethics. The fact that it’s your child and a minor makes it more reprehensible to me. again, it’s not the employer or cj system that MADE you take the drugs, knowing that you could/would be tested. Where’s your responsibility for causing the events that led to the firing/jailing?

18

Actually, you are correct, pepper.
My mother did use MJ when she was pregnant with us.

But, as I was happy to learn from someone’s sig line here, you can’t accidentally cause birth defects due to drug use during pregnancy. That made me feel much better.
[/stolid demeanor]

19

First off, is there any way of rephraseing the question using less controversial subject. I think we are getting bogged down in “drugs laws are wrong, so it is okay to try to get around them” vs. “drug laws are good, so getting around them is bad.”
Personally, I think that getting caught and fired is NOT a narural consquence of drug use. It’s kind of like how dieing is a natural consequence of jumping off a cliff, UNLESS you are wearing a bungy cord.
As for the parental angle, sometimes we need to cheat a bit in life. When I was young and my mom was in college, someimes, for whatever reason, she didnt have enough time to write some of her papers. She had me flip through the books and dictate the important parts while she down and wrote about the things I said. Is that entirely ethical? Not really. Is that okay? Yes, we all cheat a little bit in life and knowing how to that well and without hurting others or yourself is an important life skill.

20

I think the original post had two points sort of combined.

1 Using drugs, and then using someone elses clean urine to avoid the consequences is a lack of accepting responsibility ( 2sense, i’ve never heard “accepting responsibility” used to refer to a persons mental state.I’m using it to mean accepting the consequences of your actions and/or admitting (to others)that you did perform those actions.)
2 If you don’t accept responsibility for your actions, you are hardly in a position to expect your children to take responsibility for theirs (not necessarily the same action, but if I avoid being fired for using drugs by deceptively giving a sample of my child’s urine, I haven’t got a leg to stand on if I object to my son deceiving me about the window he broke to avoid punishment.)

This point doesn’t only apply to accepting responsibility, it applies to anything a person wants to teach their children.To change even sven’s example a bit, if I pay someone to write my paper, what reason do I have to be upset with my son for copying his friend’s homework? Should I be upset because he didn’t do his work? I didn’t do mine. Because he lied by passing off someone else’s work as his? So did I.