Bubble Wrap: Now With More Anger Displacement!

There was once a woman who had a 2 year old son who crawled through a dog door and drowned in the family pool. Undoubtedly a tragedy. Certainly a reason for this woman to dedicate her time to informing people of the dangers of pet doors. This much I can understand and even heartily sympathize with.

However, Carol Ranfone is taking it one step further. She wants the law to require pet door manufacturers to put a warning on their products that tells parents that their children could crawl through the door.

If Ken and I had ever thought the pet door would pose any danger to our children, we never would have installed it. We thought he was safely contained in our home and had no idea he could get out.

WTF?

Saying that you didn't know that a child could access a dog door is basically saying, "We are incapable of understanding how the real world works." One wonders why these people are advertising their claimed inability to understand basic physics - it does not bode well for their ability to care for future children if they don't understand that HOLE IN HOUSE = ACCESS POINT.

While I appreciate that the Ranfones went through a horrible experience, I hardly think Carol Ranfone's argument says anything except that they cannot accept that they could have been so horribly careless as to leave their dog door unlocked/unblocked. The PetAccessDangers.com (the Ranfones' website) collection of news only serves to illustrate that there are a lot of careless ex-parents out there.

I can certainly understand how this kind of thing can happen - just because it was careless doesn't mean I think the Ranfones should serve jail time. Sometimes "they've suffered enough" is a valid reason to withhold further judgement. However, I don't think society's forbearance should mean that Carol Ranfone should be able to affect an industry in order to assuage her guilt.

Something as obvious as a dog door being accessible to human beings should not have to be noted on the packaging so Carol Ranfone can convince herself that she was not at fault for her son's death.

Personal Responsibility

On another blog, I am chronicling the adventures of my ne'er-do-well foster brother who is currently waiting for a trial in Brazil for drug smuggling. Seems 10 pounds of cocaine fell in his bag.

Long story short, he was desperate for money due to some very poor decisions involving working while claiming to ICBC that he was disabled and physically incapable. He would post sob stories to Craigslist, claiming to be the father of 2 young children (he doesn't have any) in order to get items that he would turn around and sell. He sold his pain pills - percocet, oxycontin - off the Internet. I'm guessing that last was what led him to 10 lbs of white powder in the bottom of his duffel.

Last August, my mother got a call from D's MIL. Brazil. Jail. It was news to us, since he had no money and had not bothered to tell us "Oh, by the way, I'm going on an all-expenses-paid trip to Peru, Brazil and Amsterdam with money I got from an undefined source for no particular reason." His story: A friend of a friend offered him and his wife a honeymoon and then he was "threatened by bad men" when he was in Peru and "had" to take the drugs to Brazil. Ah huh. Not buying that one. When you're offered a legitimate trip, you tell your friends and family. He hadn't told us anything.

Over the ensuing months, his letters got more absurd and offensive. He wanted his cell phone suspended, NOT cancelled because "he had a good plan". He had bills that needed paying. He needed money for stuff in prison. I had fucked him over by not rushing to his storage locker (2 years behind in rent) and selling his stuff (when I have a job I'd like to keep and live across a large body of water).

In a letter, he told me, "I made one mistake. Don't judge me until you know the facts." No, he had made dozens of mistakes. Hundreds. Thousands. And they started with the assumption that he "deserved" the good life. Now, D thinks that we should forgive him just because he said, "I'm sorry".

And this is where I said, "No."

I've been told that I'm too angry, too judgemental, too emotional... but when do I get to say, "Look you piece of shit; you have betrayed us, you have jeopardized us, you have lied to us, you have caused a huge drain in our finances and you think that I am not entitled to judge you? If you don't want to be judged by the people who are paying for you to have a decent existence, then feel free not to accept their money."

I don't think that people "deserve" a second chance. I think they are entitled to ask for one, but they are not entitled to receive it. No one is. Especially if they refuse to take personal responsibility for their actions.

There are way too many movies where a resource-sucking leech is presented as comic relief or as a ha-ha-every-family-has-one. You know why every family has one? Because they don't erect boundaries and then verbally, physically or emotionally kick the shit out of Relative Leech if they try to breach them. This is not out of what I think is not misguided family loyalty, but the fear of what other people will say.

I've not had anyone saying that I'm not "loyal" enough; quite the opposite, in fact. I have had people say, "Well he's not even related to you!", which I don't think is the point. Up until now, we considered him family, with all the bonds that entailed - a genetic link does not have to be present to make a family. No, what makes me less and less eager to support him is his attitude. We treated him like family and he treated us like a credit card that he could draw on when he needed extra money.

Unfortunately, I am a hypocrite enough to donate money to support him or, rather, my mother's ill-advised spending on him.