I have friends in their 70s who have taken in their adult son following his divorce. It is going on two years now, and he is making no progress at finding work or moving out. Granted he has mental-health issues, like panic disorder and depression, but he lives rent-free, has a dog he does not take care of and berates his parents on a regular basis. His parents won’t even ask him to help around the house because they are afraid of his volatility. He can become extremely angry, especially toward his father. He also owns a gun.
This last bit scares the heck out of me. His father is going to retire in a couple of months, and they are planning to sell their home and move out of state. They have told their son that he is not coming with them, and the son is upset about this. His mother is trying to put together family counseling sessions but is having difficulty finding something they can afford.
As the deadline of the move approaches, I truly worry the son will shoot himself or shoot his parents and then himself. I’ve known this family for 35 years. Do I call adult protective services? Do I alert the police that a mentally ill man owns a gun? I am truly concerned. — Name Withheld
From the Ethicist:
It’s often hard to judge from the outside whether people who own guns pose a threat to themselves or to others. You don’t mention any facts about this person that indicate he is actually planning to harm himself or anyone else with this weapon. You don’t say that his parents are worried about his misusing it, either. And you don’t suggest that he isn’t legally entitled to have it.
All the same, you’re describing a disturbing situation: his volatility and abusive ways, the fact that his parents are so fearful of him that they haven’t set ordinary household boundaries, the imminence of a major life upheaval that he isn’t taking well. So you can legitimately share your concerns with the police, offering the details you know about. The message isn’t “a mentally ill man has a gun”; you would be describing a specific pattern of volatility, abuse, intimidation and distress about an upcoming rupture. (More than 20 states have red-flag laws that allow a judge to suspend someone’s access to guns when there is sufficient evidence that they pose a risk to themselves or to others.) One thing the police are able to do is check whether the person has a permit for a weapon, if you’re in a jurisdiction that requires one.
For all that, I wouldn’t be surprised if there was nothing that law enforcement could do. That doesn’t make you wrong to have made the call.
And yes, I would also give serious thought to informing adult protective services about your apprehensions. It isn’t as if you would be disrupting an arrangement that’s working for everyone involved. If his parents are being intimidated, they may need help planning a safe exit. Are you overestimating the dangers? Let’s hope so. But given your concerns and given what you know, staying silent would be a decision, too. This is a situation where it makes sense to ask for help.
Readers Respond
The previous question was from a reader who wondered whether it was OK for her family members to laugh along as her nephew mocked his grandmother. She wrote:
My brother shared in our family group chat a video of his 11-year-old son doing a comedy routine imitating our mother — his grandmother — who is in her 80s. The routine borrowed some real traits but exaggerated her into a foolish caricature. Other adults at the dinner table when it was filmed laughed and encouraged him. My mother, who is in the group chat, lives across the country, so the video was her introduction to the joke being made at her expense. She was hurt, though she responded graciously, writing to her grandson that she was glad he made everyone laugh and that he had the makings of a good stand-up comic. My own daughters, who see their grandmother daily, found the video sad. Was it appropriate for the adults to encourage a child to use his elderly grandmother as the butt of a joke? Or for my brother to send the video to her? — Name Withheld
In his response, the Ethicist noted:
Mocking Granny is a time-honored family sport, like teasing your little sister, and about as edifying. Families can be particularly careless with the feelings of the elderly, condescending to them as lovable figures of fun. The fault doesn’t lie with the 11-year-old who turned her into material, though. It lies with the adults who delightedly treated the performance like a tight five at the Comedy Cellar. Your brother then made things worse by serving the roast to the roasted. The initial encouragement was unkind, and sending the video to your mother was thoughtless. If your nephew is young enough to learn better, your brother is old enough to have known better.
(Reread the full question and answer here.)
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Kudos to the youngster who can honestly make the adults in the room laugh. No kudos to the adults in the room. If the impersonator was that good, an adult should have quickly changed his focus to his mom or dad, or a TV character. Keep the kid focused on entertaining, but change the material! — Jay
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The basic principle that needs to be stressed is that you shouldn’t make fun of anyone. Not grandma, not that funny-looking kid down the block, not the person who can’t get their words out clearly. You are never too young to learn kindness. — Connie
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The Ethicist and the letter writer have both overlooked the value of being able to laugh at oneself. I think the writer is offended and is superimposing her feelings onto her mother. I sometimes have a limp, and when one of my students imitated me going after another student with my limp, I actually found it very funny, because we don’t often see ourselves and how we look. My grandson complains about my restrictive television rules, and when his mother implements similar rules at home, he complains that “this is just like being at Gram’s!” His mother and I get a big laugh out of it. You have to be able to laugh at yourself. — Sylvia
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The Ethicist is spot-on. As a 79-year-old grandmother myself, I can relate to the grandmother in this situation. I often think that I know what it feels like to be young, but my kids in their 50s don’t know what it’s like to be old. Aging is hard enough, especially if you’ve been active your whole life and feel yourself slowing down and becoming invisible. I would be terribly hurt if my grandchild was encouraged to use me as the subject of hurtful comedy. That grandma deserves credit for graciousness, but I’ll bet she was crying on the inside. — Donna
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I am a 77-year-old grandmother who would be honored if my son raised a young comic who thought about me enough to have a routine that made people laugh. Comedy is not meant to be taken literally but for enjoyment and relief of the day’s stresses. I do think the family could have decided together whether to send the bit to grandma, considering how they thought she might react. — Lynn
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