Domino Quartz's Delightfully Quaint Random Banter Thread #248

[Rater202]

He's 11.

If you want to invoke "legally" in the argument, legally he can't be held responsible for his actions, as most children that age aren't fully rational, and his parents are held liable for his behavior.

That, combined with the fact that the whole incident was instigated by them selling his bike without telling him means that um...

They're the ones responsible for the events of the episode. Not Doug, who is just a child acting on the information he had available to him to the best of his ability.

Punishing him once the situation is cleared up is... Bad parenting. Good parents would own up to the fact that selling his bike without telling him, even if they ended to replace it with a new bike, was a **** move and that they should have foreseen that he'd be upset to find it missing and/or the possibility that someone in town would purchase his bike from the thrift shop before they told him what happened and he'd see someone around town with it.

....But then again, these are the people who named a baby Cleopatra Dirtbike. They might just be stupid.

Edit: The intended lesson seems to be don't jump to conclusions but in practice, it comes across as "you're wrong for being upset if your possessions go missing and you will be punished for it."