Are You For Real?

The May 18th The Ethicist column was written by Andrew Light, Director for Philosophy and Public Policy at George Mason University and a Senior Fellow at the Center for American Progress.  I don’t doubt that Andrew Light is a brilliant man who does some important work.  However, when he wrote this column, he was all out of whack.

 A woman wrote to The Ethicist explaining that her elderly parents want her to become her 40 year old brother’s legal guardian.  Her brother needs a guardian because he became heavily involved with drugs and alcohol as a teenager, has suffered brain damage as a result, and has spent the last 25 years of his life in and out of prison, halfway houses, and rehabilitation centers.  She has been estranged from him for years.  It is very clear from her letter that she does not want to be her brother’s legal guardian because he’s a mess, she has been estranged from him for years, she lives a 7 hour drive from where he is, and – here’s the kicker – because she’s a single mother with a demanding job.  But, he is her brother, and she wants to help her parents.  She also has no intention (and with good reason) of never letting him in her home or near her child.

Thankfully, Andrew Light says that she should feel free to turn down her parents’ request if she believes doing so would endanger her child.  Thank goodness.  But, he goes on from there.  He talks all about how he would rather give his son a kidney than a stranger a kidney, like that’s somehow surprising or relevant to anything.  He also says that he does feel that she has more of a duty to her brother than she does to most people, because he is her brother, and she should do what she can to help him as long as it doesn’t endanger her daughter.  Because, he says:

Just as you may have a stronger moral obligation to your brother than to anyone on the street, you certainly also have equally strong, if not stronger, obligations to your daughter.

I’m sorry, but who the what what?!  What do you mean “equally strong, if not stronger”?!!  The daughter comes first.  FIRST first first first first!  I can’t tell you how far down the list estranged adult siblings are, but they are WAY behind one’s children.  All he needed to say was that if she felt she couldn’t be a good mother and a guardian to her brother, than being a good mother comes first.  Period.  End of discussion.  No need to feel guilty.  Believe me, a single mother with a demanding job is probably (like most mothers) already beating herself up about something.

Nevertheless, he decides to throw a little wood on that being a good mother/daughter/sister guilt fire.  After rambling a bit about an NYU philosopher, Light closes his response with:

Even though you’re alienated from your brother now, I hope there was something in your past that brought you together. Now you ought to try to draw on that experience of being a sibling and do the best that you can in a difficult situation.

Light, dear friend, are you telling me that remembering when he shared his peanut butter with her 35 years ago is going to do anything to ease the fact that he has spent over half his life in and out of jail?  I don’t know, Light, I kind of feel like people sometimes become estranged for a reason.  Assuming there are some fond memories left, they are probably greatly overshadowed by very tragic, if not horrific, memories.  If you don’t understand that, then you’ve probably never known somebody who has anything like the kinds of problems that this woman’s brother has.

            But I also think that we need to face the facts here.  This woman is a single mother with a demanding job who lives 7 hours away.  Her brother has an incurable problem and will never be able to live alone as a stable member of society.  Even if she really wanted very much to be his guardian, I still do not think it would be ethical for her to agree to do it.  She just doesn’t have the time to have a demanding job, be a good single mother, and be the legal guardian to an incurable adult patient 7 hours away.  In this case, as in so many cases, it is most ethical for the family to leave the patient in the care of trained professionals.  A professional social worker, assigned by an offical and located near her brother, would be a far more appropriate guardian. 

            Andrew Light, this woman wrote to you to ask if it was ethical if she admits to her parents that she’s not superwoman.  She wanted The Ethicist to say it’s ok if she chooses to care for her own child, her career, and her own sanity before she cares for the junkie brother she hasn’t seen in years.  Most people would have done just that.  You told her it was only ok, if she had to, just as long as she thinks about it, thinks about it hard, thinks about any good childhood memories, and thinks of anything – even the tiniest thing – she could possibly do for her brother, because she does have an obligation towards him.  A single mother with a demanding job came for help, and you gave her a whole bunch more baggage to lug around for no purpose at all.  And that, Andrew, I find to be unethical.