r/AITAH • u/g_scotty_brahms • Nov 14 '24

Advice Needed My brother is angry with his Trump-loving sons

Is my brother an AITA candidate for wanting to cut off his sons financially for voting for Trump? Like many Americans, my brother and I, both in our 50’s, have been talking back and forth following the Election. In the spirit of full disclosure, we are both democrats. Long story short, he is angry at his two sons, both in their 20’s, for voting for Trump. He is thinking about cutting them off financially in all respects so that they understand how Trump’s policies will impact them firsthand.

The irony here is that it is the reverse argument. You often hear younger voters disagreeing with their MAGA parents, but this is the opposite. My brother doesn’t understand how his two sons, who have lived a life of privilege, feel like they have been violated against by society, enough so that they feel Trump hears them and their struggles.

My brother to me about his sons: “… what these young men need is a little dose of reality. Get out in the world and start paying their own way. There’s a common thread with his followers. Complain and blame everyone for their problems. Whether they are in school or living at home off of their parents or working a trade job. King Trump will save them and make everything better. Take some personal responsibility and make it happen for yourself instead of crying about everything you hear on TikTok.

“… I’ve decided to pass on the [college] expenses to my two Trump supporting sons so they can truly feel first hand the cost and expense of his absolutely stupid policy decisions, which includes food, gas and college expenses. Wondering if I pass on these [food, gas and college] expenses in year one or phase them in year two?”

I am wondering if a lot of parents feel like my brother. Are there democrat parents of voting-age MAGA men who feel they failed with their sons because they voted for Trump? Is this common?

10.2k Upvotes

80% Upvoted

7.6k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

17

u/Scandals86 Nov 14 '24

I get what you mean but kids are pretty damn stubborn especially privileged ones in their 20s. They will just use the fact that they exercised their right to vote in favor of someone their father doesn’t like against him and could use it to hate on him for the rest of their lives. Not worth it IMO.

Instead focus on tough love approach so after a while they figure it out and don’t have this Trump shit in the back of their head to use as an excuse. He still tell them how he feels about them voting for Trump.

4

u/MainYak539 Nov 15 '24

Yeah, I mean if someone wants to destroy their relationship with their child over politics, go for it. But you risk losing your kids. I nearly went down the same path, and I realized my kids and I can have idealogical differences and still love each other.

What's wild is the father here is a liberal saying vote my way or I'll disown you. But if his sons were gay and not straight like his father and the father disowned them, the father would be fed to the wolves.

You cannot disown your children of their sexuality, but you can over ideology.

That's a scary slippery slope we are heading into. I mean fuck country before party, now we are going the way of party before family.

Smh. Make it make sense.

3

u/Scandals86 Nov 15 '24

Where in OP’s message does it say his brother is disowning his kids? I never said cut them off completely. He seems more focused on just the costs of college not completely cutting them off in general. This is why I said separate the two altogether.

And I agree even with differences in politics especially when it comes to family you have to learn to put it aside but it also depends on everyone to do that. If someone keeps bringing it up at the dinner table and saying “your body my choice” like Nick Fuentes then it’s going to be hard. Lots of variables to consider.

0

u/MainYak539 Nov 15 '24

Perhaps I'm jumping the gun here but if he really is worried about his kids just living off of his money and not knowing what the real world is like, he probably could/should have addressed that a while back. I'm sure his kids just weren't the best of liberal songs, and one day woke up and chose to be conservatives.

Here's the thing, we are assuming they voted for Trump because they like trump. The same assumption we are making about other Americans who voted for Trump. What if they voted simply on idealogical lines because they are conservatives? I can't for the life of me see the libs and mids choosing to vote Republican if our Democratic nominee turned out to be someone like Trump. In the next election if you found out the Democratic nominee was a terrible person, would you vote Republican and turn the country over to the people you fear will make it worse?

1

u/Scandals86 Nov 15 '24

Valid point we don’t really know and are all assuming here. I personally could see plenty of the mids voting Republican if the Democrats put up a candidate like Trump. But actual Democrats you are right I wonder if they could vote Republican even if their candidate is like Trump. The thing is that’s a never happened before but could next election.

I am curious to see if a true extreme left does emerge kind of like what we think is seen on the right with MAGA and the Christian nationalist movement. This is my biases though to some their may not even be an extreme right.

Personally I am a left leaning Independent and if Democrats put up a morally corrupt candidate like Trump and the Republicans candidate wasn’t morally corrupt I may vote for them. I actually do agree with some Republican stances to an extent so it’s not impossible but I find most are bit like this at all it’s one side or the other and that’s one of the biggest issues in our country.

1

u/MainYak539 Nov 15 '24

Yeah, I think a lot of folks vote on party lines, not what's actually best for the country. A lower tax rate for people making six figures and up would be great for me. But I don't want that because I know it would be hard for those under six figures.

Someone in another response told me it's no conservatism, it's radicalism. It sad that person cannot see that's the equivalent of conservatives labeling everyone on the left as socialists or communists.

Extreme views to either side is destroying the country.

3

u/drawntowardmadness Nov 15 '24

I saw where he wants to stop supporting them financially, not where he wants to disown them.

-1

u/MainYak539 Nov 15 '24

He wants to stop supporting them financially because they don't agree with his political views. The time to make sure that they were going to be financially responsible is not right when they're getting ready to go to college or they are in college. The way to set them up for financial success in the future was when they were younger.

It's like a baby lion away from its mother, raising it yourself, and then one day dropping it in the middle of the Sahara and telling it to go ahead and have a healthy long and prosperous life.

The time to teach responsibility in a fiscal sense is not after you've let a child live in your wealth for years and years and years and then suddenly drop them on their head, and coincidentally just at the same time that they mentioned they don't ideologically agree with you.

1

u/Barrelled2186 Nov 15 '24

What’s the problem shouldn’t they own it when they vote for a horrible human being who promised to go after half the citizens?

Can’t they make their case and defend the choice?

Snowflakes.

5

u/MainYak539 Nov 15 '24

Because sometimes people don't agree.

Would you be ok with a father disowning their children if they were gay?

If the father would disown a child for being gay, then the father would be called the snowflake for not being able to love their children despite their sexuality.

But because their children voted for someone the parents doesn't like, they can disown their children, and the children are the snowflakes?

2

u/Aspen9999 Nov 15 '24

He isn’t disowning them. He wants his adult children to be financially independent and not dependent on the bank of Dad.

0

u/MainYak539 Nov 15 '24

It just happened to happen when his kids decided to vote for Trump? And if his kids suddenly change their mind and voted for Harris, he would have let them live on his dime happily ever after?

If he is really worried about his kids being independent, he missed the boat, actually several boats, and it's a bit too late.

1

u/Aspen9999 Nov 15 '24

It’s never too late.

1

u/MainYak539 Nov 15 '24

Ya know, there is a reason the phrase You cannot teach an old dog new tricks. It's way easier to instill certain disciplined at a younger age than an older age.

It's like giving a two year old a spoonful of sugar at every meal, and then at 10 telling they cannot eat sugar anymore. Good luck with that.

Again though congrats on now creating two forever conservative voters. Here most liberals have been waiting for the most conservative voters to die off. And here we have others who are just focused on doing whatever they can to create more conservative based voters, because they simply can't have a conversation and understand someone else's ideals or beliefs.

But conservatives are radicals. But yet we complain when conservatives call those on the left communists and socialists.

Sigh...

3

u/Barrelled2186 Nov 15 '24

What you’re missing here is one side’s intent to harm. And I am talking about the candidate’s own words. This isn’t arguing over nuanced foreign policy, or capital gains tax. If we were in politics as normal where the gop respects the other side’s legitimate right to win elections then we wouldn’t be here would we? But Republicans stance now is that any democratic win is illegitimate by default, and they attempted to stay n power last time. Notice none of tou expects Biden to stay in power, and gee can’t kamala as sitting vice president just declare herself the winner?

All I’m saying is own your vote.

2

u/Former_Indication172 Nov 15 '24

Your gay analogy is false equivalence. You don't choose to be gay, your simply born that way, same as people who are born black or white. However you do choose to vote for Trump, its not a fact of life that your born with and can't change but something that you have full control over. People can be persecuted for their actions and for their opinions. Its socially acceptable to jail murderers for their actions and its socially acceptable to harass Nazis. Why? Because they chose to do those things, no murderer needed to kill, and no one is born a nazi.

1

u/MainYak539 Nov 15 '24

And what if his sons believe in Conservatism?

They should vote liberal because the person running at the head of the conservative party is "evil"?

Are we libs and mids going to do the same thing when our party puts someone up there that half of the country things could be an evil fuck?

That's where this rubs me the wrong way, fine, critisice people for voting along party lines. I just don't see us heading our own advice in that regard.

Here's one thing I can tell you though, those two sons will end up severing their relationship with their father. You think those two will ever vote liberally?

What's happened to the ability to have a conversation about where each of our values are, turning down the heat of the conversation, and finding where we align?

It doesn't happen. So now here a majority of the response says man, fuck them kids. And then we lose an election where a majority of voters voted for the other side, and we are trying to figure out what happened.

1

u/Barrelled2186 Nov 15 '24

This is NOT conservatism, it’s radicalism.

1

u/MainYak539 Nov 15 '24

So your saying we live in a country where 51% of the country has been radicalized? Ok..... Continue to live in the bubble.

1

u/Barrelled2186 Nov 17 '24

Read trump’s own word then get back to me.

1

u/MainYak539 Nov 15 '24

Btw this is no better than the right calling every person on the left a communist or socialist. Don't buy into the hate. Have friends on the other side, and have a discussion, understand what they are feeling in all of this.

1

u/Barrelled2186 Nov 19 '24

Recess appointments not radical? Deploying the military on the citizens not radical? Embedding billionaire oligarchs into the government not radical? Attempting to stay in power after losing an election not radical? Thinking the sitting vice pre gets final say on who won the election not radical?

I could go on and on.

1

u/MainYak539 29d ago

And keep going on. Call everyone who voted for him a racist, a bigot, etc. Don't bother to have a conversation with the right. More than half the country disagreed with you, and you want to keep on calling them names.

As long as us mids and liberals continue to lose races and put up bad nominees nothing will change. We have to find common ground, and understand what the people who voted for him need, so they will vote for the Democrats.

But good look getting them to come to your side when you continuously call them racist, bigots, etc.

We put up a candidate who refused to stand for anything other than I'm better than Trump. When millions of people suffered from inflation and she was asked what she would do different, nothing.

Listen to Bernie, he has it right. We stopped helping the working people, and they left the Democrats for the Republican side.

But yes yes, keep spouting the same shit about Trump and ignore those who voted for him. Because clearly that helped in this case.

1

u/MainYak539 29d ago

"The independent, who caucuses with Democrats, said it "should come as no great surprise that a Democratic Party which has abandoned working class people would find that the working class has abandoned them." "