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1. Bruce Markusen Posted: January 24, 2012 at 08:30 PM (#4044961)I blame Jerry Sandusky for making me do a double take when I read this part.
Prince has not stated they are talking.
Cecil has routinely presented himself as being in Prince's life and when asked about it Fielder just stares at the reporter until another question is asked.
When you read/hear it from Prince then believe it.
Beep boop beep beep beep boop beep beep boop boop
<ring> <ring> <ring>
"Hello?"
"Hi, son its" <CLICK> "Hello? Hello?"
Now I suppose that depends on just how serious the missteps were that Cecil made, but at some level, particularly as an adult, having a deeply flawed father can be better than having none at all. Forgiveness frees the forgiver and all that stuff. Strange as it sounds, you don't have to trust somebody to love them.
However Prince is more than entitled to a "no comment" every time a reporter asks him about it, and is probably wise to do so.
From what little I've heard on it, it's basically just being a bad dad. And a mooch(trying to borrow money to pay gamblers/business opportunities while being completely out of his life for the first 18 years that type of stuff)
If you're a jerk, #### you.
Not to say nobody gets a second chance or anything. But, for me, not being involved with my shitty family members is immeasurably better than the alternative. And it seems like Cecil did enough to earn his status with Prince.
This, a thousand times this. I have a brother I haven't seen or spoken to since our Dad died in 1984.
And spent all of Prince's bonus money
Those are the main ones. Apparently there many other items of lesser magnitude but of a similar vein
edit: There is one area in which I'm a total son of a #####. My parents sprung a half-sister on me and my sister when we were around 20. They had recently found out about her, and they expected my sister and I to have a relationship with this woman.
I'm sorry, I'm simply not wired that way.
I'm glad you add some caveats. It can also be better, far better, not to have a deeply flawed father in your (or your child's) life at all. It's not the rare parent who's too destructive to be worth keeping in ones life. It's fortunate that there are plenty of good folks out there who become surrogate parents and grandparents. We are by no means limited to the family we're born into. I have a sister who, once I wrap up some business with, I'll never speak to more than superficially and more than rarely ever again. She's sick, destructive, and it's all everyone else's fault. It would be great if she was different, and if she sends me a letter in a decade acknowledging her destructiveness I'll reply that I'm glad she's been able to see that. I can't imagine resuming any kind of relationship, though.
Sometimes people go too far. She's a bully and an abuser, and both her kids, who are now in their early 20s, have told me when they finish college and are no longer dependent on her financially they have no desire to stay in touch with her. They both struggle with that, and ask me if I think that's okay. I tell them that getting free of a nasty, vicious, emotionally abusive person who veers into physical abuse is always right. I also let them know it can make sense to see where she is a few years down the road. Very occasionally I've seen parents change when they know it's either that or their children won't speak to them again.
Forgiveness does indeed "free the forgiver", but it doesn't follow at all that that means allowing the transgressor back in ones life; and it's true, you don't have to trust somebody in order to love them. It helps, but it's not a prerequisite. Sharing plasmids is not a basis for keeping something ugly going.
If your parents are going to have a relationship with this woman, you might as well make some effort to be cordial about it.
As someone who lost a father who was an ass, I argue that if at any point in your life you actually cared for him, that you might want to follow the advice (unless of course he did something unforgiveable) not saying that you should have a family dinner with him, but maybe occassional contact. Say hi, go have a beer with him or whatever it is.
Again, I just don't get the presumption of some special knowledge here. If I said "my job sucks", I don't think anyone would argue that given only that info they could presume to tell me whether to quit or stay at my job. Why when it comes to a case like this do people suddenly think they know what "advice I might want to follow"?
It's a general comment. Of course specifics could make a difference. If you say my jobs sucks, it's not that difficult to say deal with it or look for a better job. The point is that my family who didn't reconcile with my dad before his death, are still pissed at him, and pissed at themselves also.
I don't know a lot of the particulars about the relationship between the two, but the consensus on this thread (and others like it) is that Cecil is completely to blame and Prince is completely innocent. I'm not sure I buy such a simplistic take on the matter. It seems far more likely to me that there is some blame to be had on both sides.
Whether one or the other is in the wrong, I'd like to see them get back together. And I really don't understand why some people would want otherwise.
Nobody said anything like that. I'm certain that nobody here would be the slightest bit upset if Prince decided he wanted to have a relationship with Cecil.
The anti-forgiveness just because it's family people are making the point that everyone should decide for themselves what is appropriate for their particular situation. The opposite of rooting for one outcome.
I don't see anything like WANT, I see a lot of people understanding first-hand why some people are irreconcilable.
This angle will be played to the death by the media with Prince being a Tiger...but I suppose $214M makes some media irritation a little easier to handle ;-
I hope that I can get through my life without ever giving someone unsolicited advice of an incredibly personal nature into a situation that I know nothing about.
No one is giving you specific personal advice, they're giving general advice. No one person is all that unique. Because whether folks know it or not, most people have family problems. Most people have at least one family member that feel have betrayed them in some way. Now some betrayals truly are unforgivable, and others make it difficult to trust the person (though don't necessarily require cutting ties to the person). And yet still others weren't really betrayals at all, and were just a result of us projecting our own baggage onto other people. Sometimes we get angry as a defense mechanism to convince ourselves we're right and someone else is wrong and we don't want to stop being angry for fear that it would mean we were wrong all along.
But _generally_, a lot of people who harbor grudges against a close family member for a long time eventually decide they'd be better off if they'd let it go. And sometimes that doesn't happen until it's too late to have contact with that person again.
Depending on your situation, it's worth re-examining at just what level this person has hurt you. If you are dead certain you want absolutely nothing to do with this person because of behavior you simply can't tolerate, no one is telling you otherwise. But if you're holding a grudge that would look silly if you typed it out on paper and showed it to someone else, maybe it's time to move on and reconnect with the person.
Between those two points lies a spectrum where it's silly to tell anyone what to do, but saying that _sometimes_ it's better for you and those you care about to "get over yourself" and give up the grudge is hardly advice that is completely unwarranted, nor is it advice that comes from someone that knows nothing about the subject.
That's not the consensus. The consensus is that if Prince has decided to not talk to his father and that no one here is in a position to second guess him. For some reason, when it comes to things like this, people think they can offer advice when they would never presume to do so in analogous situations.
But there are a zillion things it might be in my best interest to re-examine, but people never opine on those. Why in this one example do people do so? The feeling I get is they think they somehow know better. There is the slight implication that maybe I'm being too cold hearted, etc. Really, comethefuckon, you have no idea what the situation is.
I haven't offered any advice to anyone. I don't know enough about the situation to do so. All I've said is that, as someone who sees the value of a family, I would like to see a reconciliation. I think that would be a nice thing. I honestly don't know what the complaint continues to be with such a sentiment. Unless you would prefer to see people at each other's throats.
With the regard to the issue of advice, posters at BTF continually offer advice to players about where they should play, how they should negotiate, what trades GMs should pursue, what managers they should fire, what legal recourses players should take, how they should conduct themselves away from the field. This place is a virtual advice-a-thon on baseball, social life, and personal behavior. Even though I'm not giving advice to anyone on the Fielder matter, there is now a general taboo on the giving of advice in this matter. Really? That's a little bit inconsistent.
Yes, I think the vibe is respect for Prince, who seems like - well, a prince - compared to a screwed-up Dad.
But what decision he makes in terms of reconcilation, or not, that his business. Why question him on that front?
Why do people often opine on this subject? Because I think in this example, so many people have been there before. And you'd be surprised at the number of subjects people opine on. Just because a subject can be very personal, doesn't mean very general discussion of it is off limits.
And you're right I have no idea what the situation is, hell I didn't even know you had a situation until just now. And it's not about being cold-hearted. In fact I think most of the time someone holds onto a grudge too long it's exactly the opposite: that they've become too emotional and too invested in a grudge to see that rationally they'd be better off if they just dropped it. The closeness and personal proximity of the subject makes it difficult for them to come to a decision that they would be better off making.
Is that your situation? I don't have the slightest idea, nor do I want to know. Same goes for Prince Fielder. But I'm puzzled at your argument that the general subject is somehow off limits. That doesn't make much sense to me.
That's quite a bit of snark and not really necessary. Look, I agree that people should mind their own business also, however reading some of the comments above about reconciliation, I think they are genuine and come from a good place. If you don't want someone offering advice, just politely suggest that, no sense in being a smart arse about it.
Or in your case just don't offer it, your position, from your snark, is quite clear.
The snarky answer would have been, if you don't want advice, then don't put your problems out there for all to see.
As Voros alluded, nobody is offering specific advice, it's a general advice from a perspective of people who have been there. As Voros wrote, if the issue is silly enough that if you wrote it out and see that it's silly, then maybe you need to re-examine your personal viewpoint. All I said was if this person was important to you in the past, you might want to reconsider reconnecting. It wasn't a comment saying "you should reconnect".
People get stubborn in their grudges, sometimes to the point of not seeing rationally. If the actions of the person were so horrible that you can't get past it, then that is fine, go on with your life, but sometimes people just hold onto something trivial that after 20-30 years, really isn't that important.
If you don't constantly reevaluate something, then you are just like a sportswriter who is holding onto his belief that RBI is the best way to rate a player. We don't bag on writers because they believe that, we bag on them because they refuse to learn/adjust.
Well, I don't know about that, it seems like people mostly keep the discussion within generalities. BUT Cecil is in the habit of talking to the media about this, and frequently sounds like a clueless ass. Prince, on the other hand, keeps his mouth shut about it when talking to the media, which I think most everyone agrees is the proper way to handle a family dispute. So that may be a big reason for the disparity in perception that you are seeing.
Really, it's all just tabloid gossip anyway. None of us really knows what the situation is between them, the grievances each have against each other, or what kind of relationship each are capable of having with the other. I don't see how anyone WANTS them to keep fighting - and unless you can point to someone who does, I assume these people don't exist - but at the same time, reconciliations don't happen by magic.
And since they don't happen by magic, the reality of the situation is that you don't really know what you're hoping for when you say you'd like to see a reconciliation. A reconciliation might mean accomodations by one side or the other that you and I would be unwilling to make, or that may be dangerous for one side or the other to make. Who knows? And who are we to say that things would be better off if the dispute were dropped, when we can't begin to guess at what a practical resolution would look like? You can pretend that you're taking the high road by talking about "the value of family", but the plain truth is that you don't know what the implications really are of what you're saying.
From 34: "general advice from a perspective of people who have been there"
And this I think is the crux of the problem. You have no idea whether you've "been there" or not. If you've been able to reconcile, that's great. Honestly, that's a very, very good thing. And, yes, you may have "been there", but you neither you nor I have any idea whether you have or not. So, again, I ask, whether it's concerning Prince, or me, or anyone else, given that you don't know anything else about the subject, why second guess? In other analogous situations we don't second guess, so why now? The only thing I can think of is that you conclude that your situation is in some way similar to Prince's, that is you've "been there before", and can therefore view things from his perspective. But I see no reason to believe that your situation is fact similar. The ways in which a family member can be a first class wang are wonderful in both variety and depth.
"Just because a subject can be very personal, doesn't mean very general discussion of it is off limits."
I'm not saying it's off limits. If you were acquainted with Prince and his father, I think you'd have a right to opine on his decision to cut his father off. However, you don't. All you know is that Prince has decided to cut him off. It's an epistemological issue, not one of sensitivity.
It appears that's exactly what you're saying. With the following:
I'm supposed to take that some other way?
_Everyone_ who holds a long standing grudge against a family member thinks they're doing it for a good reason. Sane people just don't do things like that on a whim. Sometimes they don't know the half of it, and have done themselves a great favor by doing so. But I think it's not out of line to point out that this isn't always the case.
For my part, my wife's father was destructive and dangerous and drove himself out of all his family's lives, but they eventually offered him a 2nd (okay, 90th) chance, and it has been immeasurably valuable to everyone to be able to reconnect. The relationships can't exactly be repaired, but all involved say they now have the relationship they "should have". It has been very good to see. Sometimes people surprise you.
More often people don't, of course.
This is just crazy talk. There is no analogous situation where people would never presume to give advice. People give advice all the time about everything.
Nobody is saying that anybody SHOULD or MUST do anything. But I bet if you tossed a dead wombat at a BBTF meetup (or any group of people, really) you'd hit one person with a ######-up parental relationship and graze at least three others.
Are the specifics all different? Of course they are. Are there varying degrees of ###### up? You bet; likely anywhere from "my dad stopped my allowance because he caught me smoking" to absolute horror.
Is ANY SINGLE PERSON in this thread suggesting that one should ALWAYS reconcile, or even always ATTEMPT to reconcile? No.
However, as #43 points out, people offer to give advice on virtually any topic. And all SOME people are saying is, if you ARE estranged with a family member, it's worth periodically considering whether reconciliation or reconnection is worth exploring, because once that family member is dead, you no longer have options. THAT'S ALL.
Christ on a pony, sometimes people around here make everything so goddamned tough.
Taking this for an example:
And all SOME people are saying is, if you ARE estranged with a family member, it's worth periodically considering whether reconciliation or reconnection is worth exploring, because once that family member is dead, you no longer have options. THAT'S ALL.
I really think most sentient beings are aware that people die, and are then no longer available for reconciliation. To me this sounds like telling an infertile couple "You can always adopt!" Really?? What is this "adoption" you speak of? Thanks so much for the help!
And no, I haven't missed that Brian C and I are essentially advising people not to give so much advice, or that the "hey lighten up everyone gives advice" crowd has gone DEFCON 1 on the suggestion that they might consider shutting their yaps sometimes.
When the rather benign, almost indisputable suggestion that "you may want to revisit important life decisions on occasion to see if your feelings have changed" produces the kind of of shrieking horror we've seen from you and others on the thread, it's not the advice givers that have gotten out of control.
The point is, SOME -- please note, I say SOME -- folks who have remained estranged until one of the parties is dead have later come to regret this, and even sometimes wish they had maybe considered doing things differently while that was still a possibility.
One presumes that these people were all sentient beings who were aware of the concept of death and how it would affect the ability to reconcile.
This really isn't a complicated concept.
In that situation, if you were to say, "Well, I don't know what happened between them, but I hope s/he doesn't regret things once it's too late to do anything about it," well, no, that wouldn't be over the line at all IMO.
Bingo... one can modify Kurt's situation in 51 in the following way:
If people are discussing an article about Jennifer Aniston and her boyfriend and, in the article, Aniston says "We're in no rush to have kids", and then someone volunteers, "That could be a mistake, because her ovaries are rapidly turning to dust" and then a 42 year old female says "Maybe she just doesn't want kids right now" and then someone else in the conversation says "Yes, but she may want to someday, so that's something she and her boyfriend should really consider talking about" and then the 42 year old female says: "Well, screw you, I really just don't want to have kids and it's none of your business to tell me or Jennifer Aniston what to do, so we really shouldn't even talk about it".
and then it would be much more analogous to the current situation.
Actually, he said he may want to, which is most definitely not the same thing. And I interpereted his comments as speaking from the perspective of someone who also had an ass for a dad, and the effect subsequent passing of said ass before reconciliation has had on some members of his family. I don't think such perspective is remotely out of line.
And I was a little confused by Dale's (not Something Others) story. His parents didn't spring a half-sister on him. One of his parents sprung a half-sister on the other at some point, and now that parent is springing it on the kids. The other parent is (if my math is correct) simply a spouse that has come to grips with (presumably) a greater betrayal than one experienced by the kids.
I have a huge problem with Voros. His stance on Wire's "I am the Fly" is utterly unconscionable; Repoz will back me up on this.
not even close to an accurate analogy.
An accurate analogy is me and you talking and you mention "me and my dad are estranged" and I reply"Have you reconsidered talking to him, my sister regrets not getting in touch with my dad before he died" then Brian C interupting the conversation to tell me that I have no business offering advice and that he's a much better person because he doesn't interfer in other peoples conversation while missing out on the irony.
I disagree; in my opinion "you might as well make some effort to" and "you might want to" = "you should". If someone said to me "I argue that if at any point in your life you actually cared for your dad, that you might want to get back in touch with him", I would not interpret that as a generalized invitation to occasionally revisit major life decisions.
Two points here:
1) My parents knew that there was a possiblity that my father had conceived a child before they had even started dating. But the mother of my half-sister put the child up for adoption, and never contacted my father to confirm that he was the father nor ever told him. So some 20 years later, my half-sister finds my father and wants to have some kind of relationship. My parents being very kind people have no problem with this and welcome her with open arms. My sister and I have never even suspected this person existed and simply resisted the idea, cause to us she was an utter stranger that happens to look kind of like us. We were cordial to her, but that was about it.
2) My opinion is, by putting that story out there, I am leaving myself open to internet stranger advice. On an irritability scale of 10, CFBs post was a 1.5. Which is well under taking umbrage at and I'm only commenting now to defend CFB as if I didn't want it commented on *at all*, I shouldn't have said anything.
edit: coke to Charles, and your details are so accurate, I suspect you're my dad under a pseudonym.
I didn't know about that. #### that guy then.
Even knowing the risks, I'd advise you're being too defensive. (-:
CFB gave a perspective from his vantagepoint, of lessons learned when faced with a similar (though obviously not identical) circumstance and the regrets his family member's course of action produced.
You're free to interpret things however you like, so long as you understand that it's your interpretation that makes that = sign valid. If I say, "you might want to," I mean "you might want to," and not "you should."
Like I said it's just a petty annoyance, like hearing about some other person's fantasy football loss or bad poker beat. But it is annoying.
Oddly enough, my friend has learned that not only do his half-siblings look somewhat like him (which is a big deal for an adoptee with no history of family resemblence), but two of them are PhDs in English Lit just like him. I don't know exactly what that tells us about nature vs. nurture, but it's certainly fascinating.
"Well, I found my birth-dad."
"Oh yeah, how'd that go? Lots of crying? Hugging?"
"No...we played Angry Birds, then he gave me all the doubles from his 1973 Topps baseball collection."
There were a series of items. That is the one that Prince relates and I suspect it's because it shuts down folks asking about his dad and why they don't reconcile. Folks feel stupid telling someone to get back together with a child abuser.
Yeah, that's how it'd go with me.
"He put me to work shelving his punk CDs. There were thousands of 'em.
"Then we watched Dawn of the Dead."
See above.
I think this is where some people get into trouble. They feel they have to go one way or the other. Why not have the best of both worlds? Forgive, and forgo.
Er, we'll have to disagree, then, since I don't have a half-sister. You must have misread a post. Thanks for thinking of me, though.
"We had to play a 12 hour Hearts of Iron III marathon - and he made me play as Romania"
"Then, we watched a Star Trek: Voyager marathon until I finally said Tuvok was the franchise's best Vulcan just to make it stop."
"He mixes a passable cocktail, though."
I'm a Voyager fan, but not even close. Spock owns that title, and his dad is probably second, and pretty much all the rest of the Vulcan's were wasted space. Of course I also feel Janeway was by far the most competent of all the Captains(with Sisko and Archer tied for least---even though Sisko wasn't a Captain for most of the show) And it did something that the other next generation episodes couldn't do and that is bring the joy of discovery, and of course they didn't have Wil Wheaton. (although Kes was nearly as bad)
I grew up and to this day live in the most preposterous "Leave it to Beaver" and "Father Day Knows Best" family that ever existed. The next awkward/angry family dispute at a big holiday - or any time - would be our first. I was almost 40 before I found out that "All in the Family" and "Roseanne" were depictions of real families. The critics said they were, but I didn't get it. We grew up as a blue-collar, 7 people share 2 steaks on Sundays, just getting by, family - but no agita.
All that said, how you and your sister handle that issue - I respect your decision.
true also that you have no say over who you are related to.
sometimes, you can reconcile - say, relative X is a drug addict/alcoholic who can't not manage to not bring drugs/alcohol into your house - be drunk/drugged and do uncool stuff they wouldn't do if sober. well, if they sober up, then that's different
sometimes, you just don't like your relative - like relative X simply is unpleasant and can't resist making everyone else miserable. why have them in your house, especially at holidays? and trust me, husband and me have gone through this stuff. why have anything to do with people like that if you aren't forced to? you shsouldn't be forced to be with people just because you have some DNA in common
and sometimes, the relative is really really bad - if your father/brother/uncle was a sandusky, you REALLY want to have anything to do with someone that evil? you would want the person anywhers NEAR your kids WHY??? besides, why should you WANT to reconcile with an abuser? i do not get that.
one of the ways of healing yourself from what happened to you with an abusive parent is to stop trying to get approval from the abuser and let them go.
as for getting with outside children who are your half siblings - well, i figure youneverknow, try em, you might could like em. one of my closest friends is a grrrl i ran into and we hit it off instantly - we told each other - you feel like family. we got to talking and found out we were actually blood cousins. she is like the sister i never had. one of my uncles - his youngest kid isn't his - and that is his favorite kid - he told me - i am real grateful to her daddy for screwing my wife because he gave me a present of this awesome kid. sometimes you get lucky...
and, by the way, finding your birth parents is not always a pleasant experience. sometimes, birth parents don't WANT to be found and don't WANT to even remember you exist, if they knew in the first place... i've seen a few of those go VERY wrong...
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