'Dad got a ticket speeding to church. He's making my brother pay for it with allowance.' UPDATED

Standing up for yourself when you're still living under your parents' roof can be a tough task. Sometimes, you need the support of internet strangers to remind you that you're not alone.

In a popular post on the Two Hot Takes subreddit, a teen shared her disapproval of her dad's decision to "charge" her younger brother for his speeding ticket. She wrote:

"Dad got a ticket for speeding to church. He's making my (F16) brother(M11) pay for it with his allowance."

Right off the bat I wanna say that my brother is autistic. He struggles to get ready on his own and takes a long time getting dressed or washing up, and mom usually has to step in and help him. Dad doesn’t like getting to church after it starts, and usually yells at us to get ready when mom takes awhile helping him.

Dad got a ticket last Sunday for speeding to church and said it was their fault for not getting ready in time. He yelled at mom in the car afterwards and my brother when we came home, but it's not like he's not trying, it just takes him a little longer.

I'm posting because dad punished him and said he wouldn’t take him to his weekend basketball class for awhile because my brother's excited to get dressed/on time for basketball and not church, and he said that that meant basketball was an "idol before God". He also said he's not getting allowance until he says so because he's gonna pay for the ticket with it too.

This is just one of many things he does, and I'm posting because mom didn’t want to talk about it. Is there anything that can change dad’s mind because it's not like he's trying to do it on purpose, and dad doesn’t want to talk about it to anyone.

The internet was fully in OP's corner.

Knickers1978 wrote:

Honestly, go to your religious leader and tell them. Your father won’t listen to you or your mother; he probably will to your priest. I’m actively non religious, but my father is Catholic. He always said it was better to show up late to church than to miss it entirely.

Sounds like your dad cares more about how others view him than he does about your brothers struggles. If he had half a brain, he’d tell your brother mass started half an hour earlier than it actually does.

OP responded:

They argue about a lot of things that I didn't mention, but dad didn't want to talk about it either. Dad just seems to think that my brother seems more excited about getting ready for basketball than church, and he's probably right because it's more fun to him.

Purple_Department_67 wrote:

Why doesn’t the dad help get the son ready too?? Like a previous reply says he could say that church starts earlier and then, I don’t know, help HIS son get ready rather than punishing a kid for being a kid.

OP responded:

Dad doesn't help at all and just leaves it to mom and yells at them as she wakes him up and goes in his room to help him get dressed.

tokencitizen wrote:

My dad used to blame my mom for making him speed and get tickets too. But guess what, he was a fully grown adult, making his own decision to speed, and in control of the vehicle at the time he was ticketed. Course my dad was also ab*sive and we all went no contact when we could.

Your dad had so many options. Helping get your brother ready on time, leaving without him, arriving late to church. He made the decision to speed, he got consequences for his decisions. The fact that he's trying to blame shift does not mean he wasn't the one at fault for speeding.

OP responded:

I didn't even think about it like that.

peggysue_82 wrote:

Church is boring and it is not your brother's fault for being late (personally my sisters and I would drag out feet in Sundays. Turning 18 was the best thing ever). Maybe your parents can be more cognizant about getting him started earlier. Have his Sunday clothes ready on Saturday night. Or maybe point out his lack of accountability, he made choice to speed.

OP responded:

Mom always wakes him up and helps him get dressed, and she's always helpful but dad yells at her too, but he could choose to get up everyone earlier if he wanted.

zyzmog wrote:

Honestly, God doesn't care if you're late for church. He's probably more concerned about Dad yelling at his wife and kids than about being late for church. And He's probably not too happy about Dad making his 11-year-old son pay for Dad's sins. (I mean, I haven't heard it from The Big Guy Himself, but I can infer all of the above from what the Good Book says.)

OP responded:

It's not like my brother isn't trying his best either, but he doesn't seem to care that he's autistic and compares his excitement to go to basketball but not church as a bad thing when most kids would probably be more excited to go to their sport than church. Speeding to church also isn't safe, but he didn't even say anything about that.

zyzmog responded:

Totally agreed. I think that any 11-y-o boy, autistic or not, will be a lot more excited about going to bball than about going to church. And I'd say that that preference will endure for, oh, about eleventy-leven years -- and there's nothing anybody can do about it.

The sooner Dad figures that out, the better it will be for him and your brother. Best of luck to all of you. p.s. "You made me break the law" coming from a grown man is hilarious.

OP responded:

The fact that he's making him pay for the ticket by withholding his allowance also pisses me off. It's all mind games of how dad thinks/guesses that we have idols before God such as basketball, but he has no proof of that although it's true, but he'll keep being annoying until he's convinced that we don't have anything before God, so it's not even good enough to just go to church among other hobbies.

Five weeks later, OP jumped on with an update.

I don’t have much of an update besides what happened today (Saturday) and last Saturday. Dad kept his word about not bringing my brother to basketball this Saturday and last, and he hasn't received allowance the past two weeks either.

Dad also had a family meeting after dinner where he said that the ticket wasn’t the main thing, but that there would be changes because God "wasn’t first in our family" because other things were an "idol before God". In regards to my brother's allowance and basketball, he said both were done until he saw changes, but he also said no hangouts/shoot-around with his basketball friends either.

He also said I'm done with my evening tennis classes for the same reason, and he said he didn't care about having paid for them when I asked about money being wasted (he didn’t say anything was changing in his life though).

During the time that we would’ve had classes, he said we were going to start family Bible study instead because we seemed more excited about other hobbies (like basketball) instead of God/church, but he didn't apologize for speeding at all. And what kid wouldn't be more excited about basketball than going to church too?

A few people asked about my mom in my first post, and I wanna add that dad yells at her too. I also didn’t add this in my first post, but my brother has other special needs in addition to autism that make him need my mom to help him with things.

Some people said my brother was wrong for not getting dressed on time for church compared to basketball, but I disagree because mom wakes him up on Sunday after setting her alarm. She helps him wash up and get dressed, but dad never helps and makes mom cook breakfast too, so she's running around like crazy as dad yells and sometimes curses.

Mom also has to iron dad's clothes along with my brother's (I prepare my own). I offered to help iron/choose his clothes the night before, but dad always said no and that mom's supposed to help him. Mom also doesn't want me to help and is usually quiet whenever dad yells at her, and sometimes she seems depressed but doesn’t say anything.

My brother has an easier time getting ready for basketball because it's in the afternoon when he's already awake (without dad yelling/making mom cook breakfast and iron). I'm going to see one of my relatives over the presidents day weekend, so I'll talk to them in-person. I also decided not to tell anyone at church because I'm afraid of them telling dad and us getting punished more.

I just hate the idea of having to pretend to be more excited about going to church than other hobbies to please dad, and I hate being punished because dad wants to play mind games about what's number-one in our lives and such.

It's not the first time we've done family Bible study (we did many years ago before we stopped and kinda forgot), so I hope it passes with time, but it seems like we're done with sports for this semester.

The internet had strong opinions about the update.

prayingforrain2525 wrote:

A good way to turn people away from God entirely. Then again, any God who is a "jealous" God is not worthy of worship. Yes, I went there.

frolicndetour wrote:

Your dad made the decision that getting to church on time was more important than him driving safely. HE decided, he should pay the ticket. What an AH.

ScheduleEmotional467 wrote:

Does your father not realize he maybe creating a issue where your brother may resent God? Or when he older even resent him? I know people who parents forced them to church an such, it caused them to walk away from their faith.

Critical_Aspect wrote:

The number of people who believe that ab*se is the path to convincing others of their righteousness continues to astound me. In the case of children, that only works until they're old enough to escape, and then they wonder why the kids hate them.

Christichicc wrote:

Stuff like taking away the sports/fun things to focus on God is partly why I am no longer religious. I am still in contact with my parents, but that’s because they didn’t yell at me like this dick of a dad does to his kids.

HUNGWHITEBOI25 wrote:

So…in about…7ish years we’ll see a post about this failure of a parent about how he “doesn’t understand why his children abandoned church and went NC with him.” What an awful parent, i hope Oop and her bro can someday get away from him.

Hopefully, OP and her brother can escape that household ASAP, or their dad has a true "come to Jesus" moment.