<p>I agree with Sax that it is a $300 life lesson, best handled and thought about by the student… though I also have no problem with the idea of supportive parents reimbursing their kid the money. After all, this is not the kid’s fault.</p>
<p>Like Himom’s son, this is the sort of lesson that I learned, and my son learned, in elementary school …perhaps in a sense we are fortunate to have encountered less-than-perfect “friends” so early on. I remember being about 12 or so and having my “best” friend steal a ring that had great emotional value to me – one day she was admiring it, the next day it was gone. I remember two very distinct incidents of thefts of cherished possessions with my son, at around age 6 & again at around age 12. </p>
<p>One of the important lessons is simply that even people who we like or who seem to be good people cannot always be trusted. Sometimes they are responding to external pressures (financial difficulties); sometimes they are individuals who seem to have internal emotional problems; and some people simply seem to have no internal concept of right and wrong, at least when it comes to theft or respect for personal property. If there is a big perceived discrepency in wealth, a thief will often rationalize that it is o.k. to steal from someone who is richer & better off.</p>
<p>None of this is meant to make excuses for the conduct – the point simply is that all is not black and white, good & evil, and seemingly good people sometimes do terrible things. It’s hard to reconcile sometimes – and sometimes we need to make some hard personal decisions about how we will deal with the person in the future. (Do you cut off all contact? or do you forgive and move on? Would it make a difference if you discovered an underlying reason for the problem - such as a drug problem - and the thief later got help for that problem?) </p>
<p>But I think that all comes back to the reason why the son needs to cope with this on his own. The fact that fake-name’s son confronted Tom and reported the incident to security, but has also said that he does not want to ruin Tom’s whole life, shows a maturity on the part of fake-name’s son, an ability to keep the loss in perspective. The students have taken action that will result in appropriate consequences to Tom, so it seems that they are in fact handling it well on their own. </p>
<p>I don’t think that fake-name should contact Tom’s parents simply because when young people are over the age of 18, it’s time for everyone to stop seeing their parents as the one’s responsible for fixing problems in their lives. For one thing, the law doesn’t impose any such obligation. But beyond that, it simply isn’t a way that young adults ought to go about solving their conflicts with one another.</p>