rSlash - r/AITA for Calling the Cops on a Family of Thieves?

Episode Date: October 11, 2026

0:00 Intro 0:07 Beach stuff 2:47 Finances 9:35 Vibes 13:06 Wifi Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices...

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Starting point is 00:01:33 is concerns about gambling, visit connectsontario.ca or call 1-8665-3-1-2,600. Terms and conditions apply. Welcome to R-slash-Am I the Butthole, where OP gets painted as the bad guy for calling the cops on a couple of thieves. Am I the Butthole for calling the cops on a family that was using the chairs and umbrellas that I left on the beach? I'm staying with friends at the beach, and since it's technically the off-season, the beach that we're at is barren. If you look at, up and down this 10-mile stretch of beach, there's maybe a dozen people at most on the beach. That, combined with the fact that the house where at is only a 5 to 10-minute walk from the beach, means we've been setting up our chairs and umbrellas in the mid-morning,
Starting point is 00:02:13 and often leaving them unattended as we go for lunch, then coming back to our stuff after lunch. Today, we came back from lunch at the house and found a family sitting in our chairs and even drinking the sodas that were in the cooler that we left. My friends were dumbfounded, but I was not having it, so I went straight down and asked them what they thought they were doing. They were acting all coy, saying they thought the chairs were abandoned. I told them, no, it wasn't, and to get out. That's when they dropped the coy routine and got snarly, telling me that if we didn't want it taken, we shouldn't have left it, and if we don't like it, we can call the cops.
Starting point is 00:02:52 I told them, all right, if that's what they wanted, and I walked off. My friends were telling me to just drop it as I was calling the cops back at the house, and I could tell the dispatcher was rolling their eyes and I was on the phone with her. But sure enough, after 20 to 40 minutes, the police rolled up and I pointed the family out to them. At first, they told the cop the stuff was theirs, but then I pointed out that my name was written on the back of the chair. I would have been content with the cop just having them give our stuff back. But since they lied to the cop, that pissed him off, and he ended up. up writing them all tickets. Now they're all mean mugging us from the balcony of their house,
Starting point is 00:03:30 two down from ours, and my friends are still saying that I shouldn't have made a scene. I didn't have any intention of the cop giving them citations. I'm not pressed about the cost of the stuff. For me, it was just the principle of someone stealing something and then actually going, finders keepers when the owner tries to get it back. They were literally stealing your stuff, and your friends were like, no, no, it's okay, let them steal our stuff. Why? Man, it bothers me when people are so averse to making a scene. Yo, these people are thieves. Go get your stuff back. Though I will say, O.P., leaving your stuff behind at the beach is kind of asking for it.
Starting point is 00:04:08 I don't mean to say that you deserve it. I'm saying that this is an expected outcome that you kind of have to see coming, right? If you leave your sodas on the beach, someone's going to drink them because there's buttholes everywhere. One thing Reddit's taught me over the years. O.P., you get zero out of five buttholes. I'm giving the thieves one out of five buttholes. Am I the butthole for telling my wife that our family will not financially suffer because she keeps bailing out our adult son?
Starting point is 00:04:34 My wife and I have an adult son, who's 21, who has problems with responsibility, basically his entire life. In high school, he did poorly, mostly because he wouldn't do the work, and ended up needing summer school just to graduate on time. After graduation, he didn't go to college, went through something like seven jobs before he was 20, and continued living with us basically rent-free. And when I say rent-free, I mean free. No groceries, no utilities, no meaningful contribution to the household. The frustrating part is that he would be broke while spending whatever money he did have on alcohol, vapes, junk, tattoos, etc.
Starting point is 00:05:14 He couldn't even keep his phone on because he wasn't making the payments. He would just go somewhere and bum every one. his Wi-Fi so that he could call or text. This has caused arguments between my wife and me for years. I've always believed that if he's going to live with us as an adult, he needs boundaries and consequences. My wife thinks that I'm too hard on him, and she has a tendency to cover for him or rescue him. For a while, we pushed the military because we thought maybe some structure would help him. He enrolled and backed out multiple times, I think three total. Eventually, I realized no Nobody can force an adult to become responsible if he doesn't want to. Then came the car.
Starting point is 00:05:57 The whole reason I'm typing this. Our son asked us to finance a car for him and promised he would make the payments. I said absolutely not. I knew exactly where this was going. After this went on for a while, somehow we ended up at a used car lot anyway, where my wife financed a used Toyota Corolla in her name for him. I refused to participate. I didn't sign anything.
Starting point is 00:06:23 I didn't even want to know the terms because I had made my position crystal clear. This was a terrible idea and I wanted no part of it. Predictively, he treated the car like everything else. He got tickets, blowouts, dents, etc. Then one day he walks up to the house and casually tells us, they repoed the car. Turns out he had made a payment in months. This was while he was still living in our house without paying rent or housing.
Starting point is 00:06:51 household bills, and while he was working on and off. His explanation was that he couldn't afford the payments and was too embarrassed to ask us for money. So the car gets repossessed, but of course, the loan is in my wife's name. I figured this would finally be the lesson. Nope. The finance company repeatedly contacted my wife about the remaining debt. She basically ignored it until someone eventually showed up at our house and served her because they're suing her. She finally contacted them and managed to get the lawsuit dropped in exchange for a payment plan of about $200 bucks a month. At this point, I'm thinking, great, our son can pay $200 bucks a month toward the debt that he created. Except he hasn't. The payment arrangement started about two months ago, and as far as I
Starting point is 00:07:40 know, he hasn't made a single payment. My wife says she asked him. He ignores her, blows her off, or says he's having money problems. Meanwhile, we're having money problems too. We're We're not wealthy. There's no trust fund, inheritance, giant savings account, etc. We're a dual-income working household, and basically every dollar we earn has somewhere it needs to go. Then today, my wife texts me, they're trying to garnish my check for the payment of the car. Apparently, they contacted her workplace. I responded, makes sense. She said she would try to make payment tomorrow because she can't have them garnishing her wages. I told her she needed to get with her son and make him pay it. She said no, because the debt is in her name and basically said that she would just
Starting point is 00:08:27 have to eat the cost. Then she told me, he won't give me the money. Work harder is all I can do. I'll eventually be able to pay the effing bills or I'll be dead. That's where I lost it. I told her Those aren't just her wages being garnished. We're married and operate a household together. Losing hundreds of dollars from her paycheck means less money available for our bills, groceries, and family expenses. She said that she'd already asked her son several times and he either doesn't respond or blows her off.
Starting point is 00:09:00 So all she can do is work and take care of it herself. I told her that's exactly the problem. She keeps asking him instead of requiring anything from him. When I told her to get the money from him now, she literally responded, Loll, laughing while crying emoji. Oh, no, if he wanted to help or could, I'm sure he would. That sent me over the edge. I told her that this is exactly how we got here.
Starting point is 00:09:26 She's protected him from consequences his entire life. Every time I've tried to hold him accountable, I've been painted as the butthole who's being too hard on him. Now he's an adult, created thousands of dollars in debt, ignored it, and apparently gets to say, I'm having money problems, while his mother works harder to pay for it. And we're supposed to have money taken out of our household to fix it. I got angry and told my wife,
Starting point is 00:09:51 this is not going to affect us or our finances. I'm making this clear to you. I told you about this car multiple effing times. I expressed my doubts, you still went and got him the car. He defaulted on the phone and now it's our effing fault. the $200 bucks a month that you're going to pay for him will not come out of regular finances. I don't give a damn what you have to do. You will come up with the $200 extra somewhere else.
Starting point is 00:10:19 Stop spending, start saving. End of story. Yeah, I know that was harsh. I hated saying it and regretted it immediately. My wife clearly thinks that I'm being too hard on both of them. I think that I've spent years watching this train coming down the tracks, repeatedly saying, get off the tracks, and now I'm being asked to help pay for the wreck. O.P., while I agree with you that your son should pay that money, you will never, ever see that money again,
Starting point is 00:10:48 because it's not in his name, so he has to just decide to give you the money? Yeah, that's not going to happen. Unfortunately, you have a wife problem and a son problem, and there's no easy way out of it, except possibly divorce. I don't know if this issue quite justifies divorce, but it is a real problem. One thing you can do today is kick your son out of your house! You say you're not enabling him, but if he's living there rent-free, you definitely are. Am I the butthole for being really rude and killing the vibe during a cabin trip? My friends and I, four couples in our 30s, got a cabin for a long weekend. We had a nice cabin where every couple had their own bedroom and bathroom.
Starting point is 00:11:27 We had plans to do some hiking, play some games, make some great meals, grill out, etc. It wasn't our first trip together, as we were. We'd been friends since high school. The first night was fine. I don't really drank, but I still had a good time. I had one beer, but everyone else managed to go through a case and a half of beers. I'm a morning person, so at midnight I went to bed. I woke up at 7 a.m. and see three people sleeping on couches.
Starting point is 00:11:53 Dishes from dinner were still in the sink, beer cans all about, so I did some clean-up then and made breakfast for myself. My wife is a late sleeper, so I'm used to being quiet in the mornings. I had coffee and read a book for a while in near silence. Around 11, one couple was up, but was keeping to themselves. Eventually, they told me I was being really rude by only making breakfast by myself and being noisy while people were trying to sleep on the couch. I just said, I'm being quiet, but they have rooms they could have slept in, and I went to shower.
Starting point is 00:12:27 Around noon or so, everyone else was up. We talked about the plan for a hike. The trail we wanted to do would take three hours, so if we waited until after 4 p.m., it would be too late as the park closes at dusk, and we'd want to grill dinner before dark. By 2 p.m., everyone was having a beer. We didn't hike. It's whatever. It's their weekend, too. We make dinner again, dishes get left out again, games and drinks again. I wasn't an unwilling participant in this, or upset about this. The next day, I was up at 7 a.m. again. Given yesterday, I have to be. decided I was just going to go for an early solo hike and hit up a diner on the way home. Everyone was still asleep when I got back.
Starting point is 00:13:08 Around 11 a.m., a few people were up. I started cleaning up again. One of the girls told me, Can you stop that? You're being really rude to everyone and killing the vibe. I asked what she meant, and her husband told me that it wasn't cool of me to go on a hike without them, and that I should have invited everyone else to the diner,
Starting point is 00:13:27 and that I was making everyone feel like slabs for cleaning up. No one else spoke up, but everyone just stared at me as if waiting for an apology or something. I talked to my wife later. She was stumped. I asked her if they had said anything about me after I went to bid. She assured me they didn't. I asked her if she thought that I was being rude, and she didn't think so. The day went on, same thing as yesterday.
Starting point is 00:13:53 We were supposed to go on that hike, but we didn't. Dinner, fire, beers. I don't think I said more than a few words for the rest of the rest of the rest of the day. rest of the day. I told my wife that I didn't really feel like staying and we just bounced the next morning, one day early. My wife was kind enough to cover and text the group that she wasn't sleeping well and just wanted to go home to her bed, but I'm sure they saw through that. Chat has been silent since. Am I the butthole? Yo, are you the butthole for what? Doing the dishes? You're doing everyone a favor, man. Oh, but we don't want to do that because it's our weekend, okay, but it's O.P.'s
Starting point is 00:14:28 weekend too. And if O.P. gets stressed out by, you know, dirty dishes and wants to clean up, what's the problem? If Opie wants to go on a hike, what's the problem? O.P., you're in the clear here. Your friends are just being weird and picky and acting like spoiled teenagers. You get zero out of five buttholes. They get one out of five buttholes. Am I the butthole for changing the Wi-Fi password after my landlord kept coming into my apartment? My landlord lives in the same building and has a spare key to my apartment. I understand that landlords sometimes need acts for repairs or inspections, but lately, he's been coming in way more often than I think is normal. The first few times he gave me notice, so I didn't say anything. Also, FYI, I'm a girl, and he's gay,
Starting point is 00:15:12 so I didn't really bother. But recently, he started coming in to check something without telling me beforehand. Nothing was missing, and he wasn't doing anything creepy, but I'd come home and notice things had been moved around. I finally told him that I wasn't okay with him entering without letting me know first. He said I was being dramatic and that it was his property, so he should still be able to check on it whenever he wants. Sure, I hate conflict, so I let it go. A few days later, he asked me for the Wi-Fi password
Starting point is 00:15:43 because apparently he needed to check the router. I gave it to him. Then, I noticed my internet was being used at weird hours when I wasn't home. I changed the password, and I didn't give it to him again. He confronted me about it and said that I'm making his job, unnecessarily difficult. I told him he can contact me if he needs access to the apartment and I'll arrange a time. But I'm not giving him unrestricted access to my Wi-Fi or letting him come into my home whenever he feels like it. Like, for real, I'm paying rent. He said nobody visits anyways and that I'm
Starting point is 00:16:16 being entitled and he'll be canceling my lease once it ends. Now I'm wondering if I went too far or if I actually am the butthole. O.P., canceling the lease here would be doing you a favor. You definitely have a toxic landlord. In all my years of living in apartments, I had a landlord come into my place maybe like two or three times total, and they always asked beforehand. So this guy's violating your rights. I mean, he's calling you entitled, but there are some things that you literally are entitled to. Like if you, I don't know, buy a hamburger, you're entitled to eat the hamburger because you are now the owner of that hamburger. The word entitled kind of has like a negative connotation to it. But some
Starting point is 00:16:58 entitlements are good and proper. And you being able to feel safe and comfortable in your own home that you pay for is a good entitlement. That was our slash am I the butthole. And if you like this content, be sure to follow my podcast because I put out new Reddit podcast
Starting point is 00:17:13 episodes every single day. My rec league goalie says he plays for the love of the game. You gave up six goals last week, Steve? Maybe play to win, huh? Like with Bet365. get paid the second my team goes up big with early payout and can cash out at any time before the game ends. Come on, Steve, bet 365, the home of winning early. Must be 19 and older, Ontario only.
Starting point is 00:17:38 Please play responsibly. If you were someone you know is concerns about gambling, visit connectsontario.ca or call 18665 through 1,2,600. Terms and conditions apply.

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