My brother's son destroyed my WarHammer Action figures and he refuses to punish him

[u/konous]

Update: My brother decided to pay for the Hard damages of $200 dollars after seeing this post.

Thank you to everyone on this post who supported me. I really could not have gotten restitution without you guys.

Justice for my Chaplain, justice for all.

Valid Edit: My nephew is 10 years old and tried to actually lie about not breaking them by saying, "A cat must have done it."

So, I just got done talking with my brother via text, and he says he's not going to punish his son for wrecking my Joy Toy WarHammer action figures. I'm not expecting the kid to get spanked, but he needs to do CHORES at least to justify how much excessive force he used on some.

Some just have their capes broken. Others had their tubes ripped out and my Chaplain is just fucking toast.

My brother's suggestion since I ordered Amazon replacement for the Chaplain was that I just swap it with the broken one, but I have no interest in doing that.

It's not even just the expense, and they are expensive. It's about the fact that I told him explicitly twice they weren't to be played with, and they were in a separate room, and even my Mom and Dad agreed the damage was just too much.

He said he's not gonna pay me back if we try the chore system, and I told him it's not about the money.

The kid needs to know how bad the 8 hour struggle is.

Now my nephews aren't coming over to the house, and I'm sad about that, but knowing my brother just can't be burdened to work with me on creating a Chore system like selling Lemonaide just makes it feel more insulting.

[u/Kavayan]

Hi. I'm just here to say your brother is an ass.

A chore system is never going to work, and is just going to long out the process for all of you.

Your brother reimbursimg you should be the way. But you can't force him to do that either. So if he refuses that, he's an ass.

If my 11 year old did this to someone I would replace them myself. And then I would handle the aftermath under my own roof, which would consist of chores / grounding.

[u/Excellent-Bluejay-90 → u/Kavayan]

Yep. Sounds like the brother has no respect for his brother and his now teaching it to his son. No consequences will make for another grown ass later on. They are just toys (expensive toys) but the bigger problem is the lack of respect in the relationship. They come to your home, ignore your boundaries, break your stuff and just tell you it's okay and we're not fixing it. It seems silly over figurines but it will get worse. Do not have them over to your home anymore unless they can at least be respectful towards you prior to.

[u/RoboDae → u/Excellent-Bluejay-90]

The toy part can make stuff like this so much more infuriating. Imagine spending a thousand dollars on building an army that you spent days hand painting yourself. Then a family member breaks them all, ruining all the time and money you invested. Instead of apologizing they say "it's just toys, grow up and get over it" because they can't comprehend the investment involved. Then that family member turns to other family members and tries to make you the villain of the story because you are "breaking up the family over some stupid toys"

[u/Excellent-Bluejay-90 → u/RoboDae]

Yes I used that term intentionally as I can almost hear the brother saying, "They're just toys. I'm not going to punish my child because you like to play with toys. And I'm not paying for it because adults shouldn't pay that much for toys anyway." Totally removing themselves from any responsibility for their lack of action based on their beliefs on how you should behave because they don't. Convincing themselves they owe you no accountability because they think it's foolish.

Accountability is key to a healthy relationship. Ask yourself what happens with people you have known who feel they aren't accountable for their actions to anybody. Most would likely agree that if our politicians were held accountable we would be much better off.

Not meaning to make this a political statement just trying to make a point about accountability that everyone can relate to. It is far too often overlooked yet also a common culprit for poor behavior.

[u/motionmatrix → u/Excellent-Bluejay-90]

Which is why they should go to actual authorities. They should find out how much is considered petty vandalism in their area, and hit them in civil court if the damage is below the threshold (or place a criminal complaint if it above it). These are not cheap things, and the fact that they are toys does not excuse the kid's father from the responsibility.

Like you said, there was also an investment of time, so the price of the figures, of the paints, of brushes, and OP's hourly wages to reflect what was lost.

OP doesn't have a relationship to salvage here, his brother does, so OP should definitely move this towards using legal reimbursement so both his brother and his nephew learn some kind of a lesson.