I know that in many cultures families stay together for longer periods than we currently consider mainstream, and sometimes even an American household included three generations (ala "The Waltons). My uncle lived with my grandfather until my grandfather died when my uncle was almost 40. But my uncle held a full-time job after he returned from the military after the Korean War. My uncle bought most of the groceries, paid the taxes on the house, and did most of the basic household repair work. They each did their own laundry and took turns cooking. My uncle would have felt emasculated had he expected a parent to provide for him. Their living arrangement was a matter of convenience and saved money for both of them--my grandpa wasn't in any way, shape, or form my uncle's caretaker.

I think the grating thing for parents in THIS generation is that the kids often have so much expensive stuff that they think are necessities. They're glued to their cellphones and their video games, don't pull their weight with household chores or expenses, and truly don't have a clue how much food and mortgage payments and taxes and basic expenses cost.

Maybe young adults today watched too much Friends during their formative years, seeing how those young adults lived in fancy apartments and wore beautiful clothes and didn't work much at all. Or maybe they've just absorbed the values of the White House. The current resident there moved in seven years ago to what had once been his father's house after failing at job after job and being rescued time and again by his dad and his dad's friends.

So I guess maybe the LW's slacker son will turn out okay--when it comes right down to it, he could still grow up to be President of the United States.

The meek may inherit the earth, but probably not the apartment. If the LW hasn't been making the other two people in the apartment pay 2/3 of the rent, he's already been losing money on this. And since he can't afford the place on his own, he really shouldn't be there anyway.

If the lease is still entirely in his name, his first step should be to go to the landlord and say he is moving, and ask the landlord whether the landlord prefer that he find a new renter--he knows a young family who would like the place--or whether the landlord prefers to rent it out new. If the LW wants to be kind, he can inform his "friend" before he talks to the landlord. Either way, he has a right to every penny of the security deposit he spent, and needs to be taken entirely off the lease.

If the lease is in both his and his "friend's" name, he should go to the landlord and say he's moving out and wants his share of the security deposit back and wants his name off the lease.

Sharing an apartment with friend or stranger always has risks, and since this guy lacks the skills right now to deal assertively but kindly with roommates, he'd be wisest to find a place that he can comfortably afford to live in alone so he doesn't get into this kind of situation again. He'd also be wise to get some assertiveness training. Some of the letters writers sound like they've been burned and have become not so much assertive as aggressive and mean, the opposite face of the same bad coin as the LW's excessive meekness. Learning how to set fair boundaries in a warm but effective way is the goal.

"Any good liberal would happily go homeless to accommodate anyone else" only in a world where any good conservative would happily sell out a friend or his own mother rather than make a single accommodation for anyone but himself. All the while touting his "Christian values."

I attended the American Ornithologists' Union meeting in Santa Barbara in 2005, when an all-day symposium about California Condors was held. Researchers presented their studies finding conclusively that the precise chemical forms of lead found in lead-poisoned condor blood samples were the forms in bullets. There were an enormous number of papers and studies establishing that lead is the number one cause of mortality for condors, and that the situation is a genuine crisis for the species. The research was compelling.

Hunters have a long and honorable track record as conservationists. But they also have a long track record as obstructionists when their personal sport might be modified slightly to protect species. Lead shot for waterfowl hunting was banned in the US only after a long and bitter battle, even though that shot was not just poisoning Bald Eagles and other scavengers feeding on crippled ducks--it was poisoning the waterfowl resource itself when spent shot rained down on wetlands for ducks, geese and swans to pick up as grit. Hunter paranoia was at the forefront then (they kept claiming that banning lead shot for waterfowl hunting was the first step to banning hunting altogether), and it's at the forefront now.

I hope Arnold Schwartzenegger lives up to the reputation he's earned as a conservationist. I also wish more hunters would rise to the challenge of living up to their own reputation as conservationists. As the number of hunters steadily decreases, based on declining numbers of Duck Stamps sold each year, sportsmen will become an increasingly beleaguered minority. It will be increasingly difficult for them to defend their sport if they squander so much of their resources and reputation on fighting this kind of battle, in which ALL the scientific evidence is against them.