Aziz Ansari on Visiting Parents

Visiting our parents is often something people don’t want to do these days. Maybe, that’s because we are thinking about the visit the wrong way. That’s what Aziz Ansari suggests, but is he right? I’ll explore the topic of visiting our parents on the weekend in light of Gospel teaching.

Aziz Ansari Visits his Parents

In Aziz Ansari’s comeback to Netflix, Right Now, he takes on the controversy in his life and in the world. I’d like to hone in on the part where he talks about visiting parents. This part of the show involves his turning to the audience and asking, “You see your folks often?” Aziz calculates that we all might have only 20 more years left to see our parents and 60 more visits. “Are you creating cherished memories?” he asks the audience. “There’s like five hands raised right now,” he interjects. He explains why so few. We all had the same lousy weekend. We all started the visit by purposefully arriving late on Friday.  The next morning, everyone got up late. We all spent the day avoiding any conversation more serious than “oh, you got a new coffeemaker.”

In fact, Ansari says, “The rest of the day, all are on their phones, computers, doing whatever they can to avoid eye contact or  deep conversation.”  Ansari tells us, “At a certain point, collective guilt sets in.” We might ask what is this guilt about? What is it the typical person feels they ought to do with their parents? That comes later. I think the basic answer is that we all feel the need for connection.

Ansari’s Answer to Our Guilt 

In this imaginary scenario, the guilt leads to an awkward family gathering that results in someone’s turning on the television to put everyone at ease. Finally, the day ends, and the next morning dawns; it’s time to go, but “Just as you’re leaving, one of your parents finally looks you in the eyes. And they’re like, uh, ‘Is your life okay?'” However, Ansari explains that this final attempt at real dialogue is answered evasively with a “yeah!” Thus, the weekend visit ends without any real connection “because we’re completely incapable of having a real conversation with these people we’ve known our entire lives. ”

Ansari explains his reason for telling us all this is that he wants us to finally sit down and have a conversation with our parents. “I’m saying it hopefully to inspire us, to talk to these people, to get to know, em, right? ‘Cause when they pass, we’re the ones to tell their story, okay?” The answer to our guilt: learn about our parents. 

To my mind, Ansari’s answer is incomplete. Seeing myself as merely a kind of glorified historian with my parents seems inadequate. It’s not reason enough to visit at least for me. More than his answer, his questions resonate. He leads me to ask, why should I visit my parents? Why can visiting them be uncomfortable? And why, despite any discomfort that I might feel, do I feel that it is a good thing to see them? Is it simply because I know time is running out?

Realizing that the clock is ticking is the first step. As Jordan Peterson says in 12 Rules for Life, “The heightened knowledge of fragility and mortality produced by death can terrify, embitter, and separate. It can also awaken” (359). However, as Ansari shows, a visit isn’t enough.

Modern Problems in an Age of Isolation

We might also notice that it is really only recently that this question – should I visit my parents? – has become such an issue. It is hard to imagine that there was such a decision, not long ago. The weekend and visiting one’s parents are really modern problems. I would imagine that in former times, aging parents probably lived with their children. The family unit wasn’t so splintered. Likewise, the weekend didn’t pose such an existential question to our ancestors, or so I imagine. Especially to someone like Ansari, without kids, the weekend now stands for that block of time that is set apart for me. Thus, modern people find themselves trying to find their way back to basic principles about life. To a degree, they are forced to reinvent the wheel and ask existential questions about what is and what is not important to their lives. 

Ansari’s piece also shows us how much the modern person lives without a sense of necessity to relationships. Rather than making us happy, this freedom makes us isolated and sad. The question, why should I visit someone if I feel uncomfortable with them, applies to almost everyone in our lives. While there are certainly times we don’t have to visit someone. if we don’t want to, at other times this question is a reflection of society’s extreme individualism. It is all too easy just to drop someone out of one’s life because they are difficult. That we can do this, does not make our lives happier. Indeed, the people who have shut out their loved ones may feel particularly lonely.

Family vs the Individual 

This leads me to ask whether, perhaps, we have it upside down these days by putting the individual on top. Echoing Aristotle, the Catechism states, “The family is the original cell of social life. It is the natural society in which husband and wife are called to give themselves in love and in the gift of life. Authority, stability, and a life of relationships within the family constitute the foundations for freedom, security, and fraternity within society” (2207). The Catechism insists that rather than the individual, it is the family that makes society.

It shouldn’t be any wonder then that without the family we tend to feel isolated, and that when we don’t visit our family, we start to think we are failing in our duty. This duty is also in our conscience.  For that reason, if someone kills his or her parents we have a special word for the action, and we feel a special kind of horror. At the end of the day, it is not me, me, me, the individual, but the family that has the most importance. 

The Fourth Commandment 

We all have the fourth commandment to “Honor your father and your mother” in our hearts. Why would God give us this commandment, thus verbalizing what we know instinctively?  Obviously, there’s a special bond of gratitude that we all have to our parents, a bond that may be weakened in modern times. Our parents gave us life and taught us how to behave in the world.  God wanted society to work, and without the foundation of the family, it is hard to imagine that it could. Our maker also wanted us to have an immediate connection to another human being, a connection that would last us our lives. For these reasons, when parents behave poorly or are not present, the child often suffers and may end up wounded. 

Reasons why visiting our parents is hard

Then, why is it so hard at times to love these people in our lives? To me, the answer is twofold. First, our society has made getting old a curse and stripped the old of their value. Euthanasia, abortion, and contraception all communicate one loud and clear message to society: life isn’t that valuable unless you are in a certain age range. In Evangelium Vitae, St. Pope John Paul II calls this a culture of death. In such a culture, those who do not have economic value are cast out, for “This culture is actively fostered by powerful cultural, economic and political currents which encourage an idea of society excessively concerned with efficiency” (12).  Like it or not, this point of view is contagious. We carry it with us subconsciously. 

Another reason I believe visiting parents is difficult is that we fear being judged. This is a point Ansari addresses when he challenges us to have a real conversation. The reason a real conversation is hard is that it might involve saying the wrong thing or saying something exposing. It might even be hard in not knowing what to say. Fearing the judgment or imagined judgment of a parent, adult children may be afraid to share their struggles or even listen to their parents talk about theirs. This is also the reason behind many of the superficial interactions that fill up the day. 

The Need for Vulnerability

From my own experience, I know that I tend to forget the people I just had a light conversation with; true friendship requires vulnerability.  Jesus says that a house built on his words is like a house built on rock. He tells his disciples, “Everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock. And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall, because it had been founded on the rock” (Matt 7:24-25).

We could apply these words to all our relationships.  This may open a Pandora’s box of questions. Are we really with someone for their looks or their personality? Do we really know the people in our lives? Do we even really love the people we think we do? These questions may lead to a kind of awakening like the Peterson quote above suggests.

Conclusion

Technology has extended our lifespans, but the true meaning of life hasn’t changed. We still demand to be loved for who we are, not what we do. Visiting home may be hard, but let’s try to love each other for who we are, children of God.