There are often disputes in life: when parents are legally stripped of their guardianship rights by the People's Courts due to serious faults such as child abuse and abandonment, can they claim the obligation to support their adult children when they are old, weak, unable to work, and have no source of income? Many people hold the simple idea that “if my parents are not fit to raise me, I have no obligation to support them,” but the law provides a very clear answer: guardianship rights and the obligation to support are independent of each other, and they do not affect each other. Unless there are special statutory circumstances, the obligation to support cannot be arbitrarily exempted.

  Article 26 of the Civil Code clearly stipulates that adult children have the obligation to support, assist, and protect their parents. This obligation is a statutory obligation arising from the blood relationship and social public order and good customs, and it is mandatory and not affected by whether the parents have fulfilled their guardianship duties. Guardianship rights are the exclusive custodial responsibilities granted by law to parents over their minor children, the core of which is to ensure the healthy growth of minors. The revocation of guardianship rights only means that the parents have lost the qualification to care for their minor children, and it does not eliminate the parent-child identity relationship, nor can it directly exempt the children from their obligation to support. Article 37 of the Civil Code further clarifies: after the guardianship qualifications are revoked by the People's Courts, the children who are legally responsible for supporting their parents shall continue to fulfill this obligation, thus clarifying the independence of the two from a legislative perspective.

  In judicial practice, the exemption from the obligation to support is limited to extremely special circumstances and there is no room for arbitrary exemption. Specifically, only when the parents have committed intentional criminal acts such as child abuse, abandonment, and sexual assault, and these acts have caused permanent physical and mental trauma to the children, and the parents have shown no remorse and have not taken any measures to compensate for the injuries, will the court, based on the principle of fairness, consider exempting the children from their obligation to support. Apart from this, even if the parents had not fulfilled their guardianship responsibilities or had general faults towards their children at the time, the children cannot refuse to fulfill their obligation to support. When the parents are old, unable to work, or face difficulties in life, they have the right to file a lawsuit according to law, demanding that their adult children pay alimony and provide necessary care.

  It should be noted that the core of the obligation to support is to ensure the basic survival rights of the parents, rather than a “reward” for parents with faults. When the court hears such disputes, it will not make a general judgment but will comprehensively consider the degree of the parents' faults, the specific circumstances of the children's injuries, and the children's actual economic capabilities, etc., to reasonably determine the method and amount of support, taking into account the legitimate rights and interests of both parties.

  In summary, the revocation of guardianship rights does not equate to the exemption from the obligation to support. The law both severely punishes the parents' acts of infringing on the rights and interests of their children and guarantees the basic rights of the elderly to receive support. Children cannot refuse to support their parents on the grounds of their parents' past faults, and parents should also reflect on their own faults and rationally assert their rights to avoid the escalation of conflicts, achieving a balance between the law and reason.