apathetic 7 yr old deficating in pants

He may be doing this to get a reaction out of you. You need to be totally unemotional about it. Make it his problem. He needs to clean it up (do the laundry, change the sheets, etc). Not you. Let him know that he made the choice to do this and he has to pay the price. Again, not you - he made the choice. Say something like "Oh honey, I'm sorry you made the choice to spend the afternoon doing laundry instead of playing with your friends. What a bummer for you." You also need to vary your consequences. That way he can't predict what you will do. Sometimes children will actually do something and get punished, just to prove to themselves that they can control their parents. They think "Watch this, I'll do x and mom will do Y." And when it happens they feel victorious. If mom does z, then it throws the child off kilter. These are just some thoughts that popped in my head when readng your post.