"Why Chinese Mothers Are Superior" lol

To a child? A teen is one thing, but a child? Did your parents raise you this way, Kino? If they did, I am sorry, because that's a horrible way to raise small children.

Okay, my dad is nowhere near that bad...but a few days ago he showed me this article and said that he should've raised me this way.

^^I got to play sports.

edited 20th Jan '11 10:09:53 AM by Kino

I agree that her later articles sound like backpedaling. The whole thing smacks of a ploy for attention that she's now regretting.

With he exception of withholding food, that's not so bad.

Tell that to the little girl that had her father screaming and calling her a lazy whore all the way home from soccer practice because her asthma was giving her trouble and she didn't want to play while her chest felt like it was on fire. When that happens to you, you are not not thinking "Gee, he's right. I should apply myself harder shouldn't let myself get knocked down by obstacles like my asthma." You're thinking "Please stop screaming, daddy. Please stop please stop please stop. I'll do anything. I'll go back to the soccer field, just please stop screaming at me. Oh God this is all my fault, I'm sorry. I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry..."

No, that isn't a hypothetical.

^Actually I did think something like that; then again I didn't have asthma.

Let me add my thoughts:

To whichever person commented on WSJ on how "PPL WHO STUDY 4 COMMUNICASHUN DAGREEZ R FAILUREZ HERP DERP (and author of the article, though hopefully the way this backfired taught you a lesson):"

Though my parents would love me no matter what, even if I didn't get an A despite trying my hardest, I am someone who instilled this so called "Tiger Mom" thinking on myself. But with modifications. I forbade myself from using the computer in distracting ways until weekends. I didn't not sign up for many out of school activities, placing a decent amount of focus on school work. I did not allow anything below a B- (oh God, I'm the world's greatest slacker you guys!). And I graduated fairly high in my class and got a 3.7 GPA. But oh no, that's not good enough! But that's fine; I don't care what you, Chua, or your little flock of 'WESTERN PARENTS RAIZ LAZZI KIDS NO MATTAR WAT' sheep think. I pushed myself in the sense the 'Eastern parents' would, but did not maul myself over it, same as other 'Western Kids.' Towards the end of my High School career, I wanted to strike a balance between the two 'methods' within myself, and in the long run, I'm happier that I did. And I have creative ideas that I will voice proudly one day, and your pathetic "anti-creativity" speech will not stop me (and believe me, I usually don't like to speak highly of myself in that way). So while I was initially angered by this article, after reading others' thoughts and doing some of my own brief soul-searching, I can say with confidence: Piss off. Goodbye, and thanks to you folks here on TV Tropes who put up with this rant.

ARI

edited 20th Jan '11 2:12:13 PM by Ari1991

I read this article a few days ago and I'm so glad that there's a thread for this. Immediately after finishing that horrible piece of bile, I dubbed Chua "Yale Bitch", which is how I referred to her when I was talking about this with my friends.

And then it was apparently about how she learned she was wrong, and that she actually exaggerated her horribleness in the article. I calmed down a bit, and sort of let the rage out of my chest and figured I'd learned a good lesson about how appearances were decieving.

And then it was apparently about switching from forcing her to be perfect at the violin to forcing her to be perfect at tennis? Fuck.

My perspective on this article comes from almost being a victim of insane Tiger Mothering (if not quite as extreme as Chua's). My mom, who was never pushed to be successful in school and therefore (she thinks) she never was successful in life, was all set to lay the heat and pressure on me like a steam cooker. My dad, who was pushed to be perfect and was nearly broken but instead rebelled in countless ways (including marrying my mom) warned her against it, and I was saved.

I am so constantly grateful for that. I actually have downtime in my life. I am actually allowed to quit when I don't like a certain extracurricular I'm taking. I can actually write my fanciful little stories without being yelled at for doing something that isn't pushing me towards MIT. It's true that even if she had gone ahead with her Tiger ways, she would probably have hugged me and told me she loved me, unlike Yale Bitch, but it would certainly have been unpleasant, and I've seen so many of my friends in the Indian-American community completely disintegrate their relationships with their parents because of this stupid, cruel Tiger Parenting.

"I've noticed that the people that tend to be most successful (Science fair winners, sysadmins, people that try cool science projects because they feel like it) have much laxer parents."

So have I. I have a friend who has pretty liberal Indian parents, and he's the one that truly excelled in math and science, because he loves it, and they fostered that love. He does robotics and studies engineering, but also watches TV and movies and listens to music and plays sports and is a funny, friendly guy. One the other hand, I have this...err...not-really-a-friend who thinks movies are stupid, TV is stupid, videogames are stupid, sports are stupid, and being nice to "stupid" people is stupid. His parents are...not liberal.

edited 22nd Jan '11 12:23:41 PM by OnTheOtherHandle

EDIT: Ignore this, my argument was based on misreading the post I was arguing against.

edited 22nd Jan '11 8:16:28 PM by BlackHumor

I don't know whether to be happy or sad about the fact that her daughter will never be a tennis prodigy, which is presumably what Chua wants.

So anyone actually read the book instead of taking articles written by others at face value?

Tell me you didn't buy it.

The article was written by her. Check the byline.

I'd read the book if I could do so without buying it and giving royalties to her.

We can only hope these kid's dad is better.

No I haven't bought it I am curious since we are intent on passing judgment that we have the entire story.

Though my parents would love me no matter what, even if I didn't get an A despite trying my hardest, I am someone who instilled this so called "Tiger Mom" thinking on myself. But with modifications. I forbade myself from using the computer in distracting ways until weekends. I didn't not sign up for many out of school activities, placing a decent amount of focus on school work. I did not allow anything below a B- (oh God, I'm the world's greatest slacker you guys!). And I graduated fairly high in my class and got a 3.7 GPA. But oh no, that's not good enough! But that's fine; I don't care what you, Chua, or your little flock of 'WESTERN PARENTS RAIZ LAZZI KIDS NO MATTAR WAT' sheep think. I pushed myself in the sense the 'Eastern parents' would, but did not maul myself over it, same as other 'Western Kids.' Towards the end of my High School career, I wanted to strike a balance between the two 'methods' within myself, and in the long run, I'm happier that I did. And I have creative ideas that I will voice proudly one day, and your pathetic "anti-creativity" speech will not stop me (and believe me, I usually don't like to speak highly of myself in that way). So while I was initially angered by this article, after reading others' thoughts and doing some of my own brief soul-searching, I can say with confidence: Piss off. Goodbye, and thanks to you folks here on TV Tropes who put up with this rant. tongue

See, this is the correct approach.

Because if you as a parent provide all the incentive for achievement, then you risk your child crashing due to lack of incentive once you leave the picture.

The objective is to instill self-motivation toward achievement in the child. I disagree respectfully with Prof. Chua that supplying that motivation will achieve this objective effeciently.

The only way it would be efficient is to encourage the child to develop themselves in other ways, to outpace the pressure put on the child externally, and/or to become a safe haven away from such pressure.

Thread Hopping. I have noticed that my weekend newspaper (also a Murdoch paper) has decided to feature this editorial.

Should I bother to read it?

I didn't.

@Glenn Magus Harvey

I feel bad, though, because I wrote my rant as if my parents were absent in the process. No, they were quite present, and they pushed to a degree; but they knew when to stop. And I actually spoke with them about their thoughts on the article; they didn't give a damn about what Chua said. They did what they thought was right for me, and while I'm not "NUMBAH WON!" I'm in a good place.

I think we need quite another kind of NUMBAH WON to stop this kind of thing! Don't the KND have sectors in Asia?

Wait a minute. Didn't ancient China adopt Buddhism? The philosophy that encouraged moderation in everything, recommended meditation, and taught people to seek wisdom above material things? And generally adopted a "Stop and smell the roses" outlook on life? How can this woman then turn around and claim that it's part of Chinese culture to push your kids to the breaking point?

Confuscianism

Quickly skimming the Wikipedia article on it tells me they throw around the word "perfection" a lot, as well as presupposing an autocratic ruler because if left to their own devices people are so petty and not perfect. Yeah, I can see where she gets it from.

Somehow, I feel that this book, the editorials and opinions and columns about it, and the ensuing firestorm of controversy, have not done much good toward decreasing stereotyping of Chinese-Americans in the United States.