21–30 of 217 posts
I hope I don't sound too racist or anti-Semite. Why is it that when a Jewish mother does the same as the Asian mother, no one complains? I'm a Chinese btw.
Extremely well written, and echoes many of the comments in the quora thread (and in my own observations). There's a logic to it all though, in China for example, there isn't really any reward to be a big risk taker, and the downsides can be huge (social isolation, imprisonment, worse). Success then is to follow directions, do what you are told, and do it with supreme competence. This is often discussed in terms of th…
I hope I don't sound too racist or anti-Semite. Why is it that when a Jewish mother does the same as the Asian mother, no one complains? I'm a Chinese btw.
Used to be there were quotas on how many Jews to let into Ivy league schools. Now that's applied to the Asian kids, with "diversity" as the excuse.
I'm also sure for every joke and stereotype of the Chinese mother, you can find an equivalent one about the Jewish mother.
Most Chinese families aren't crazy-obsessed with achievement - I'd say about 1/4 of them exhibit this kind of insane behavior, but that's still a very, very high rate, which is where this stereotype comes from. The rest are similar to their high-achieving white counterpart families.
Just as a data point, my two parents (two MDs and one PhD, yeah, it could have been real, real bad) weren't like this. I had a very normal childhood. I did all the things that white kids do.
I would like to bring up a possibility, which is possibly controversial: a lot of these kids let themselves be trampled on by their parents. In addition to (probably) being bullied at school, they are bullied at home by their parents. I really wish they would do more to stand up for themselves. They can't be blamed, though, as their will has been systematically removed by the parents in most cases.
Overall, this whole thing is a great example of very smart people doing very stupid things.
A not unrelated issue is the high rate of Asian American girls/women who refuse to date and marry Asian guys. It's so blindingly obvious as to why, I'm surprised anyone ever has to ask the question.
I don't want to start another topic, so I'll leave this - an excellent response from a user on Quora on the topic: http://www.quora.com/Parenting/Is-Amy-Chua-right-when-she-ex...
I did not choose the title of the WSJ excerpt, and I don't believe that there is only one good way of raising children. The actual book is more nuanced, and much of it is about my decision to retreat from the "strict Chinese immigrant" model. -Amy Chua
I hope I don't sound too racist or anti-Semite. Why is it that when a Jewish mother does the same as the Asian mother, no one complains? I'm a Chinese btw.
When art historians analyze late 20th and early 21st century culture, they will certainly coin the jewish-complaining art movement, which spanned television, movies and stand up comedy for like 30 years, and is still running strong with Curb your Enthusiasm.
I don't want to start another topic, so I'll leave this - an excellent response from a user on Quora on the topic: http://www.quora.com/Parenting/Is-Amy-Chua-right-when-she-ex...
I hope I don't sound too racist or anti-Semite. Why is it that when a Jewish mother does the same as the Asian mother, no one complains? I'm a Chinese btw.
A friend of mine, a mother of a gifted 5th grader wrestling with similar issues of parental control as Amy Chua, shared the WSJ article with me today. It reminded me of something Steven Pinker writes about in one of his books. In his book, he breaks down the work of Judith Rich Harris ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judith_Rich_Harris ) to this formula: Genes have 50% influence over a child's development, peers 40%-50…
I love the article. This is why we fight. I am your Chinese parent and call you "stupid" when I want to show you that I believe you can do better. When you tell me to "do whatever makes me happy," I feel you are being irresponsible because I can't control myself!
I guess we fail at being each other's parents. :)