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great article: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704111504576059713528698754.html (legit ns'rs read the whole thing)
thoughts?
this article reminded me of The Giver or Brave New World where everything is robotic and people are assigned their occupations and there is no individuality.
One of the best things about being an American is that you are entitled to life, liberty, and the puruit of hapiness. These parents are taking away these rights.
The girl didn't snuggle with the mother because she had suddenly created a special and close bond with her...the girl snuggled with the mother because she felt like she had finally earned her acceptance and approval and felt she had finally earned her right to be loved. Children shouldn't have to earn their right to be loved.
Just because your dog still runs to you, wags it's tail, and is extremely loyal and affectionate after being told "bad dog" and being hit or punished does not mean that hitting him was the right thing to do. This mother has been given the validation she needs to think that her abuse was okay. It's not-- many victims love their abusers.
Hey, Some Guy, you hit the nail on the head. As spouse of a Korean woman, I can vouch for the "rest of the story" to which you allude. This Tiger parenting is something truly to be feared, and our tolerance of it is tantamount to participation in it. Not good.
Some Guy,
Thanks for posting that. I am married to a Japanese woman, so your wife’s, and Amy Chua’s, parenting styles are all too familiar to me (I have seen many other, but not all, Japanese moms act likewise): constant and continuous berating, belittling, and attacking the children themselves and not the behavior ("YOU are stupid. YOU are fat. YOU are a little shrimp."); pitting the children against their friends and peers, thereby destroying their friendships ("Why can't you be like so-and-so. He/She is better than you."); competition with other mothers vicariously through the children; screaming at every little mistake in that piano piece. (In Chua’s Today Show clip, chills went down my spine when I saw her facial expression as she was monitoring her daughter's piano playing—exactly the same expression my wife has when she peers on over my children's shoulders as they practice. I and my children have come to hate the piano thanks to her.)
I battle fiercely against my wife to protect my children daily, but she is single-minded and impervious. No compromise. Like Chua’s husband seems to have done, I try to at least act as a mitigating factor—showing the children that there are more humane ways to approach life. Hugging and consoling them when the abuse overwhelms them. Sadly, there is not much more I can do.
Japan has not signed the Hague Convention on children’s rights, and ALWAYS supports Japanese citizens over non-Japanese people. Therefore, my wife could abduct the kids to Japan anytime, and as has been done countless times in cases of Japanese citizens leaving non-Japanese spouses, and I would have absolutely no recourse. The Japanese government would support her in her efforts to prevent contact with the children.
Some will undoubtedly use Chua's book as a parenting guide; Nevertheless, I am glad the book is coming out. It is already causing others to come public with stories of tragic parental abuse committed in the name of accelerated learning and misguided Asian values. Let’s hope some unintended good does come of Chuo’s book after all.
Gibran expresses it best:
On Children
Kahlil Gibran
Your children are not your children.
They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you,
And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.
You may give them your love but not your thoughts,
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow,
which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them,
but seek not to make them like you.
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.
because the chinese are really good at making violins. If you left a chinese woman out in the woods with absolutely nothing, you'd return to find she had asexually reproduced 47 children who had become the new york philharmoic and a violin-making assembly line.
http://articles.sfgate.com/2007-01-21/news/17227993_1_violin-and-bow-makers-stringed-violin-society
aren't you at work?
It's a horrible way to deal with raising children. I am married to a Chinese, from China, and the verbal and emotional abuse is horrifying to an American parent. Telling a child that they failed, are a loser, are useless. Telling the child that he/she should either obey or leave the house (8 year old child), telling the child that their clothing will be thrown out, or their Beanie Baby collection will be thrown out. I could go on and on. In addition, and this is something I am sure that this author has left out, there is a high degree of physical responses to the child (hitting, pushing, wrestling, slapping on the head) by Chinese parents.
This woman is doing it all wrong, and this kind of child raising cannot be defended. The United States is not a third world country, and we should not tolerate such primitive child raising behavior in a modern society. This woman is a misguided, cruel bitch needs to have her cruelty exposed and investigated. Believe me, I know all about this situation.