I waded into the comments, they are  fascinating and, warning, absolutely addictive. There are many of high quality and thoughtful, and clearly lots of Asians are responding with passionate views, some bitter about their upbringing. Others immigrant children of other cultures who also recognize the syndrome, and others western businesspersons in China who have an opinion on the results.  I copied some of the ones I found most interesting as I went along,to give readers here a taste, they are below.  (I should mentIon that in the sections I read, more than a few mentioned things like high suicide rates among Asian college students and stuff like the propensity to do things like join more authoritan churches in adulthood, I didn't copy those because they were repetitive . Relatively few are wholly supportive--I guess if you support this kind of parenting, you are not impassioned to write about it as she is. There were dismissive short comments scattered here and there, but not as many as like on a typical HuffPo thread--I included one as an example.)

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Mark Moersen wrote:

I am an American who owns a business in China. This article didn't surprise me, but it is instructive in showing the genesis of several common characteristics of virtually all the Chinese I have worked with. They show no initiative, and need to be told what to do every hour of every day. The are taught what to think, but not how to think. They report problems sometimes, but never solve them. They do not create anything, certainly not any new ideas, preferring to take the low risk route of falling back on what they've been taught and memorized in the past. When you lay their work out in front of them and tell them what to do, they plug away at it diligently until they're done. They will get it done, but won't find or even look for a better or faster way. With all the manufacturing going on in China, isn't it surprising that Americans have to go over there with our designs, show them how to make the products, watch them very carefully, and then bring the products back. With rare exceptions, like Haier, you don't find genuine Chinese products in America. I think it's because of mothers like Ms. Chua
 

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Sherman Tran wrote:

I'm really happy that my mom isn't Mrs. Chua.

I am a happy freshman in high school, and my parents are immigrants from Vietnam. However, they are nothing like Mrs. Chua. I get great grades in school (all A's so far), but guess what? I still participate in activites and clubs (cross country, track & field, swimming, tennis, football, the arts), hang out with friends, have sleepovers, go watch movies, and watch TV. I'm not a programmed robot.

I believe that spoon-feeding your children and forcing them to follow your regimen isn't going to get them anywhere on their own later in life. Sure, you might land them a spot in an Ivy League college, but school smarts does not equal street smarts. My parents always supported me with whatever I was doing, whether it was sports, school, or anything else by telling they were proud of me and to do well whatever I do. This I believe is important: that you build your own future with positive support from family and friends. As a result of this, I have a great educational life, sports life, social life, and family life.

I'll be happy knowing that my future job will be something I enjoy and not something I was forced to take on. One of my teachers told us before she left to choose an occupation where you'll cry when you leave.

I am perfectly happy the way I am.

Mrs. Chua, if this is serious, congratulations on adding to the stereotype that a lot of Asians have to put up with. Maybe stop supposedly speaking for every Asian parent please?


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YJ Kim wrote:

I beg to differ with Amy. If I didn't have two teen and pre-teen Asian kids of my own, I'd be scared of Amy - she sounds just like my mom. Amy, darling, what do you really know about 'having fun'? Really, some of the most fun things happen in my (long) life when I can admit (lately) that for the most part, I don't know what I'm doing - especailly when it comes to parenting. But that hasn't stopped me from trying and learning. Life's most precious moments have absoluitely nothing to do with practicing or rehearsing. One of the proudest things I find as a parent is to see how other people can inspire and mentor my child. Both my kids are lucky to have wonderful teachers, coaches, camp counselors, and friends they learn from and share right back with them. Teaching is definitely a two way street - there's a more joy in give and take.
My 13 year old son recently asked me what he should do when he starts high school next year. Aside from being floored that he asked me for advice, I told him what my 'superior' asian mom never had the luxury of being able to teach me: that it's ok to make mistakes - mistakes are wonderful opportunities to learn. It's hard to push your own limits when you're afraid of failing.
Amy, darling, you must read my favorite book by another Amy - The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan. Amy Tan writes with both her left and right sides of her brain. Intelligence has infinite dimensions - it's really fun to try and learn to use lots of them - even if you're not that good at most.


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Eva Wu wrote:

I have lived with both versions of this parenting thing. When I was little I was discipline by my grandparents who had a similar approach like Ms. Chua. But when I moved to the US and my parents took over, they had a very "uncaring' approach, similar to the "western parents" Ms. Chua Mentions. There are goods and bads with both types of parents, but I'm getting ahead of myself.

I have to say that i do agree with her point about how children themselves doesn't reallly care and it's up to the parents to push them. When I used to live with my grandparents, they pushed me into violin, ballet, drawing, swimming, and many other things. While some I didn't succeed in, I loved and excelled in most of them. My grandparents helped me to develop my skills in them by not allowing me to quit when I am discouraged. But when I began living with my parents, things began crumbling. I didn't realize this before when I was little, but now i realize the value of my grandparents pushing me into doing these things. My parents didn't "push" me at all. In fact their attitude was pretty much "do whatever you want". But at that age, all I wanted to do was play, so obviously i didn't want to continue all those activities. But as my older self reflecting back to when I was little, I really wish that my parents had pushed me into doing those activities, because I had the potential to do better, but because I was too stupid when I was little, I missed out on all those opportunities.

While I think parents should push the children into exploring and doing certain things, I don't feel parents have the right to limit the type of things we can get into. For example, Ms. Chua forbids her children from doing drama (which I find ironic, because her husband actually studied theatre in Julliard). Doing something like that is simply irrational to me. Amy Chua shouldn't have the power to dictate whether or not her daughters are allowed to do plays or not. Perhaps they could turn out to be amazing actors but misses out on this opportunity because their mothers forbid them from doing it? That would go completely opposite way from what Ms. Chua hoped to achieve.

I have been in situations similar to that of the one Lulu was in with her mother, in fact this has happened to be quite often while I was living with my grandparents. Sometimes I would be kicked out of the house because I wasn't able to do something. I feel like the way they treated me there severely scarred me. I have considered suicide when things like that happened. (Imagine.. a 7 year old thinking of suicide). Or at the very least, run away from home so I don't have to deal with such extreme pressure from an asian parent anymore.

Lastly, I have read several people's comments about IQ vs. EQ. The funny thing? I'm pretty sure my EQ was much higher when i was living with my grandparents (aka the "chinese mother" ideal). My grandparents were much more social than my parents and promoted me to be more social with my friends and be more bold. But when I came to live with my parents I suddenly became shy and unable to talk to new people.

One last thing I want to mention, my mom showed this article to me... and I actually teared up reading it. One reason was because it brought back bad memories. A second reason was actually because I felt not able to live up to my parent's expectations. I was more or less annoyed that someone would write something like this, so I basically use spend 2 hours (of which I should have been doing hw) looking up this nasty lady named Amy Chua, going through the comments for the article, and writing this comment. Well, that was long... hopefully it wasn't just random rambling that doesn't make any sense to anyone :P


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Matt K wrote:

After being shown this article by my other Chinese friends, I feel obligated to put my 2 cents in to offer a different perspective on Ms. Chua's primitive and naive methods. I'm an American-born Chinese who has experienced half of this crazy strict Chinese parenting as a child. I say half, because my mother is an unusually sensible Chinese lady who had quite the unusual childhood and early adulthood as a fresh immigrant to the US from Taiwan. She raised me in a half-Chinese, half-American style, attempting to combine the best from both worlds - instilling a drive to succeed while always being supportive of my efforts and concerned for my happiness. While my parents almost approached Amy Chua's insanity, maybe to about 80%, they were never able to "break" me as Ms. Chua has done to her daughters. The animosity between my parents and I grew to the point that I was nearly disowned, after I told them to back off and let me handle my life my way, an intolerably American concept.

5 years later I can confidently say I enjoy more academic and social success than ALL my Chinese peers, regardless of the severity of their upbringing. In addition, I have a more human and normal relationship with my parents, where I don't have to worry about being hounded to death over a bad test or a skipped class. If my experience isn't some kind of divine fluke, then I must say that neither a total Chinese nor Western upbringing can raise happy, successful children. It is naive and disgustingly narrow-minded to assume there is only one correct way to raise a child, and whoever thinks otherwise needs to reexamine their lives thoroughly and come to terms with whatever personal failure instilled that sort of thinking in them.

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Xanthe Kraft wrote:

There is a reason Westerners are leading in Science. My Chinese friend (I met at Stanford while I studied there) verified what I now express. He attested to the fact that the Chinese are never taught to love anything. They are forced to study in their strict education system, (which if westerners did the same, their math and science scores would be, granted, higher) taught to only do things the right way and never to follow instinct, passion, or intuition. By the time they finish their education, they want nothing to do with it. It only causes them pain, and they have no enjoyment in learning, or "learning is fun" attitude as looked down upon by Chua. Due to this, they don't want to discover, innovate or create, they just know. It is the group of "loser" westerners taught oh so horribly that "learning is fun" and to follow their own interests that end up creating and discovering ways to cure illnesses, develop inventions, in short, be CREATIVE. I wonder. Did her daughter play at Carnegie hall because of her outstanding original compositions? Are Sophia and Louisa even allowed to create? CAN THEY? I wonder, when does mere technique fall short? Finally, to pull out the old Einstein quote "Imagination is more important than knowledge". But hey, that's coming from a loser that failed miserably in high-school and ended up contributing more to science than virtually any modern scientist. One more thing, am I the only one that finds Chua's "no play date" policy arrogant? It has a "my-children-are-too-superior-to-associate-even-for-3-hours-with-yours" connotation to it.

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CATHERINE COY wrote

Amy Chua sounds like a borderline psychotic and an abusive mother. I hope one day poor little abused Lulu punches Amy's lights out. What a sickening dysfunctional family.

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Toni Mack wrote:

Granted, I've read only three of 150 pages of comments. But I've yet to see what seems to me a quite cogent question: how do the daughters feel about their upbringing?

I grew up a child of a broken Western home, wondering whether either of my parents loved me enough to want me around. They might've been happier if I'd never existed, even if I became dead.

I'm not saying they did indeed wish me nonexistent, even dead. But I underwent what a counselor later called serial abandonment. I didn't seem to matter. My parents were pursuing their own happiness.

So from my perspective, the Chinese mother sounds wonderful. She clearly cares, she loves her daughters, and I don't know how they could fail to know as much. She is intensely involved in their lives, working toward and for their futures. She has profound faith in her daughters, in their potential to succeed.

If I'd been so relentlessly driven by a parent, I think I'd have thrived at the challenge. As it was, I was pretty much left to my own devices, to make of my life what I could, on my own - with less than zero self-confidence, as you might imagine.

So - has anyone read the book? Do the daughters say what they feel about their upbringing?

Deb Moore replied:

That's not caring. Swing by Foxwoods Casino in Connecticut, the state where Amy lives. The majority of people who go there are Asian. The majority of people arrested for leaving their kids in the car while they gamble are Asian. We have hot summers and bitter cold winters. No matter what the weather, they leave their kids in locked cars while they are in the casino. The first time I took my kids there, they wanted to know if there was a Chinese convention going on. Watch them crumble in the parking lot after they lost everything. My friend plays poker at the private tables. Eight Chinese people who played with her so far have killed themselves. Some of them have an obsession to be perfect. That's not caring and it isn't healthy. It's sick.


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Alan Caj wrote:

I think a reasonable dose of strict, results-oriented parenting was helpful in keeping me on the right track, in terms of academic and social development, when I was a younger child. Though some kids are industrious and ambitious from the start, I suspect I would have reverted to the slacker aimless version of myself and spent way too much time with the tv or the computer, had my parents not made me go to chinese school, go swimming, and study for the SAT in middle school, among other things. While I resisted (sometimes violently) their efforts, they knew how to apply enough pressure for me to reluctantly go along, but not so much pressure that I would mentally or physically break, causing long-term damage to our relationship. As I became a teenager, they gradually dropped these requirements, and whenever they wanted me to do something, it came more in the form of persuasion or suggestion. However, they always kept a baseline requirement of strong academic performance, and during the critical years of high school, we suffered none of the tumultuous fighting over getting good grades, because I trusted their advice - and ended up doing great in my classes. And, I ended up realizing that the activities they forced me to do were good for me, though I definitely wasn't wise enough to realize this during the fact. So from my personal experience, I think that parents should instill good work ethic and interpersonal trust with their kids when they are young and immature, even using force and harsh tactics when needed, and then gradually let the kid come into his/her own, hopefully with the channels of communication and trust between parent and child intact. This prevents both the robotic and potentially destabilized kids who come out of Amy Chua's draconian methods, and also the potentially lazy, underachieving kids of a purely soft approach. My parents, who are first generation Chinese immigrants, took the best parts of both traditional Chinese and western methods. There should be a middle ground on this issue.


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Jenna Xue wrote:

You know, I'm the daughter of a Chinese immigrant mother, and unfortunately, I do seem to think that most (or, a lot) of Chinese mothers fit Amy Chau's highly stereotyped portrayal. However, I'm glad that I am and I know a lot of Asian kids who rebel against the stereotype and realize for themselves that just because something is traditional and "for the best" isn't always right. Plus, a lot of the kids I know who grew up into thinking that their mothers were right, who are cellists and med school graduates and smarty-pants on paper are ostracized sociopaths.

Now, I don't know everything of the typical Chinese upbringing because my single mother is probably more liberal than most Western parents in some respects. Not only did I get to do all of the activities that were listed in Chua's no-no list, but I had a virtually unhindered childhood, what with no curfews, bad behaviour in school, no rules at home (which meant that I was never monitored when it came to homework, I got to eat whatever I wanted, I could watch as many hours of TV and use as much internet as I wanted, I could stay up as late as I wanted), and I'd never gotten grounded or punished for any of the awful things I did (trouble with the law, getting suspended from school, staying out all night and morning without even a call home, and sexual promiscuity). My mother basically treated me like an adult when it came to extracurricular activities.

However, with all the perks came a lot of pains. Most of the verbal abuse that Chua describes is a slap on the wrist compared to what I got from my mother. For a lot of Chinese people, verbal and physical abuse is a tool of power. It certainly was with my mother. She didn't yell at me or hit me everyday because I'd done something bad and had to be reprimanded; she hit me, yelled at me for no reason, and called me awful names to prove that she could. That was her wielding her iron fist. One morning my mom came into my room to say talk. I'd just woken up from my slumbers and after half an hour of trying to convince me that I should be a doctor and me consistently rejecting her pleas of any sort of job in the medical field, as I lay in bed, my mother proceeded to beat me into submission for the next 15 minutes. A dutiful daughter would've just said "yes" to get her to stop but I could never give in to the tyranny of her ways.

This is why I view the "Chinese" way that Chua describes as inferior. I don't think it's wrong to yell at kids or show them who's boss every once in a while but unwarranted abuse is never effective. Your child may become a piano prodigy and a doctor and a math whiz but he or she will be scarred for life. I certainly am.

I find it funny that Chua omits physical abuse of Chinese parents. In addition to forcing her Lulu to practice the piano, she probably slapped Lulu until her litter fingers danced like a marionette doll. It seems that she is aware that physical abuse is considered unacceptable in the West and thus fails to mention it but her failure to mention it is indicative of a remorse of her parenting techniques.

My parents were and are awful people. They never taught me a thing. They never taught me about love or compassion or respect or hard work. They told me that money was more important than anything else in the world and the other day, my dad told me that I'd never be a good person because I wasn't a Christian. This was very surprising since he's an atheist, has been absent most of my life, and has never tried to teach me anything about Christianity. They still hope that I'll go to med school and make a 6 figure salary, which is expressly why from a very young age, I migrated towards the arts. I'm a struggling novelist and I admit that the pleasure that I get from knowing that I disappointed them is saccharine.

As a previous commenter noted, the way the Chinese people raise their kids isn't to make them the best they can be, it's to make them be the best the system expects them to be. More and more people are deviating from this norm, which I think is progress. Chinese parents raise slave-workers and people who know how to obediently follow the rules, perpetuate the status quo, and remain inside the box. I'd rather be exceptional.

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HANNA TONG wrote:
Dear Amy,
I am angry, outraged and disappointed by this article. You have taken Chinese parenting to the extreme. Especially as it seemed you are a 2nd generation Chinese American and a Yale professor, that such extremity in approach and lack of respect for your children. Publicly calling your children "garbage" is not part of the culture. My parents, who never went to school themselves, never did that when I was brought up in Hong Kong. Yes, they are very strict but public insult is never tolerated. It is a reflection of your poor character. Your boldness to claim such early achievements of your children so far in their early life is saddening. You should be cautious not to use your luck to defy many studies of teenage depression and rise of suicidal rates in many Asian countries.
There are so many more years ahead of them. There are so much more to life than piano and violin. Instead of teaching them to be self-motivated, to find their talent and pursuit the best use of their talent for society, they are taught to be selfish and self-centered to achieve their individual success. I am a 1st generation Chinese mother with 2 teenagers who seek to blend the best of the West & East - foster creativity, cultivate their passion, provide freedom with appropriate guidance, teach them to set high expectations of themselves and establish a strong work ethics.

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John Shum wrote:

This article hits home for me, raised by moderately strict Chinese parents, and now a parent of a young child. I'd add that the updated philosophy for any parent would be realizing that achieving little wins in life builds confidence that can carry throughout a lifetime. These little wins could be winning first prize in a piano competition, or being rewarded for being good at something, but rely on various factors as underscored by Malcom Gladwell, as he notes that outliers have several things in common: Timing, Opportunity, and 10,000 hrs of practice.

Whether you're Asian, White, or Hispanic, or whether your parents are immigrants or not, there are varying levels of becoming an outlier or being 'successful', but the key issue in question not address in the essay is how Chua defines being stereotypically successful... and at what age does she make that judgment? We all know that money doesn't buy happiness, and at such a ripe young age of 15, money doesn't matter. So to a kid, how is that defined? And for whom - the parent? Why?

To me, success is happiness, throughout a lifetime. The problem is for most immigrant parents, they would instantly respond with, "of course my child is happy. They didn't grow up suffering like we did, therefore, they are happy." This puts a whole different perspective on happiness and success. These days the standards have changed and the ante is raised. The parental expectations set a moving bar where success is straight A's and admittance into Ivy League colleges. Then it's a good job, a wife, and healthy kids. The vicious cycle is then repeated.

I've seen many of my Chinese friends be pushed to limits and have cause some breakage, but then repair. One friend was pushed to become a lawyer, only to hate every step of the way, quit, and open a tropical fish store. Another lied to his parents all the way through college until graduation, where he finally admitted he wasn't pre-med, but spent 4 years majoring in film, and got a job producing films. Another non-Asian I know was forced to give up her ballet career for med school, became a doctor. I gave up music after getting full rides to conservatories for music - all to major in engineering.

I don't think any of us regret the steps we took, but didn't think we'd do it again. I think about all those brain cells spent on learning music - piano, violin, and trombone - when I could've been hanging out with friends watching TV so I could answer more questions while playing You Don't Know Jack - in order to impress my friends through my interesting social being. It's much more social, and in the end of my 35 years, to me, is the key to happiness.

I think the takeaways for parents from this article should be that you have to pay your dues to become exceptional at anything. The confidence gained from any single accomplishment will take you a long way. Being pushed at a young age or being pushed as an adult evens out in the end, and should be measured by happiness. It's like sleep training a baby - make them cry it out early, and they simply have them learn and it gets better for both kid and parent. Edge cases may reveal 20 years later that certain kids should've have been sleep trained as a baby, but we'll wait for the jury on that one. Chua is correct in saying there are certain things that need to be overridden, such as children giving up too early, but I run into many friends that said they tried music, or art, or sports - and never found anything they were good at. This is where the battle begins, but may not end until age 23, when they find themselves spending 10,000 hours in the gym to find that they're actually nationally competitive in Jujitsu - enough to win respect and gain confidence to leverage that momentum in other areas of life.

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Susan Lee wrote

This article is obviously annoying and controversial. But what Chua doesn't understand is that her kids are free to reject all of this "sacrifice" she's put into them any time they want. (They may also suffer mental health, anxiety, and other problems in their adulthood from the really intense and manipulative childhood she is providing.). What will she do then? Will she threaten to cut off her daughter (emotionally, financially, communications wise) if one of them decides to go to art school to learn illustration? Will she scream and shout if another daughter drops out of college to become a freegan?
My parents are from Korea, and they're more laid back than Ms. Chua. We are very lucky because although my parents started out as intense and ambitious as Ms. Chua, they eventually learned to calm down and be more accepting. This made their lives much easier too. We are well adjusted, well rounded adults now, even though all three of us kids have completely rejected the high achievement, uber-competitive parenting culture that many (but not all) Asian immigrant families participate in.
I feel sorry for Ms. Chua, because the moment she realizes that she can't control her kids will be difficult one.


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Kim Eagles replied:

"Nonetheless, we can't ignore the test scores that show Chinese kids calculating circles around American kids. "

First let me say we agree on the fact that there has been Nationalism on both sides of the US/China fence. However with regard to your quote above. I think you can disagree (if not ignore) the so-called test results (and I've never actually seen any done on racial lines). Rather easily. I have no idea if what Ms. Chua describes is the norm in China (some people here seem to argue yes). That said, if it is the Chinese idea and this is what Chinese students in the sciences are primarily reared with. I'd say that an awful lot of these kids are growing up into scientists who can't produce good science. For example Chinese medical journals (some of which I read because I can read Chinese) are well known for producing poor quality results. The fact that Chinese medical journals can't seem to produce an RCT which gives a negative result for acupuncture is so famous that there was actually a Non-Chinese (Chinese/Western is too much of an us/them oversimplification) medical journal article on the subject.

Richard Feynman commented on a similar thing in Brazil (IIRC) where he saw students working very very hard but were actually unable to recognize a practical application of the work they were doing.

Doing the work is important but it's not nearly as important as Ms. Chua implies - especially since she has made some pretty mathematically idiotic statements - which as I've commented on earlier is said for someone who self-identifies with excellence in math and science - However it's only part of what one is trying to achieve in the sciences. The rest is problem solving and so far there's no objective research showing that the so-called Chinese way of doing things actually helps.

Incidentally I see what appears to be the results of similar parenting styles all the time. People who are so bullied that they can't operate without someone breathing down their neck. For example one individual I know has almost zero self-discipline ie. they can't set a goal based on rational markers and achieve it. They *can* work very hard at something that their culture valued during their upbringing. These people also have no useful sense of ambiguity either. Things are either part of their upbringing and therefore intrinsically good or not and intrinsically
dismissible . When faced with something that challenges a tenet of their upbringing they have absolutely no mechanism to cope and are reduced to the same shaming, disapproval, sometimes tears, etc which Ms. Chua seems to endorse.

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Simon Thomas wrote:

Thanks to Amy Chua for her refreshingly honest post.

I'm glad if her own children are happy and contented products of her regime; however, what is missing from this piece is an analysis of the general happiness of children brought up in this way. I know that many of the Chinese, Korean and Japanese students to whom I taught English bemoaned what they saw as their lack of a proper childhood compared with Westerners, and the seemingly endless round of schoolwork and private tutorials to which they were subjected from early morning until late at night. They also sometimes mentioned the suicides of some of their friends, who, they would say, could not cope with the pressure to perform that was heaped upon them by their parents and their society in general. It would be helpful to see what statistics of childhood happiness and suicide rates would suggest on this issue, as at the moment it is just personal anecdote from Amy and from me.

I am also a little sceptical that the method Amy proposes actually does educate children in meaningful ways. Again, from personal experience, almost all the Asian students in my classes had a very good knowledge of the formal grammar of English, but were more or less incompetent when it came to actually using the language to communicate. This failure seems to stem from the way in which they were taught the language at school and university, which was extremely heavily reliant on memorising facts and on drilling, at the expense of real-life usage.

This experience seems to echo that of the physicist Richard Feynman, who wrote about a lecture tour of South America in which most of the graduate students he saw knew a lot of facts about physics, but showed very little insight into or understanding of the subject. Again, he blamed this on their excessively memorisation-focussed educational systems. To me, the key question here is: become educated in what, exactly? The mere excelling at formal exams can lead to social success, but this in itself seems hardly sufficient for profound - or even useful - understanding of the subjects in which one has been examined. Indeed, it seems rather trivial.

There is also the problem, in Korea at least, of "keeping up with the Kims" - if your neighbour's children have just started piano lessons on top of their other studies, your children have to do the same - and, furthermore, must do better than the children of your neighbours. This leads to a reason-free and ever-increasing pressure on children to excel in a growing list of subjects.

I also worry about the characters or mind-sets of children brought up to always obey their parents: on the face of it, at least, this does not seem a good way to encourage independent and critical thinking, but rather to the inculcation of social obedience and conformity. If this is the case, then not only the individual children themselves, but also society as a whole would suffer.

At the moment, then, I am not at all persuaded by Amy Chua's defence of the "Chinese style" of bringing up children. However, her analysis of the differences between Chinese and Western parenting styles seems interesting and worthy in itself, and I think she is right to deride the over-sensitivity of US parents if they really are as fearful of offending their children as she describes (I'm afraid I'm a little removed from first-hand knowledge in this instance, as I was brought up in the British Isles). It also seems obvious - as I think Amy's article consistently implies - that children (and many adults too) are not usually the best judges of their own long-term interests. It also appears true that many children can achieve quite extraordinary things if consistently, or relentlessly, pushed. But my question is: to what end?

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bobby brown wrote:


I am absolutely amazed at how soft we've become as Americans. Ms. Chua could have been describing American mothers back in the '60's and 70's. This is what was expected of those of us who excelled in school AND sports. I wasn't allowed to quit swimming when it got hard. My coaches and teachers pushed me as hard as my parents did. And every time I had a "breakthrough", either in school or sports, I learned that I had not yet reached my potential - that if I pushed a little harder I could do even better. Now, I have a fantastic life and I love my parents, teachers and coaches from back in the 60's and 70's for believing in me. Now I know I can do anything I put my mind to.

We went to the moon in the 60's with a computer 1/100th the power of what's sitting on most kids' desks. These days kids are using their computers to land virtual spacecraft on ficticious planets while they flunk math in school. The computer games are written by Asian programmers. And we wonder what's wrong with America.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405274870411150457605971352869875...

Robert Kwan replied:

First, go to just about any four-year university and take a look at the student body. Many of its high achievers are Asian, which may or may not have had anything to do with their moms being draconian disciplinarians. And if it did, supporters of this parenting model can pat themselves on the back.

Then, go to the mental hospitals. Where you'll see Asians (women in particular), talking to themselves, sitting in a drugged up stupor, peeing in the middle of the room, etc. and hi-five yourself for the damage you've caused. (But it should be mentioned that some mental patients' condition have nothing to do with their parents).

Seriously, I've personally seen people who have LOST THEIR MINDS and it is not a pretty sight. One particular Chinese girl I knew in college had cut marks all over her body. It was seriously freaky because she would wear tank tops as if nothing were wrong even when she had a fresh cut on her arm. Disturbing to say the least. I think it was the classic cry for help.

And no, it's not the "mother's" fault in the entirety. Societal/government/educational/individual factors play a role as well.

And I don't know what's worse, things that kind of suck or things that totally suck. You're right, if things totally suck, people are smart enough to drop it. Unfortunately, it's the stuff that "kind of" sucks that plagues humanity for 1000s of years. Example being the Chinese examination system that lasted in China for thousands of years, swallowed countless lives, and made China the laughingstock of Asia before it was finally abolished in the early 1900s.

Don't settle for the velvet coffin... things that are "kind of good" but ultimately lead to a horrible end...the parenting described in this article easily being one of them.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405274870411150457605971352869875...

erika schneider wrote:

Why bother to immigrate, so your children can fit in only in China and your family? They won't fit in in America, and they will fit into your family like you did into yours - partly by love and more by fear - which is your relationship to China itself and why you left.
Amy, retain a good divorce lawyer because you are going to alienate your entire family and are making your home an Asian ghetto. The point of life is not to dominate every realm to prove one's worth and dignity. People are born with dignity and should be disciplined with love, respect, and dignity. Love should not be confused with co-dependency and fear, which is how you were brainwashed and never became aware of. Get therapy. Material success is not all there is to happiness - but it seems that way when you're immigrant who gave up everything to start over. Go see a psychologist specializing in immigrant psychology - the Jews have alot in common with this, putting their family's worth onto the kids' success, using verbal abuse and fear, creating co dependent kids and young adults who are sheep. They have to fit in here.....is creating mini robots really best for them? I'm from a Jewish family of Holocaust survivors who did the same thing. It did not work for me because I saw a society where I felt more comfortable and happier than I did with my angry parents who loved me only for what I did for them as a puppet daughter, and when I failed, I was ostracized and emotionally abused much further. What is the point of life?? Domination and survival to repay your parents? Go back to China if you want to blame Western parents' praise for causing eating disorders and then say that you are superior. Good thing you're not a diplomat, but it sounds like you'd fit in in China. But then you'd only be allowed one kid, I forgot!! Maybe you could trade her in so your other kid will work harder at piano. This article hits home way too hard - I am disowned from a similar Jewish family because I did not achieve properly and I also talked back to the verbal abuse. I was also expected to succeed by marrying earlier and breeding, and I have failed at that, and I cannot speak to my mother without her being verbally abusive. My grandmother did not survive the Holocaust for this. Get your priorities straight or get a good divorce lawyer for when your poor husband dumps you and leaves you in your Chinese ghetto you've created for yourself. Get some therapy!!

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405274870411150457605971352869875...

sivam krish wrote:

Amy praises the most perfect way to bring up thoughtless passionless piano bashing, super competitive kids whose great grandfathers fossilized a culture that got them out of paddy fields.

The next generation should not have their brains stuck in mud of the rice fields and they should not bury their children’s brains in it.

What happens when this mindless thoughtless robots need to compete in non repatitive tasks that their parents are not anticipating ? These kids will have zero competive advantage – but may enjoy the thread mill as trained by their parents.

I have taught such kids at university level and understand the massive inabilities that come with their narrow performance gains. They end up being a talent less lot happy to consume, pollute and lead meaningless lives like their super competitive parents.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405274870411150457605971352869875...

Kathleen Bootsri wrote:

I do agree that the Asian parental way/perspective of raising children is quite different in retrospect of Western parents; but I've seen how the high pressure of reinforcing the high standards is double-edged sword. I've noticed how my best friend from JHS into early college years held up high grades because of her traditional Chinese upbringing, but I grew up in a Thai family with a looser Westernized upbringing - she was told that anything less than A was disgraceful, I was told to keep working hard like I currently was and to keep being a good student, even if I skimmed a B. We both ended up top 10 within our high schools and we both ended up in the same college. What I've also realized is that similar friends with the same high pressure Chinese upbringing had became double-edged for my other Asian friends - some have grown to despise their parents and turned to gangs and drugs to get away from the constant sibling comparisons and discouragement, some go into depression because they feel they can never be good enough to meet their family's standards, some lie to themselves being unhappy in their current lifestyle but simply doing what they do to appease their family. So I don't necessarily agree that the Chinese upbringing is the superior way because it is very double-edged - yes it does grow confidence when a child continually gets pushed to the limit, but on the other side of the thought, often times children push themselves to the standard simply because they are trying so hard to avoid the emotional punishment from their parents for being looked down upon for their "low" performance and being looked at as "dumber" than their peers or siblings.

Oy, I forgot until now that one of my favorite mainstream movies,

Parenthood (directed by Ron Howard)

has a character in it, played by Rick Moranis, parodying very similar child rearing.

(Well, it used to be one of my favorites, until I watched it enough times and got sick of it and its imperfections became more glaring --there's just some fun character acting in it, like from Dianne Wiest and the actors who play her two kids and her daughter's boyfriend, and I think it does a real good job of getting across the sublte chaos of middle class life with more than 2 kids in house.)

Anyhoo, Moranis and his wife have only 1 kid, a little pre-school girl.
He obssessively--but sweetly--no abusive attitude is shown--drills her day and night with flashcards et.al. and overschedules her into all the appropriate upper class activities like karate and music before she is even of age to understand what she is doing. He is like desperate to not lose a single developing neural net before it is too late. His wife is not always supportive but doesn't object that much.

Two of my favorite scenes were where Moranis and his kid interact with the family of  Mary Steenbergen and Steve Martin characters. The latter have a much larger, unruly brood, and are stressed out by all the challenges, and their youngest is a toddler boy that no one pays much attention to as he wanders around and does his own thing, teaching himself about the world. While Steenbergen is tending to a large birthday party for their older boy with minor emotional problems, Moranis is in the kitchen, and they both watch as the toddler boy puts a steel pail on his head and bangs his head with the pail against a wall. Steenburgen laughs and says something like: He likes to butt his head on things. Moranis says sarcastically How proud you must be! Meanwhile later at the party, Moranis' little girl genius freaks out screaming at a hand trick done for a group of kids because it is not logical. Later she sees the the toddler boy spinning around on the grass making himself dizzy, and totally puzzled, asks her mother why he is doing that. Mom says, like "geez": Because it's fun!" She starts an argument with Moranis that he is turning their kid into a weirdo that doesn't know how to act like a normal kid. It has a dopey happily ever after ending though, where Moranis sees the error of his ways and learns how to relax a bit and let his little girl play and enjoy family life.

interesting interview with her @ The Guardian:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2011/jan/15/amy-chua-tiger-mother...

excerpt:

.....Sitting opposite me sipping water in Norwood, an arts club in Chelsea, in a black sweater and miniskirt with silver hoops in her ears, she is petite and pretty and much softer looking than in her book-jacket photograph ("She doesn't look very mean," my son said.) If on the page she can come across as a little unhinged, in person she is charming, warm, down to earth, and quick to laugh. The truth is, we are definitely in a monster-free zone.

"I think I know what's to come," Chua says with a wry smile. "When I show this book to immigrants and immigrants' kids, they were like, exactly, this is how it is. It's funny, they relate, it's not controversial for them. Now among my western friends it provokes extremely intense reactions in all directions. Some, including my closest friends, are shocked and aghast." Did she anticipate this reaction? "I do now. My husband kept warning me and my sisters kept warning me. But I guess it's part of my personality. A little bit rash. For me, so much of my book is making fun of myself through the words of my children. And some people get that. Other people read it straight. My older daughter said, 'Mummy, you put only the most extreme stories in. People don't realise how much fun we had'."

What Chua didn't put in the memoir, she says with a hint of regret, is all the good times. "All the way through, Jed was bringing balance to the family, insisting that we were going to go on family bike rides and to Yankees games and apple-picking and water slides and bowling and mini-golfing, so we socialised a lot actually …" ("My mum has a touch of the dramatic, and she's much nicer in real life," Sophia says to me later by email. "She lets me go to rap concerts with my friends and do archaeological digs in our backyard – not very 'Chinese' activities!")

She'd had no idea that she was going to write her testimonial to "Chinese" mothering and its dangers, but in the black, bleak summer of 2009 that followed her beloved sister Katrin's diagnosis of leukaemia, when her 13-year-old daughter Lulu was in full rebellion, she began to put pen to paper. "I wrote this in a moment of crisis. I tend to be over-confident but I really felt that the whole family was falling apart, I thought, have I done every single thing wrong? Have I wrecked everything? So after one terrible blow-up [with Lulu], I got on my computer and the words just poured out.".....