In defense of the Western mother

meh.. id rather do the chinese one

A Posse Ad Esse has some good points. I wish I could find this article I read a few years ago, where the author made the case that American "education" (and I use the word education broadly here, not limiting it to school, but also including life experience, friends, parents, etc.) doesn't produce the best test scores, but it seems to train people to succeed in the business world better (due to better soft skills, people skills, creativity, intuition, independent thinking, etc). Now, I don't know whether the author was right, but I will say that I don't think training your kids to be great students and playing the piano is a clear path to a successful life. In grad school, a huge chunk of the students are from China, and they absolutely kill it on the coursework. Seriously, they get solid grades in every class and all of them pass both qualifying exams on the first try (a ridiculous feat, to say the least). What's funny though, is that they don't necessarily go on to do good research. Even more importantly, most of them don't seem like they could be that successful in a lot of regular jobs. They can absolutely murder any coursework you throw their way, but so what? Life is not about sitting around taking exams in classes. I'm not down-playing school, just trying to point out that it's far from the be-all-end-all of success.

Here is the issue. If you are a poor Chinese person and you are trying to raise your standard of living, the "chill" way of life that is advocated in this rebuttal isn't going to do it. I really think this desire the Chinese mother has for her children to succeed is a very fresh memory of what it was like to live in utter poverty.

Also, this rebuttal was pretty weak. Being your kids friend and letting them do as they want is fine as long as you are wealthy enough to pay for them for a long time. Go real a book called Failure to Launch and you will know what I am talking about.

Econ, your post echos my thoughts exactly. SB for you.

A Chinese kid who has one of these "tiger mothers" have been told what to do their entire life. That attitude might end up making you a good employee but not a leader.

Agree with you ANT. The rebuttal was weak - she made no actual arguments and gave ONE example of her own child who is obviously in the minority by coming to her own senses and deciding to not give up. I guarantee 95% of kids in this situation would not do the same. And she made no connection on how the behavior of her own child can be replicated.

I think the sole focus on academics by Asian parents is overrated, but at the same time it's important that kids know the importance of discipline and drive, and for them to hold high expectations of themselves. It doesn't always have to be getting A's in school - it can be excelling in sports, OR the school play, or being socially competent, etc. But where the current Western way falls short is a lack of responsibility to develop that - there will always be kids that excel on their own - unfortunately the majority will not.

I don't mind the want for high achievement, but strong positive reinforcement can go a long way. My parent's attitude was that they wanted me to treat high school as a full time job, so they paid me for high marks. It seems silly, but it was great encouragement and it involved a lot less of them calling me 'garbage'.

Yeah, I think the Chinese mother operates based on fear more than anything. It might work for Machiavelli, but I don't know if the parent-child relationship should be predicated on terror.

There should be discipline, but it should be more of a mentorship. A positive, guiding force.

Parenting = Angel's Heart, Devil's Hand...gotta be a balance of both

^ Agreed. Things she didn't allow her children to partake in (sports & drama) are actually very beneficial to developing a kid's confidence, leadership and social skills which go a far way in the long-term. That said, I do agree with some things she said (where Western parents' potential over concern for hurting kids' self-esteem can also prevent them from challenging their capabilities/boundaries... like patronizing the kid 'oh you got a B-, that's pretty good...' when you know they aren't really trying).

My mother was/is a great balance of both. A's were always expected, but she didn't have to force us to work hard; we did it ourselves because she ingrained it in us how important being intelligent is. At the same time, we were encouraged to have friends, do extracurriculars (and could quit if we hated them, but only after a decently long period of complaining), etc. For example, when I was little I played piano, then in middle school I played viola, and then in high school I played guitar (electric mostly); and I am very, very good at guitar now, because it's something I actually like and thus practiced for hours every day without anyone having to force me to (and let's face it, playing John Mayer to a chick will instantly get you laid; Mozart, not so much).

I may not be a crazy quant genius, but I'm not too far off; and my social skills allow me to lead a very happy life, i.e. tons of friends, fuck buddies, gf's, etc. Social skills are also important for work, but I didn't develop them for work (and I can't think of anything sadder than someone who is so work-obsessed that the only reason they would pursue social skills is for work purposes).

I am indian, and my parents didnt drill me when I was young. They wanted me to be happy when I was young but at the very least made sure I didn't drop out of school. They didnt care if I went to med school, hell they didn't care what I do as long as it wasn't drugs and I was happy. I was 17 in junior year of high school when my parents moved back to India because they couldn't afford living here anymore. I didn't want to go so we kept the apartment we rented, I got a job to pay my bills and my parents sent more money every month from India. At the point I had a 2.0 GPA in high school, and no future in sight. I got my act together, took the sats, went to a really shit no name university for one year and got a 3.5 GPA; transferred to a semi target state school where I currently have a 3.4 as a junior and after busting my ass off networking I have 2 interviews at BB and 1 at an inter dealer broker for summer analyst positions with 20 OCR applications pending since the deadline was just friday.

So what got me motivated? It wasn't my mom drilling me, but the experience I had when reality hit me and I saw I have no future in sight. I was determined not to work a shitty job at gap or a&f the rest of my life and I turned my shit around by my self.

My point being, the chinese mother is overdone and overrated. If my mother drilled me when I was younger I would probably have committed suicide when I was younger. You don't need to drill As in a kid for them to be successful, you just have to give them direction which both Chinese and western mothers don't do

I strongly believe in guiding children as opposed to over-structuring their lives. I, for one, had fairly strict parents and rebelled against them for about 15 years. If they had let me do the things I wanted (more or less), I'm pretty sure I would have turned out fine, if not better, than I am right now.

Whenever I think of overly strict parents, I remember the saying that goes something like "the harder you squeeze, the more they'll slip from your grasp."

Way I see it if you succeed all the time its no fun but if you lose a couple of times it makes the wins so much better. Also what's the point in just getting straight A's in college etc if you don't ever get a chance to enjoy life?

Such a pointless article.... There are a bunch of western mothers who are strict, and visa versa.. the whole racial thing is a B.S.

why the hell is everyone stealing my monkey pic god damnit I had it first

the "chinese mother" treats her kids as another chance to vicariously live out her childhood dreams. I'm gonna guarantee that the chinese mother in question wanted to be a musician when she was younger, and her parents said "no, you are going to study hard in school so you can excel academically", or she broke her hand and had to give up her dreams of being a child piano/violin prodigy. Honestly,reminds me of loan sharks - Brian, you got my money? I'm sure there's a stable middle ground somewhere between the control freak psycho and the laissez-faire approaches to parenting

http://www.vault.com/wps/portal/usa/blogs/entry-detail?blog_id=1280&ent…

Another article resulting from the original Chinese mothers one.

I'm not trying to stir up any controversy; this is honestly a question that comes to mind as I read all this stuff: Does this sort of parenting make it hard for your child to be a leader, but make them a very successful follower? I have no evidence, anecdotal or otherwise, of this claim -- but I must admit, it seems very logical (at least to me, haha). If your whole life, your parents have made you do everything they ask and demanded that you are incredibly obedient (at school, at home, etc), what happens when people aren't there to tell you everything to do? Or, if you're parents constantly stress the importance of getting good grades and learning lots of abstract and potentially impractical material, at the exclusion of things like sports, socializing, and maybe even starting a business or something like that, then why would you ever take the ambition to do creative stuff that nobody's ever done before? If this is articulated poorly, which it probably is, I hope I can reword it better later. I guess what I'm saying, is that it seems like the original mother has a very narrow definition of successful -- she forces her kid to get a 4.0 GPA, when maybe a 3.5 GPA and a more well rounded skillset would be better. I was reading the graduation speech by Paul Graham a few minutes ago, and he seems to stress treating high school like a day job and focusing on other stuff in your off time. It seems that the child of the original mother has no freedom to learn what they might be truly passionate about (because of the constant focus on being a good student), what they might want to spend a lifetime doing, what they might be good at, what unique ways they can use their talents, etc.