Notes of a native tiger son: it's a weird time to be Asian-American

This observation hit me like a two-by-four:<p><i>"The Immigration Act of 1965... created preference categories for science, math and engineering-trained immigrants to come over. [Asian countries] were producing a surplus of college-educated adults but lacked a sufficiently developed domestic economy to adequately absorb them. The 1965 Immigration Act, in trying to bolster America's own domestic needs, inadvertently helped absorb that surplus [and] influenced the American perception that Asians were somehow naturally gifted in math and science because there was a disproportionate number of immigrants coming from Asia with those skills."</i>

This piece definitely hit home for me, a 2nd generation Asian American.<p>As a kid in the 90s, I remember talking to an older friend about future career advice. I mentioned acting or dancing as possible paths for Asian Americans. He scoffed, telling me that the only place for Asians in American pop culture was in martial art films. Out of all the memories, that particular conversation stuck with me for years.<p>My father's immigration to the states was squarely in line with the Immigration Act of 1965. He was at the top of his class (and really, the country) in Taiwan, and came to study for his PhD at Yale. I grew up in a household not too far off from Chua's advice. There are pros and cons to this way of parenting (I won't go into all of those). What I know for sure is that emulating it to a T is bad.<p>The most dangerous aspect of the Chua-way of parenting isn't the borderline academic abuse: it's the blindness to opportunities. Sharply focusing on math and science, and then aiming to get into an "old" profession like being a doctor or lawyer, prevents the child from ever exploring or even considering other possibilities.<p>Growing up, I really didn't consider other career opportunities besides getting a PhD like my dad and pursuing an electrical engineering career. I have since deviated from that path, but it took me a long time and a halfway pursued PhD. Now I'm happily doing web development and design for my job, a longtime hobby of mine ever since childhood.<p>I have always wondered what would have happened if my parents had let me explore outside of the usual math and science career paths. Maybe I would have jumped into web development earlier and more seriously. Or, maybe I would have been a dancer or chef. The possibilities I could have explored in college, but didn't because of guilt, still keeps me up at night.<p>In the end, I did finally find my passion and am pursuing it full time. But, I know a lot of my Asian peers who are now stuck in a career choice that was thrust upon them by their parents. And now they can't, or don't have enough motivation to get out.<p>I have no idea what tactic I will use to parent my own children someday. But I know for sure that I will let my child explore career choices outside of my own, and to let them mold their own career path.

I've thought a lot about this subject. I have come to conclusion that asian parents hating comes from internalized self-hatred of being yellow and yet at the same, being unable to express one's Asian values in a Western society.<p>Almost everything against the Asian parents are against how their values are different from typical "American" parents: strict vs. lenient, off-putting vs. dotting. "I have to sit at home doing SAT practice sets and violin lessons while other kids are going to Chemical Romance concerts." A lot of anger comes from if my parents didn't prevent me from doing X (electric guitar) or forced me to do Y (volin), I could have been Z (football quarterback/rockstar/kissing the prom queen). These reasons may be true, but it's irresponsible to put all your shortcomings on your parents and it's dangerous because I know people who are in their late 20's, 30's long after they have moved out their parents house still playing the blame game.<p>On the other hand, American culture is so different than Asian culture and no matter how Americanized you get, you still have some Asian influences. For instance, when I'm out with my Asian friends, we interact like we are kindergarten teachers, always very attentive to others' egos and emotions whereas with my American friends, we interact like we are in prison, joking and bustin' each other balls and never showing vulnerabilities. Sometimes I get frustrated at the "games" you have to play chasing American chicks or "bromance," where you have to put a "confidence" facade instead of expressing yourself as is.<p>But I have come to accept Asian parents for what they are. I'm grateful for what mine has taught me and not grateful for their old ingrained concepts that runs counterproductive to living in a Western society. But one thing is constant always however, you can't teach old dogs new tricks. I could bang my head against the wall to try to explain to my parents American values and they won't understand (because maybe I myself and really anyone else don't even comprehend what American values are). But it's more practical and beneficial for me to accept responsibility for my own issues and work on them myself.

<i>As a result, throughout my childhood—and most of my adulthood—we mostly contended with a slim parade of different, sometimes contradictory, caricatures: lotus blossoms and dragon ladies, math nerds and martial artists, refugees and gang-bangers. Ad nauseum.</i><p>The amount of presumption that I have to deal with from strangers on a regular basis is still disturbing. Such interactions only comprise a small fraction of the total, but a modern urban setting is sufficiently populated to generate a regular supply. No, I look nothing like Jackie Chan. Please don't treat me like someone wearing a costume at Disney World. I'm not a cartoon and I'm not your instant Asian friend. Yes, I was born here. English is my first language. I know next to nothing about martial arts. I'm not bad but still not that good at math. No, I don't think I'm better than you, I don't need to be shown up, you're not making the world a more beautiful and better place by doing that. (Still, all of those are better than the instant Asian=target of abuse idiots or the weird psycho-sexual vibes from certain kinds of middle-aged white guys.)<p>I observe the little dance that people go through when they get to know each other. I notice the little verbal and non-verbal signals being passed and being noticed. I'd really like to notice more of those transactions and stop wondering about their relative lack coincident with these big globs of presumption coming out of nowhere.

Following the media frenzy that is the aftermath of Chua's article i cannot help but feel that there is a larger macro narrative at play here.<p>There is no doubt, the article struck a nerve for many Asian-Americans, some of which try to either validate the way they grew up or the understandable resentment of others who feel cheated from some vocation that didn't materialize because of the Math/Violin issue.<p>Then there is this large group of what seems to be largely white who either figured there was something there for the upbringing of their children, and those who cry abuse.<p>As I was raised in another country, this conversation, whether of Asian origin or Caucasian, strikes me as a genuine american cultural phenomena. There is an anxiety here about children and the way they are brought up and educated that is unmatched anywhere else that i have seen. This discussion and the discussion of yesterday about the treatment of all males as defacto criminals in their approach to children, feeds from the same root, that strikes me at times as some kind of hysterical episode.

The author points out something he may not have even intended: that parenting might not matter at all, despite the raging discussions about which parenting style is better.<p>In fact, lots of research on twins and adopted children suggests that parenting matters very little in shaping a child's personality and skills, while biology and peer groups matter a lot. Identical twins turn out quite similar regardless of whether they grow up in the same family, while adopted siblings are as different as any random people. (Check "How the Mind Works" by Pinker for a great overview.) People have a hard time accepting this, since most would like to believe that they have a power to shape their children, but this does not make it any less true.<p>&#62; the Immigration Act of 1965... didn't just abolish racial quotas, it also created preference categories for science, math and engineering-trained immigrants to come over.<p>Ah, so Asian immigrants to the US are far from an unbiased sample of their original populations! This explains a lot more than bitter fights over parenting.

Oliver Wang is totally right on this.<p>But i'm slightly more ambivalent than he is on the subject. What Chua wrote did hit a resonant note in American cultural stereotypes, and that's bad, BUT, i don't think it invalidates Chua's points particularly either.<p>Chua's approach is a particular style of child rearing, but her own piece was so filled with nebulous caveats, that i found it hard to believe that anything she particularly said was rooted in being Chinese.<p>The real problem in the end, i guess, is just that she was an Asian woman saying these things. Not that she's got some of the overbearing qualities shared by strict mothers everywhere.

Anybody want to weigh in on why Asians give their kids Western first names in the US? Why don't they use Chinese first names? Why don't they change their last names also? Serious question.