Hard Then Soft
So I thought I'd kick a dead horse long after it had been beaten senseless by every offended AA blogger out there. I'm referring of course to Wesley Yang's incendiary article Paper Tigers, which beats down and exploits the hell out of another dead horse Tiger parenting. Originally I had no intention of commenting on Yang's article, because:
1) It was too damn long. 11 PAGES for God's sake!
2) I'm too busy parenting my tiger cub.
But I recently listened to a podcast with Wesley Yang and Jeff Yang where Wesley makes some pretty compelling points about the flaws of Tiger parenting. Wesley comes off much better in the podcast than in his article, so I don't know if his article was edited to grab as much attention as possible and piss people off the way Amy Chua's article was engineered to be an idea virus on steroids.
It's funny that Asian Americans were pissed off with Chua and her fascist style of parenting, and then were pissed off at Yang who railed against Chua's fascist parenting. It's like the proverb quoted in his article:
Doesn't matter what you say, but how you say it. And Asians just don't like other Asians who strut around and quack too loud, even if they're quacking a truth.
Now I said "a" truth, not "the" truth. I'm not going to hit every point in Yang's article (11 PAGES!), but I do think that his article speaks to a significant subgroup within the AA population. Everyone within the Asian American community has hinted at what Yang is saying in his article. It's just that Yang said it the loudest with a big microphone.
In the 90's, I had an Asian American Studies professor say, "There is a Bamboo Ceiling. There is no denying that. But there is some truth to the stereotype that Asians don't raise hell when they hit that ceiling. You can't just be a hard worker, stay quiet and pray that your boss or your colleagues will recognize your effort."
My professor related that although a lot of Asians came to him griping about hitting the Bamboo Ceiling, not one of them asked for that raise or pushed for that promotion.
Fast forward 10+ years and you have Yul Kwon insinuating the same thing in a VisualizAsian interview: that the Bamboo Ceiling is there, but Asians as whole need to 1) step up and become leaders and 2) recognize obstacles of cultural dissonance.
I think the issue most people had with Yang's article was the tone. Yang essentially presented Asian culture as a liability and Western culture as the ideal. But let's be honest here: a lot of Asian Americans got to where they are because their steely discipline was forged from Tiger parenting. Emotional trauma and social awkwardness aside, self-discipline and the ability to eat bitterness go a long way in helping one achieve success in life.
The answer lies somewhere in the middle between Tiger parenting and Wesley Yang's "fuck this, fuck that" attitude toward Asian values. Most Asian Americans I know followed the straight and narrow path laid out before them by their parents, but somewhere along the way they wandered off.
They said, "Fuck this! I'm not happy!" and they decided to do a career change. They were successful in a traditional field, made their money and then decided to follow their passion.
For example, I know plenty of Asian cops who had a previous white collar career. A lot of former IT guys. One guy was an engineer (I don’t know what kind, but he is logical as a Vulcan). Another guy was a draftsman at an architectural firm. My very first partner used to work for Charles Schwab. I once rented a room to an FBI agent who used to work as some kind of business-information-computer dude. He decided to switch careers, when he was at his work watching the Twin Towers collapse on 9/11.
And there are plenty of examples of Asian Americans in business and in the media who decided to break out and follow their dreams. Let me tell you a story:
There was an optometrist who was successful, intelligent and attractive, but for whatever reason she was single. Her parents wanted to set her up with a nice Korean boy, the son of a friend that they knew.
Like most people would, this woman thought to herself, "I don't know...this guy sounds like a loser."
But she decided to give him a chance, so they did a phone date. They seemed to have a nice enough conversation and she was impressed with his background. He graduated from Stanford and Yale Law. He said he worked for various companies and firms in the past. She asked him what he did now, and he said he was currently unemployed.
That of course raised a red flag in her mind. She asked him what plans he had for the future, and he said, "I want to go on Survivor."
By now she's thinking to herself, "This guy's living in LaLa Land! What loser gives up a career in law to apply to be a contestant on Survivor? Dream on!"
Suffice it to say, they never went out on an actual date nor did they even have a second phone call. She totally forgot about him. Then one night she watched the season premiere of Survivor.
And sure enough, he was on the show: Yul Kwon.
I guess the point I'm trying to make is that it always better to start off hard, then soften up. You want to develop self-reliance, discipline and confidence early in your child, so he or she can rely on these traits in whatever passion s/he chooses to pursue.
They do this in the military and police academy. You start off hard with the discipline and the training, and then once your recruits pick up the skills and confidence that they need to do the job, you can soften up a bit and teach in a more relaxed environment.
So if you're a product of strict hard Tiger parenting, don't worry. You'll have plenty of time in adulthood to soften up and follow your passion.
1) It was too damn long. 11 PAGES for God's sake!
2) I'm too busy parenting my tiger cub.
But I recently listened to a podcast with Wesley Yang and Jeff Yang where Wesley makes some pretty compelling points about the flaws of Tiger parenting. Wesley comes off much better in the podcast than in his article, so I don't know if his article was edited to grab as much attention as possible and piss people off the way Amy Chua's article was engineered to be an idea virus on steroids.
It's funny that Asian Americans were pissed off with Chua and her fascist style of parenting, and then were pissed off at Yang who railed against Chua's fascist parenting. It's like the proverb quoted in his article:
"The loudest duck gets shot."
Doesn't matter what you say, but how you say it. And Asians just don't like other Asians who strut around and quack too loud, even if they're quacking a truth.
Now I said "a" truth, not "the" truth. I'm not going to hit every point in Yang's article (11 PAGES!), but I do think that his article speaks to a significant subgroup within the AA population. Everyone within the Asian American community has hinted at what Yang is saying in his article. It's just that Yang said it the loudest with a big microphone.
In the 90's, I had an Asian American Studies professor say, "There is a Bamboo Ceiling. There is no denying that. But there is some truth to the stereotype that Asians don't raise hell when they hit that ceiling. You can't just be a hard worker, stay quiet and pray that your boss or your colleagues will recognize your effort."
My professor related that although a lot of Asians came to him griping about hitting the Bamboo Ceiling, not one of them asked for that raise or pushed for that promotion.
Fast forward 10+ years and you have Yul Kwon insinuating the same thing in a VisualizAsian interview: that the Bamboo Ceiling is there, but Asians as whole need to 1) step up and become leaders and 2) recognize obstacles of cultural dissonance.
I think the issue most people had with Yang's article was the tone. Yang essentially presented Asian culture as a liability and Western culture as the ideal. But let's be honest here: a lot of Asian Americans got to where they are because their steely discipline was forged from Tiger parenting. Emotional trauma and social awkwardness aside, self-discipline and the ability to eat bitterness go a long way in helping one achieve success in life.
The answer lies somewhere in the middle between Tiger parenting and Wesley Yang's "fuck this, fuck that" attitude toward Asian values. Most Asian Americans I know followed the straight and narrow path laid out before them by their parents, but somewhere along the way they wandered off.
They said, "Fuck this! I'm not happy!" and they decided to do a career change. They were successful in a traditional field, made their money and then decided to follow their passion.
For example, I know plenty of Asian cops who had a previous white collar career. A lot of former IT guys. One guy was an engineer (I don’t know what kind, but he is logical as a Vulcan). Another guy was a draftsman at an architectural firm. My very first partner used to work for Charles Schwab. I once rented a room to an FBI agent who used to work as some kind of business-information-computer dude. He decided to switch careers, when he was at his work watching the Twin Towers collapse on 9/11.
And there are plenty of examples of Asian Americans in business and in the media who decided to break out and follow their dreams. Let me tell you a story:
There was an optometrist who was successful, intelligent and attractive, but for whatever reason she was single. Her parents wanted to set her up with a nice Korean boy, the son of a friend that they knew.
Like most people would, this woman thought to herself, "I don't know...this guy sounds like a loser."
But she decided to give him a chance, so they did a phone date. They seemed to have a nice enough conversation and she was impressed with his background. He graduated from Stanford and Yale Law. He said he worked for various companies and firms in the past. She asked him what he did now, and he said he was currently unemployed.
That of course raised a red flag in her mind. She asked him what plans he had for the future, and he said, "I want to go on Survivor."
By now she's thinking to herself, "This guy's living in LaLa Land! What loser gives up a career in law to apply to be a contestant on Survivor? Dream on!"
Suffice it to say, they never went out on an actual date nor did they even have a second phone call. She totally forgot about him. Then one night she watched the season premiere of Survivor.
And sure enough, he was on the show: Yul Kwon.
I guess the point I'm trying to make is that it always better to start off hard, then soften up. You want to develop self-reliance, discipline and confidence early in your child, so he or she can rely on these traits in whatever passion s/he chooses to pursue.
They do this in the military and police academy. You start off hard with the discipline and the training, and then once your recruits pick up the skills and confidence that they need to do the job, you can soften up a bit and teach in a more relaxed environment.
So if you're a product of strict hard Tiger parenting, don't worry. You'll have plenty of time in adulthood to soften up and follow your passion.
Comments
There are far too many viewpoints to take on in regards to Wesley's article (eg, self loathing, alienation, the IR debate, etc.) so I'll address some things.
First, I didn't have any of that tiger shit from my parents. Both of my parents were born here in the US. However, there was some sort of unspoken, unwritten expectation that we do well in school and be successful. But I am the academic black sheep in my family, being the only one to go to a public university and not some elite private school. My siblings are all overachievers. But yet, no one beat us or harangued us about our grades or extra curricular activities. I was the one who got bad grades in high school and did poorly on the SATs and all, but I did much better in college.
Some people are late bloomers. I just happen to be one of them. And without all that tiger shit, I turned out to be okay and self sufficient. I think that was my dad's influence: be self sufficient and be smart with your finances. You know, save some money for a rainy day rather than blow it all on some 52" hi-def flatscreen TV.
Second, despite the hurdles we face as Asian Americans, sometimes we just need to stop being so self conscious. Just simply...be. Those hurdles are always going to be there for marginalized minority groups. Sure, the ceilings hurt; the stereotypes and caricatures of AA's hurt; yes, alienation rears its head and places in awkward social positions sometimes. Life isn't always easy.
We all just have to do the best we can with our lives. It won't be done in one fight. You have to keep chipping away, bit by bit. See the obstacles for what they are, recognize it, and fight the good fight when the situation arises as best as you can, and move on.
I'm a product of tiger parenting, but both of my parents are incredibly supportive of the arts and literature, and so I never felt pressure from them per se to pursue a more traditional career path.
Sure there's a "bamboo ceiling" and I was one who raised hell to break it. To paint the fairer picture though, that's what it becomes: hell. There is a fake, superficial respect that is granted to your face, but you'd be kidding yourself if you didn't think there was hostility directed at you behind your back. It's something you learn to live with if you want to break the ceiling. That, at least, is the point we are at now as APA professionals. Yes, you can break the ceiling if you raise hell. But we're still at a point where there are consequences, real consequences, for doing so. Man, I sound negative today.
Reminds me of a line from that HBO documentary East of Main Street. Some artist said that we have our rights and privileges now because somebody before us paid the price.
It's tough raising hell, because like you said, there's always the possibility of retaliation and resentment. I know of 4 people who filed lawsuits against their employers, and they were all non-Asian (3 white, 1 black; 3 men, 1 woman). But their lives were hell for years.
So I tip my hat to you.
Same here. High school was a bit too much for me. I went from a straight A student to a B student.
But then of course there were other things like being a rebellious teenager and finding myself. Those things might of contributed to me slacking a bit.
General ed stuff in high school was kind of boring, and while other subjects were real tough for me, such as math and chemistry. It wasn't until I went to UC Davis that I began studying stuff that actually interested me.
The reason many AAs are pissed about Yang's piece is that it panders to the old stereotypes to the mainly white audience, the same ones that Chua is rightfully criticized for. It accepts them as true and assumes that AA must accept the anti-stereotype as something to uphold as the right goal for every AA especially for every AAM.
Likewise, many AA who criticize Amy Tan and Kingston e.g., do not do so because they are critical of Asian culture and are vocal about it. They do so because these writers uncritically accept white American stereotypes of Asians and use them to glorify whites and white cultural norms and values.
Yang did not offer many interesting insightful points for such a long piece. It was a boring rant for the most part though there were some good points.
But I do think he speaks to a significant minority within the Asian American communities. It is a minority, though, because most Asian Americans I know, men and women, have no problem in romance, assertiveness, leadership or socializing with non-Asians. Once you know that certain people from certain cultures act and think differently, then its not that hard to readjust and adapt your behavior for certain situations.
Now the workplace is quite different, and it is a combo of racism (conscious and unconscious) and cultural differences that contribute to the bamboo ceiling.
Is what he's saying new or different? No.
But to have what he's saying on the cover of a mainstream publication is new.
You know in social psychology, there is a 4 point personality model: conformist, anti-conformist, individualist and the 4th one I can't remember.
I think a lot of whitewashed Asians take a combination of conformist and anti-conformist approach to operating in American society. In other words, they conform to white ideals, but purposely take the anti stereotype approach you mention (i.e. "I don't date Asian guys.)
Even though it was way too long, I think that overall Yang's article bit off more than it could chew. He threw out so many points - all of which I think had valid aspects to them (some more than others) but which he couldn't or wouldn't explore more deeply.
It would have been better if Yang had been given the opportunity to write a series of shorter pieces with more substantive content, or focused his 11 pages more specifically.
I also think AA's would be less pissed about the article if it wasn't published in a mainstream publication. Like you say, many AA's have said exactly the same thing but on Asian focused platforms.
And it's a tough thing, because when do you decide, as an Asian American writer, to air out your community's dirty laundry on a mainstream publication? A lot of AA bloggers and commentators got pissed off about that.
It's one thing to point out an issue and say, "hey some guys need help in this." But it's quite another thing to present the issue as if all Asian guys had this problem and present it as such in a mainstream publication.
Because non-Asians are prone to stereotyping. And yes, I am stereotyping about white people's propensity for stereotyping.
When the Tiger mom article came out, it got circulated among the high school staff that my wife works with. Their reaction to the article was, "Oh my Lord! These Asian parents are emotionally abusing their kids! No wonder little Jimmy is quiet. He's depressed!"
Just real quick on the bamboo ceiling. I think it also depends on the circumstances. I can only speak from my own experiences and where I work, but I figured out, after trying to get my promotion to middle management, that the system is broken. It wasn't so much racism as it was a political system. I am not the only one who couldn't get promoted from within my field office.
First, we are too close to our HQs. HQs has mandated that people who get promoted to managers out in the field have to do HQs time at some point. After awhile, people have kids in high school, don't feel like moving out of the area, and so they politick like crazy to leave HQs and come to the field office and not have to uproot the family. The rank and file call it the "HQs shuffle". We won't ever get the supervisory positions here because they always get backfilled by folks from HQs. No matter how qualifed you are or how well you know the job.
I got screwed out of the supervisory position for my unit TWICE. But the thing is, I've come to peace with it, even though I have the most experience and have been at the task force from day one and know the ins and outs. Why? Well because I've been the acting supervisor on many occasions (a thankless job) and in dealing with upper management, I discovered that I don't want to be around them. I'm better off being a journeyman senior staff member with a supervisor as a buffer.
And if I DID seek out a promotion, and got it, guess who my peer group now gets to be? You become a puppet of upper management. And trying to become upper management, and what it makes you do, goes against my value system. I've seen far too many people ingratiate themselves to a-holes and psychopaths just to get their promotions. Remember, you take upper management's money, you eat upper management's shit.
Sometimes it isn't about the money or the prestige. It's about your own happiness and trying to control what you can. And I'm not one to kiss ass and genuflect and ingratiate myself to idiots. To me, that's not ambition. It's losing your self respect and dignity.