Here's an interesting
response from a piano teacher to Ms. Chua's article.
Did anyone read through the comments on the article? I saw a lot of long comments written by people who described their upbringings under the type of parenting described by Ms. Chua, and the vast majority wrote...well, negatively.
This one is particularly wrenching. It's a YouTube link supplied by a commenter.
In all honesty, the method described by Ms. Chua seems to me to be best-suited to people who are smart but aren't terribly creative and who wish to ensure that their kids are successful inside the box. The Chua approach is well-suited to this, as it teaches (forces?) children to do what their elders or superiors tell them and not to question what they're told. Thus, it produces people who get along well at work, get promoted, and have many external indicators of success.
But it won't produce the original thinkers who shake up things and move a field or a society in new directions. This is because the "DO IT THE WAY I SAID TO!!!" method doesn't teach children to think originally, challenge authority, and think of groundbreaking solutions to problems or field-changing ideas (e.g. in theoretical physics, politics, or energy generation). Giving children no or very little say in the choice of extracurriculars and other things also discourages them from exploring an idea simply because it might be interesting. When you're taught that the only way to succeed is follow a prescribed course and to do what senior people tell you do to, the way they tell you to do it, you can't develop the ability to question ideas that everyone accepts (though they might be wrong). Again, this is fine if you want to have external indicators of success and want the same for your child --- though it's a shame that the child doesn't get any say in things (at least, not under the philosophy advocated by Ms. Chua).
It seems that some of the people who grow up this way clearly do have creativity and find a way to overcome their upbringings (for an example, see the YouTube video I referenced). These people must be have very strong characters and I really admire them.
Val
