"Asian" vs. "Western" Parenting - An Essay

[Isaac Sumizone]

This topic is why I want to be Japanese in my next life.

[Mauzel]

Originally Posted by Tzar Rob

But I have a question for you. How would an Asian parent respond to someone not pushing themselves to max later in life, such as post graduate? Like would someone working in a sweatshop still be pushed to go back to school, try to get better job, etc etc, or by that point is everything already set in stone?

Actually, thats basically what will happen. When an Asian kid graduate and cannot find a job for a prolonged period of time; every time they come in contact with their parents (assuming he already moved out), the parents will pester the child to go find a job, go pursue an alternative education, or even something like go find a wife, etc. This phenomenon do get a bit diluted compared to early life, with the lessening in the degree of close contact between the parents and their child. (ie. If you are at college two-thirds of the year, the degree of involvement will basically lessen by two-thirds compared to high school - even less when you become completely independent post graduation)

Originally Posted by Tzar Rob

Its seems that the Asian families, and Asian societies in general, have an "old" style of honor. By old honor, I mean the idea that what you do reflects on your family. Dishonoring yourself is dishonoring your family, which is something nobody wants. Didnt the samurai rather kill themselves than be taken prisoner, because it was seen as more honorable?

I believe that the West has moved onto a different style of honor, an honor code that often reflects itself in things like gangs and what not. It doesnt hold the older and more noble sense that it used to.

Or am I being to general?

In terms of the concept of "Honor," it is quite aligned with the industrial revolution. If you look into the history of any nation, the loss of the extreme devotion of honor (Code of Chivalry, Bushido) both seemed to correspond with the time period of the nation's entering into the industrial revolution. (Industrial Revolution in Europe/NA, Meiji Reformation, etc.) For China, the entrance into the industrial revolution is ROUGHLY about the generation of our grandparents, for which some of our parents may have also experienced; its pre-industrial revolution that the concept of the traditional family is strong, now, in the new generation, the concept of traditional family waned immensely. If you ask anyone born after ~1980s, you would not see the same strong traditional values as the concept of the family name, honor, or even gender inequality.

And to correct another misconception, the concept of Seppoku, the ritual suicide of a samurai, is basically a militaristic principle, and not as much linked directly to the concept of honor. Basically, it is the concept of the "ultimate sacrifice and loyalty to the state," and we see reiterations in the Occident as well - The captain going down with his ship, WWI soldiers charging toward the opposing trench even when death is imminent. Most seppoku occur under two unique situations; when a town falls to the enemy, and the commander suicides in exchange for the life of his soldiers (the duty of a leader), and an alternative to summary execution for crimes against his superior (insubordination).

Only for those who are interested in the concept of the family name in china (Note, this can be extended to Japan as well, tho keep in mind that the focus should be SOLELY on the Tang and Song dynasty, when Japan literally tried to copy everything about china via japanese scholars in china; this scholarly exchange fell into oblivion after the fall of the Song Dynasty), below is a general summary of its coming into existence and waning. Tang and Song dynasties were the first dynasties that experienced an explosion in the concept of family name; due to an increase in the ability of maintaining a stable agricultural yield from year to year, and large landowning aristocracy came to being. This is due to the fact that some of the families (or clans) became large and extended due to their wealth, and often have large estates dotted with schools and residences. Basically, its an attempt to separate the self from the non-self. The government at the time also encouraged large self-sustaining landowning aristocracies, since they allowed the government to easily collect taxes and helped subsidized many of the operating cost (ie, the magistrate - equivalent to a modern mayor+district court+chief of militia - were the lowest "paid" position of the government. Without a well staffed retinue of civil servants (some were paid directly through the magistrate's wage, other wages come from funds deducted from the tax the office collects - a crime punishable by death), the magistrate alone simply cannot maintain the office in the modern sense, and most of the regional operation comes from the landed aristocracy - such as census, land surveys, crisis management (soup kitchens), crop rotation/wheat storage, standing militia, etc. Basically, the nation was in essence a feudal society.

Similar circumstances enveloped the ensuing dynasties, and only until the Qing dynasty (the last dynasty), that Kangxi emperor actually decided to expand the wage of the magistrates to allow for the recruitment of civil servants. (note that he only increased the wage, and not directly chose to pay the civil servants; meaning, the lowest recognized government position was still that of the magistrate) It curtailed the strength of the aristocracy (large families and clans), though it didn't do much in the expansion of the government authority. One thing to note the extent of the aristocracy's power, Li Hongzhang (The later- Prime minister of china, and commander in chief of the Beiyang army/navy - China's most modernized army at the time) literally went back home, rallied his clan, and began to build up a modern military, constructed factories and railroads. His "clan" army, known as the Beiyang Army/Navy, was even considerably stronger than the Emperor's own military, to the point that the emperor could not disband it, and eventually leading to a mere tacit recognition as basically a huge paramilitary group under the service of the Qing dynasty. Note that all of this was funded by Li Hongzhang's and a few neighboring clans, without even a penny of assistance from the government. The aristocracy carried onto the republic of china, in which these super-families still held considerable regional powers; one of the later cited reasons for the fragmentation of the republic of china as larger ones become regional warlords, and eventually fueled the rise of communism.

When Mao came along, he basically did the old Theodore Roosevelt big stick politics; breaking up the super-family clans and redistributed the land, which is why now you rarely see powerful clans with their own super-estates. The concept of the family, in this sense, has taken a huge blow, in which the extended family began to slowly reduced to only three or four generations, and when china entered the industrial revolution, the resurface of migrant workers (which was basically stifled since the Tang and Song dynasty's clans) basically led to the emphasis on the nuclear family and the crumbling of the traditional sense of honor and family name - keep in mind this boom has not been around for over 20-somewhat years.

[Izubibbywutz]

Derp