No Battle Cry in This Tiger Mother Debate

I first heard about the controversial book, Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother, at a lunch when someone asked me my opinion on the latest media frenzy circulating around the book excerpt in the Wall Street Journal.

As usual, I had no idea what they were talking about. I must confess that as a busy mom, my awareness of current events takes a backseat to school newsletters and the status of my laundry pile, so this happens far too often (when a girlfriend texted me “the Chilean miners are out!,” I honestly thought she was talking about the results of a World Cup game, not the successful rescue effort that brought worldwide attention).

Over the next few weeks, the Tiger Mother was all I heard about.  Maybe it was because I am Asian and people thought I could identify with being raised by a Tiger Mother (a little), or was an expert on Asian culture (I am not) or that I would be interested because it involved an Asian (not really). Whatever the reason, I generally ignored the hullabaloo on a number of grounds. 

First, I dislike controversy—I get enough pointless debating at home and it is uncanny how much grown adults can sound like my six-year-old. Second, I have not read the book. I can count the number of books I have actually finished since my first child was born on one hand, so I am not about to squander precious free time (and $25.95) when I can get the CliffsNotes here, there and everywhere. How else would I find time to watch “Modern Family” while I sort laundry? 

So you can imagine my hesitation when the Patch asked me to write a response to the issue. After extensive perusal of the social commentary on the book, it appears much of the squabbling stems from the allegation that the WSJ excerpt was not reflective of the book, touting it as a parenting guide rather than the “self-parody” Ms. Chua claims it was intended to be.

Regardless of what you believe, there is no doubt that the phenomenon has been a book publicist’s dream come true (and perhaps Ms. Chua’s nightmare—good thing she got paid six figures up front.). Aside from its overly sensationalized debut, what I believe lies at the core of the controversy is this: none of us parents know what the heck we are doing.

Parenting is a waiting game. You never really know if you have done it well until you are done doing it (and many of my older, wiser friends insist you are never done doing it, but that is a discussion for another time). If you multiply the dizzying array of possible personalities your child could possess by the various places you could land on the parenting style spectrum, you end up with an infinite number of permutations. Self-doubt and double-guessing are the only sure outcomes in parenting, at least until you see the end result. The irony, of course, is that then it is too late to really do anything about it.

Therefore, I find the debate ridiculous.  Those who vehemently disagree with Ms. Chua enough to send her death threats obviously think she has issues (and clearly have issues of their own), but what parent does not have issues? Guilt is an inherent part of being a parent and each of us has our own way of wrangling it. Some smother it with an overzealous hand and others try to squelch it by coddling their children. Either way, if all of us were completely honest, we would have to admit that most of our parenting is by trial and error. The ugly truth is that we all fear screwing up our kids and what others will think of us for doing so.

So I say ease up on the Tiger Mother. Not because I agree with her approach, but because I think even her opponents will find they have more in common with her than they would like to admit. That, and because I am a bit jealous that she and her publicist are making out like bandits, all because she is willing to reveal to the world what most of us are not: We all get a little crazy in our parenting when we think nobody is looking.