GE1401 University English
Argumentative essay

Tiger parenting style should be discouraged
Lam Nga Yan, Cyndi
SID: 53559755

According to the Oxford Dictionary, tiger mother is a strict or demanding mother who pushes her children to high levels of achievement, using methods regarded as typical of childrearing in China and other parts of East Asia. We should be familiar with this term under years of living in a Chinese traditional family. There is also a more common term called the Soccer mom, which refers to a mother who spends a lot of time and also money taking her children to various kinds of activities such as music classes, sports, etc. Actually, the most famous tiger mom is originated from Amy Chua in the book Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother (2011). It is a book listed on the bestseller booklist for weeks; its online version has been read more than 1 million times and it has attracted more than seven thousands comments so far.

As mothers often play a more important role on teaching children while fathers spend more time working outside to earn money for family, it does not mean that fathers are not involved. In this passage, I am going to argue for the tiger parenting method in Hong Kong nowadays. Let me show you some extreme cases for blindly implanting the parenting strategy. In China, there is a 'Tiger Dad' who trains his 3-year-old son with heat and cold. For example, he provided nothing for his son to wear on a snowing day no matter how loud was his son crying and begging. He asked his son to fly a helicopter when he was only three. He even shared some of the video-tapes of his ‘tiger training procedures’ on social networking sites. Some of these actions are considered cruel by the public as even a normal adult cannot bear this kind of severe suffering. So how can a child do so?

Tiger parenting method has raised so much criticism and caused controversy. Some say that it deprives the right of children to enjoy their innocent childhood. As normal kids could enjoy their wonderful weekend on family activities and games, nonetheless, meanwhile some kids may spend their time with music or tutorial classes. They have to do everything in advance so that they can have a higher chance for achievement in the future. For children who have to fight for their future living and sacrifice their childhood, they might feel regretful later for losing their precious memory. Moreover, if children are always kept under stress, the huge psychological pressure may lead to mental illnesses. Children may suffer from depression and other emotional problem such as anxiety disorder. Research also finds that they would experience low self-esteem; have poor relationship people including their parents, teachers and friends. The worst situation may come to violence and behavioral problem. If the problem continues, the quantity of hidden mental illness patients in society will increase more obviously. Then, the trend of the above mental illnesses will become more youthful in society, hence this causes social health problem.

By taking the Happy Planet Index of Hong Kong as reference, Hong Kong has a score of 37.5, which is ranked 102 out of the other 151 analyzed regions. The calculation includes mainly three aspects, experienced well-being, life expectancy and ecological footprint and Hong Kong people have a very high life expectancy score. The analysis shows that parents may have over-expectation on their children and they want their children to take the advantage when they are small so that they need not to worry about their living as well as to enjoy quality assured living standard. On the growing process, children somehow cannot fulfill all the requirements of their parents; they may blame themselves for not satisfying their parents and eventually lead to sorrow, sadness and disappointment among the family.