Reports from the monkey bars show children in China are just as lazy and spoiled as those in America.Â Â Most Chinese householdsÂ (with working mothers and stay-at-homes-alike) employ anÂ “ayi” – a cook, cleaner, child-minder similar to a super-nanny.Â Â The ayi, along with China’s one-child policy, are giving these children the impression that they are the sun the world revolves around.

The Tiger Mom is a myth, unless you mean the furry jungle cats.Â Â According to Tessa Thorniley, an ex-pat living in China for nearly a half a decade, she has never met another Tiger Mom as described by Amy Chua.Â If you’ve been childless for the past year you might not know Chua’s story.Â Â A Chinese-American,Â Chua sounded her battle cry that if we American parents were more strict and structured like our Chinese counterparts, our children would all be well-behaved,Â well-manneredÂ mathematical geniuses.Â Or at least concert violinists.Â American moms lapped it up like a cat to spilled milk.Â When we toured preschools in NYCÂ last year I was shocked by how many discussed their plans to start a violin program.Â For 3-year-olds?Â It was the Tiger Mom effect.Ĭhua outlawed peer socializing, television and video games with herÂ two children.Â She reprimanded parents in the US for indulging ourÂ kids like the wholeÂ country was a child of her own.Â She made us all feel bad about letting bedtimes slide, allowing video games or defending hours of PBS.Â She gave American parents a one-size-fits-all mandate to be stricter with our children, no matter who they are, no matter what the circumstances.Â And now it turns out she doesn’t represent an entire culture.

Battle cry of the tiger mom