Interesting. My kids did music (singing and piano), and while not as intently as sports, on occasion when we went to local, regional and national events, my wife and I thought the parents and vibes were similar to sporting events both good and bad. So I wouldn’t say that sports have a monopoly on neurotic parents/behavior or a monopoly on developing engaged healthy young adults.
6 Likes
The problem is with tiger parenting thousands and thousands of kids are being abused (I stand by that word) while only a handful could produce type of results the society admires. So one kid makes math Olympiad while 999 has mental health destroyed by parents while trying. So we want to admire that one and pat the parent on the back for job well done while closing the eyes on the other 999.
My kid trained in tennis with a group of kids whose parents would stand by the sidelines and yell at their children. We had some clear stars in the group, but the kids who couldn’t win were yelled at by their parents for losing and made feel they didn’t listen or worked hard enough. We walked away because situation got so bad that my kid would refuse to play if other parents were present. It took us six months or more of not being around that group to understand the psychological damage of that environment. Is this all worth it so you can get to be a recruited athlete to a name brand school for bragging purpose? The world has gone mad.
And I don’t mean that for the right kid intense training is a bad thing. It’s that we now expect normal kids to produce superhuman results by the means of abusive parenting.
1 Like
At least in my sports circles, there is a very active, ongoing debate about what is appropriate for parents to do. Various youth leagues have taken increasingly strong stances against a variety of parental behavior, coaches and sometimes parents themselves are talking to other parents about it (not always pleasant conversations), and so on.
1 Like
As someone who has met a lot of math Olympiad kids, ranging from locally talented to IMO contestants, I disagree very strongly.
3 Likes
Despite the alleged prevalence of tiger parenting in the Bay Area, there’s also quite a strong backlash against competitive sports in high school here. Sometimes that’s centered on health concerns, with a lot of parents saying they won’t let their kids play football and wanting to stop heading of the ball in soccer. Other times it’s related to kids leaving class early to play competitive sports. I don’t think the football quarterback is as high a status position within our school as it might be at high schools in other parts of the country. Though my kids never had any interest in competitive sporting activities, the closest we got was S getting quite serious about poker during college…
Of course a cynic might say that the kids of all those Silicon Valley nerds are at a disadvantage if college admissions are based on sporting prowess so the tiger parents are just seeking another advantage for their nerdy kids… 
1 Like
As a parent who spends a lot of time around these same kids, I disagree with you very strongly.
The kids who have inherent talent thrive, and the rest ….
1 Like
Given that I know a few hundred happy math Olympiad kids, you apparently know a few hundred thousand unhappy math Olympiad kids. How do you make the time?
2 Likes
Do you listen? I know kids who are grinding for AMCs and AIMEs daily and will never qualify. That’s where unhappiness and stress lies, not among talented kids who do make it.
No one has any insight into whether a kid is happy or not, other than the kid. And it is not the “now” state but, the future state of these kids when they have more awareness of the sacrifices they made etc…
So you just agreed that @medea has no basis for claiming so many unhappy kids, right?
Stepping back, I have no doubt that there are tiger parents for math as there are for other activities. Perhaps it’s even 5x.
And make no mistake, I agree it’s wrong to destroy a child’s confidence or to make love and affection conditional on performance.
I am talking about kids around me. My children’s friends. Unrelenting grind to score high enough in AIMEs to qualify. Tears, anxiety, suicide attempts (I know two)… I am talking about a cohort of kids I know in my child’s group. I am not talking about a PG kid who was born to be an Olympian. I am talking about others whose parents believe in that but the kid doesn’t have that sort of talent and what happens in the process of their parents trying to make an Olympian out of them. I have seen enough. This is the tiger parenting I see around that I can’t stomach.
Nobody is questioning that some kids thrive in competitive environments. Of course some kids do. I question that sort of parenting on those kids who don’t thrive in those environments and I think those are majority of the kids.
1 Like
It becomes a problem when the children are pushed beyond their capabilities and desires. I have a competitive percussionist and a very talented dancer. Both of them love their activity and pushed themselves to get to the highest levels. I would ask them every year if they wanted to continue because it would be fine if they didn’t. They continued and still participate now in their adult lives. I feel for those children that hate what they are being pushed to do or are drained trying to please their parents and not themselves.
4 Likes
Completely agree. The kid has to have the drive, not the parent. And they aren’t going to get to a high level if they don’t love the sport or activity.
For example I did a lot of math as a kid and literally loved doing it, so much so that I physically missed it and would feel sad when I didn’t do any math for a few days or weeks. It came as quite a surprise when I eventually realized that not everyone (even those who are math majors) dreams in math and solves problems in their sleep.
3 Likes
Best comment on this thread!
My worry — and i am aware of my own tendency to tiger parent — is the slippery slope between “do your best”, “oh, here’s an external benchmark for best”, and what that means I’m unintentionally saying about all the other kids who don’t reach that mark. This thread talks a lot about the potential abuse of the tiger-parented child, and the possibility of an inferiority complex, but there’s risk of creating a superiority complex as well, which is probably no better.
Well said, Austennut!
6 Likes
I think it’s important to distinguish between believing you are better as a person (which I think is what you mean by “superiority complex”) and having the self-confidence to believe that you can do anything (or at least a lot more than anyone else expects). Although Americans are notorious (and sometimes rightly mocked) for their over-confidence, it is helpful for things like entrepreneurialism and better than the alternative of chronic negativity and cynicism that is common in other parts of the world.
And in terms of comparing your skills to others, there are quite a few careers where that will be inevitable and constant. My D is a professional dancer and that’s something she has to worry about every single month when she is competing for a spot in auditions, performance roles, etc. There both a high level of self-belief and loving what you do are essential to working in that field at all (just the nightly ice baths for her feet make me shudder).
I’m happy that my kids have had the self-confidence to want to compete for low percentage outcomes (say a 1% chance of succeeding) and feel good whether or not they win. And had the drive to do it, since some of those require years of work to pursue that goal. Dance is one example (only 10% of those who auditioned got offered a spot at her college, less than 40% continued in dance after college, now 2 years later only 25% of those are still dancing professionally), academic prizes are another.
4 Likes
As a parent of a musician, I agree with you.
I’ll admit I can’t quite wrap my head around the idea of music as a competition. I guess just about anything can be made into a competition, but I think music is particularly poorly suited for this. And this is whether the competition is about winning some sort of actual music prize, or whether the prize is calculating what percentage of other musicians have failed to make it as far as you have.
I happen to know a lot of outstanding professional musicians, and music competitions and fighting over music opportunities isn’t their backstory. Instead what they all seem to have in common is being raised in a family and community rich in music. No Tiger Mother standing over them for hours making them repeat a passage “until you get it perfect.” Mom was too busy being the singer in her jazz band (and 7 other musical projects.) Their community wasn’t about comparing what Suzuki lesson book they had completed or what low admit % conservatories they were targeting, it was the amazing music played every Sunday at their churches, it was elders mentoring kids, it was hosting other musicians at your house when they came into town on tours, and maybe jamming in the basement.
Music opportunities weren’t scarce resources to compete over because the community was so musically fertile that they were the ones creating the opportunities.
Just a totally different vibe.
2 Likes
Isn’t music highly competitive if one wants to make a career out of it?
1 Like
Competitive isn’t the adjective I would use to describe the mindset of the successful professional musicians I know. Fertile, generous, creative, generative, collaborative and above all very very musical is what I see.
5 Likes
In a sense, music is competitive when one looks at the scenario of many qualified applicants taking an audition for a particular job/position.
But the music world also very much self selects thoughtful, collaborative people who are a joy to create with. If one thinks of an ensemble or music production as a group project, musicians who have the ability to make the group better and impact it in a positive way throughout the process, tend to have more success than those whose competitiveness make them difficult to work with.
3 Likes