I dunno about other asian countires, but in Japan, they put an enormous amount of pressure on the kids to pass.

no doubt, I'm always hearing from kids of Asian parents how they're pressured to be successful in everything, including who you marry.

 

Good thing my wife isn't Asian. :tflaugh

no doubt, I'm always hearing from kids of Asian parents how they're pressured to be successful in everything, including who you marry.

 

Good thing my wife isn't Asian. :tflaugh

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...are you making this up, or was this the result of a university study?

 

 

 

About your wife.

 

 

 

About your wife not being Asian.

 

 

 

About this being a good thing.

no doubt, I'm always hearing from kids of Asian parents how they're pressured to be successful in everything, including who you marry.

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Too bad the two asians living next door to me aren't pressured to bathe :grr

no doubt, I'm always hearing from kids of Asian parents how they're pressured to be successful in everything, including who you marry.

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Too bad the two asians living next door to me aren't pressured to bathe :grr

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"bathe" ??? What are you - French?

.......................... right...........

 

The initial question of this thread was 'what would happen if swearing was allowed in Transformers?' - during this discussion, it was pointed out that swearing is already frequently used in the Japanese versions of TF shows. There's little point in discussing this if we're not going to look at the wider social construction and effect that this has. I pointed out that although Japanese shows have a higher frequency of foul language, children swearing inappropriate (e.g.: at parents, teachers, police etc) is not a wide social problem in Japan. It is in Western countries. I work with children... every day I hear kids swear. In Japan I never heard kids swear (in fact, I rarely heard anyone swearing).

 

I pointed out that one reason why I believe this happens is because Japanese kids - typical of Asian cultures - instills a higher sense of responsibility and self-discipline. This means that because Japanese children are taught to be more self-responsible, there is not this problem of openly overt anti-social behaviour in Japan such as swearing, violence, vandalism etc. This is not to say that it doesn't happen at all, it does - but it tends to be more covert, and statistical facts show that it happens far less frequently. Japan has extremely little crime involving violence and anti-social behaviour... statistically the second lowest crime rate in the world. And Japanese police officers seldomly carry a weapon.

 

A university study of Asian-Australian school students concluded that it was a culture of instilling principles of self-responsibility that allowed them to achieve higher grade averages in school compared to their non-Asian counterparts. I'm not making it up - I didn't conduct this study, so I don't see what you're trying to achieve by attacking me for it.

 

In Western countries we are struggling in trying to instill values of self-responsibility in our kids, who are often taught the opposite. Ever since the Vietnam War, we have been taught what our rights are and what we can get away with. We've become very good at reminding people about what we can do and what they are not allowed to do to us, e.g. "You can't talk to me like that," "It isn't against the rules/laws for me to do this so what are you gonna do about it?" etc etc., parents often teach their children about what their rights are and what they can do and what people can't do to them. Now, there's nothing necessarily wrong with this, but what some parents fail to do is to also teach their children what responsibilities are also attached to their rights and freedoms. This is part of the reason why we have so many damn lawyers in our countries (it's not the only reason, I know, but it's part of it).

 

One method of classroom management that many schools are now implementing is Self-Control Reality Therapy, based on the Choice Theory of Dr. William Glasser. Glasser's theory is based upon re-instilling a sense of self-responsibility into students, so rather than reminding a kid for the fifth time to take their book out, you would say, "What are you supposed doing right now?" - by answering this question the child is made to self-reflect and accept ownership of his/her own behaviour... in other words, to take responsibility.

 

This is something that goes well beyond the classroom and effects society as a whole. The Japanese are exposed to a far higher frequency of swearing, violence etc. in their fictional literature. It's well known that Japanese comic books and cartoons can be writhe with scenes of explicit violence, Transufomah! etc. -- even cartoons shown at prime time, intended for a general audience in Japan, would garner an M 15+ rating here... and it's happened. Rurouni Kenshin was aired in prime time with the Japanese equivalent of a G rating. The DVDs are sold here under an M rating. Super Dimensional Fortress Macross is also sold here with an M 15+ rating, and that was obviously intended for a young audience. Western TV and literature is far more heavily censored, yet Western countries have far higher incidences of anti-social behaviour despite this censorship.

 

IMHO, this is partially due to the Cathartic effect of lighter censorship laws, but primarily due to the cultural penchant for teaching responsibility.

 

A lot of parents send their kids to learn Asian martial arts like Karate, not simply to learn how to fight -- you can just as easily learn boxing -- but also to instill principles of responsibility and self-discipline into their kids. Even if the instructor and class are all non-Asians, because these associations follow an Asian-based ethic, there is a culture of discipline and respect in the school. Unlike Western school classrooms, students at most martial arts schools will never question their teacher and regard him/her with absolute trust and respect. The kind if misbehaviour that classroom teachers have to tolerate on a daily basis is absolutely unheard of in your typical Dojo/Dojang/Guan. I'm certain that any other martial artist on this board would be able to verify this. If there are also any other educators here, I'd love to hear your input.

i'm not a teacher or anything goki, but my view is this.

 

kids do what they do because it's taboo.  the kid that cusses in grade school is always the coolest guy on the playground because he's uninhibited and he's doing something "naughty" so the kids think it's cool.  same goes for just about any problem thats youth related.  example, drugs and alchohol, the cool kid in hs is the kid that can score you some killer bud or the kid that can buy the alchohol for the party.  doesn't necisarily mean that kids should be allowed to buy alchohol (though i think if your old enough to die for your country and get marred you should jolly well be able to have a beer!) and drugs, but i'm sure that the popularity would go down because it wouldn't be such a taboo.  thats why kids wanna play gta, thats why kids wanna sneak into mommy and daddy's room and steal the porno mags, kuz they're told they can't.  i know thats why did most of the stuff i did, kuz mom n dad said i couldn't so it MUST be cool!  my nephew laughs his ass off everytime he hears a "curse word", why?  because it's a sin, thats why, it's a taboo and he thinks it's hilarious when anybody does it.  if you oppressivly force laws and moral standards on a human chances are they are going to reject them.

 

i agree with you somewhat, but i think that it's not just parents instilling a sense of freedom in their children (lacking responsability or not) thats to blame, while it does help it's not the sole reason.  hell, if it where strictly parenting i'd be a bible thumping strait as an arrow xian and yet i'm far from it.

You make a good point, and that's something that I briefly touched upon when I said that exposure to literature with lesser censorship having a Cathartic effect.

ah, well then we agree, and somehow i'm not suprised

 

learned a new word too ^_^

Too many words...

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Yeah, but Japanese kids try to ram their fingers up your butt!!! Chew on that :tfevil