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PaperclipPerfector  6d ago (text post)   27915 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of June 23, 2025

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Asian tiger parent culture is different due to bugman conformalism. They send their kids to extra lessons to get ahead in public school, the same one normal kids go to. Not this abomination that this parent is getting into.

Asian tiger parent culture is different due to bugman conformalism

I can’t parse this sentence. Asian culture is more conforming, so their children go to public instead of private schools? Weird tech-nerds are more non-conforming? I don’t know what bugmen are.

I don't know about all Asian countries, but, my wife grew up in China and had to cram and apply to get into a good public high school. Not going to high school or going into a less selective low ranked one were the alternatives.

I've seen 'bugmen' is a racist slur against Asians. But Bronze Age Pervert uses it in a non-racial sense as a slur against regular people. Asserting people you don't like are similar to bugs.

I'm not sure I have this right as I'm only going by impressions picked up online at third-hand, but there seems to be the reverse idea about Asian universities: what we would call the state ones are considered the high-value, high-class colleges you want your kids to get into (the equivalent of MIT and the Ivies), going to a private university is considered a step down (think "small liberal arts college in the middle of nowhere versus an Ivy League college").

So you grind grind grind to get into the right university to get the degree that will get you into the handful of 'acceptable' large business combines where you grind grind grind to get on the executive path or else you're just an 'office worker' which is a failure.

There is this notion of being an elite/belonging to the elite, and elite seems to mean "from a wealthy family, went to the right university, got into Big Corp and am on the executive promotion track".

Let the more informed correct me, please!

This is the case in germany as well for the most part, though it's as always more complicated. For the state universities, there are very few shortcuts, top degrees are kept highly selected & small, and it's free to boot - you just have to be good enough. The private universities, meanwhile, have the reputation that anyone can just buy their way in. It's gotten even harder for them since there's lots of new, easy-to-get degrees even in state universities nowadays. But most people know which are which, so they're only worth it if you can't get anything else.

All bugman references aside, I think the point is that Asian societies are more conformist, so everyone sends their children to the same (public) schools and then quietly to cram school out of sight.

Weird tech nerds are more likely to brag about sending their children to an experimental school, whereas in Japan this is kind of like saying ‘I’m an enemy of society and I don’t want my children to be brought up in the normal way’. There are special schools for diplomats’ children etc. but not enough to matter at scale.

You are not wildly off, but this is an exaggeration. There are many private schools at the secondary level in Japan. They cost more and in general may have a higher academic standard. Their accreditation is only relevant in terms of what they may prepare students to expect in the college entrance exam. In some cases these private high schools have International Baccalaureate programs, etc. As for university, the highest ranked schools are public (Tokyo, Kyoto, Kobe, etc.) But any kid from any high school, public or private, who can pass the entrance exam can get in. This, as you say, is the purpose of cram schools at the high school level.

Re: private schools, would I be right in saying that most of them are grandfathered in? Particularly thinking of the Catholic schools.

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