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Americans Aren’t The Only Asshats Out There…

By admin on November 24, 2009

I want my children to be successful in life. To that end we allow them to get involved in sports should they so choose as well as other extracurricular activities. We’ve done quite a few. Basketball, soccer, martial arts, wrestling, softball, beta club, girl scouts, etc…ad nauseum, and that’s just the two girls. Being successful in their education takes precedence though. A’s and the occasional B’s are what is expected here and we (mostly my wife) will step up and help out with studying if we are needed. Should grades start slipping then the extra stuff goes.

I recently had to deal with my 12-YO on that one. She is currently on the wrestling team at her middle school which means 6 p.m. pickup at school. She also goes to church on Wednesday nights and Sundays as well. She had several homework assignments due and procrastinated on them as well as a project that was due in two days. She had a wrestling meet the next night. Her choice was to stay up until midnight and finish it that night or skip the wrestling meet and chance being dropped from the team. She chose to finish her work and we managed to get to bed about 11:30. Too late for me considering that I have to get up at 4:30 every morning but I wasn’t about to force her to stay up and not be there to help out.

 While I am not a huge believer in any type of organized religion my children are smart enough to figure that stuff out for themselves. Our next-door-neighbor is a pastor at one of our local churches and all I told my wife was that I think going to church is a good thing for them morally and socially but the first day that they come home and tell me that I am going to hell for not believing will be their last day at church until they turn 18.

Anyway, my whole point is that it’s OK to want your kids to be successful in all of their endeavors but you have to let your children be children too. They need time to play. Time to pretend and just decompress. It’s NOT a good thing to make them so ultra-overachieving that they skip their childhood and this is what brings me to the REAL point of this post.

Yang Fen is a divorced father in Haikou City, Hainan Province, China. He has decided that the way to win his wife back is to turn his 6-year-old daughter into a famous marathon runner. His little girl recently ran 86 miles in two days and he wants to train her to run that distance in ONE.

She is forced to run laps as soon as she gets home from school, where she recently skipped two grades, sometimes until midnight. According to the article over at FOXAtlanta he is concerned over her puffy toes and swollen feet but the training continues anyway. So much for fucking concern. His comment to an interview was “Now there is only my daughter and me, I have no choice but to let her share some of my treasure. I hope she will become more mature and sturdy through the training”

In addition to her running she also takes guitar and singing lessons.

There’s something to be said for living vicariously through your children but driving them too far physically and emotionally to make up for your failures just makes you a bigger…failure.

Not exactly a crime story, I know, but in my eyes this is as much child abuse as if he was punching her in the head before bed every night.

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Author and owner of Captain Obvious' Crime Site. I have been blogging in one form or another since the days of Fidonet and BBSes in the early nineties. Started blogging in it's current form around 10 years ago and got seriously interested in crime in 2005, about the time Natalee Holloway vanished. I've been hooked ever since.
  • Southern Lady

    It most certainly is child abuse. Where will she find the time to play? And shouldn’t most parents realize that play is part of education that teaches children about life? What if this child really isn’t interested in running? Or guitar? Or singing? What if she is a natural born scientist or teacher or politician even, but won’t have the chance to discover that for herself?
    And what about the physical abuse resulting from her strenuous runs? No. Horrible.
    I feel for her, and for the others whose parents push them against their limits. My parents put me on stage starting when I was 3, and highly trained me in music until I was 18. Imagine their shock when I told them I would not attend Julliard but become a scientist instead. Still, they did not intentionally abuse me. It does not sound like the same case with this child.

  • Southern Lady

    It most certainly is child abuse. Where will she find the time to play? And shouldn’t most parents realize that play is part of education that teaches children about life? What if this child really isn’t interested in running? Or guitar? Or singing? What if she is a natural born scientist or teacher or politician even, but won’t have the chance to discover that for herself?
    And what about the physical abuse resulting from her strenuous runs? No. Horrible.
    I feel for her, and for the others whose parents push them against their limits. My parents put me on stage starting when I was 3, and highly trained me in music until I was 18. Imagine their shock when I told them I would not attend Julliard but become a scientist instead. Still, they did not intentionally abuse me. It does not sound like the same case with this child.