The American Mental Illness Olympics

March 24, 2011

The race to acquire a serious mental illness (SMI) is a race you “DO NOT” want to win, and Asians earned last place. If you are among the 97% of Asian-Americans without a SMI, thank your Tough Love parents.

To the average Caucasian-American parent, in a perfect world, all dreams come true and everyone is having fun and enjoys life daily.

That is the foundation of the self-esteem movement, which turned the average American parent into a SAP (a member of the Self-esteem arm of Political Correctness).

Here is more evidence that Tough Love parents, the Amy Chua’s of the world, are right while the SAPs are wrong.

The National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) in 2008 said that Asian-Americans (coming in fifth in the mental illness Olympics) had the lowest prevalence of SMIs by race, while Caucasians took the gold medal; Latinos the bronze and Africa-Americas came in fourth.

American Indian/Alaska Natives took the silver SMI medal.

The most disturbing comparison was the one between young and old. Those 18 to 24 had four times the SMIs than people over fifty had. It is obvious that SAPs did not raise older Americans. I am sixty-five and my parents did not score high on the Amy Chua Tough Love scale, but they were not SAPs.

Another NIMH study says, “Moreover, African-Americans and Mexican-Americans were significantly less likely to seek treatment than whites.” There is no mention of Asians in this study.

The evidence suggests that Amy Chua’s Tough Love methods (or Tough Love parenting methods in general) lead to adults better able to cope with the challenges and stresses of life that most “will” face.


Self-Discipline may be the key to controlling mental health.

In addition, success at completing college shows that the average Asian Tough Love parent is more successful than all other parenting methods.

The National Center for Education Statistics (IES) said, “Bachelor’s degree completion rates of students seeking a bachelor’s degree at 4-year institutions varied by student characteristics, including race/ethnicity and sex. Asian/Pacific Islander students had the highest 6-year graduation rate, followed by White, Hispanic, Black, and American Indian/Alaska Native students.”

If whites were so successful at earning college degrees (since they were second place), why did they come in first in the SMI Olympics—the race you want to lose?

In fact, the IES says, “The educational systems that outperformed the United States in fourth-grade mathematics—namely, Chinese Taipei, England, Hong Kong SAR, Japan, Kazakhstan, Latvia, the Russian Federation, and Singapore — all were located in Asia or Europe (where Tough Love parenting methods prevail).”

I’m confident that most American SAPs will continue to criticize Amy Chua’s Chinese-American Tough Love parenting style for being too demanding.

I’m also confident that most American SAPs will keep blaming US schools and teachers for the lack of student performance.

However, the average number of minutes (less than 5 a day) that s SAP parent in the US talks to his or her average SAP child that spends an average 10 hours a day watching TV or playing video games, or texting or social networking on Facebook shows who is really to blame for winning the SMI Olympics, and it is not Amy Chua.

I wonder how many of Amy Chua’s critics have placed at the SMI Olympics.

Discover more at In Defense of Tiger Mothers Everywhere

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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of the concubine saga, My Splendid Concubine & Our Hart. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too.

If you want to subscribe to iLook China, there is a “Subscribe” button at the top of the screen in the menu bar.

7 Comments | America, American culture, China, Chinese Culture, Chinese women, cultural differences, education, family values, health care, parenting | Tagged: , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Lloyd Lofthouse

America’s Gift to China – the Curse of the Middle Class Bulge

March 3, 2011

The Atom Stack Tribune reports McDonalds is facing stiff competition in China. Today, McDonalds has more than 2100 outlets in 450 cities and towns across China.

KFC has three times as many stores serving artery clogging fried chicken, while Coca Cola reported a 26% increase in sales in China of its sodas making up for reduced sales in the US.

At the end of 2010, Starbucks reported more than 750 Starbucks locations in Greater China.

Pizza Hut food is expensive in China when compared to Chinese restaurants, which explains why Pizza Hut focuses on China’s middle class.  Pizza Hut started doing business in China in 1987. Today it operates 3,000 restaurants in 650 cities and towns.

What has been the result of all this American fast food in China?

In 1979, less than one percent of China’s population was diagnosed as diabetic. Since that time, the increase of diabetes has paralleled China’s development along with the growth of American fast food outlets in China.

A recently published study reported that the proportion of diabetics in China was nearly equal to the United States, which is almost nine percent of the adult population.

In addition, the growth of reported cases in China is growing at about 1.5 million annually on average.

The increase in diabetes in China is due to increasing obesity, lack of exercise and to poor eating habits.

Dr. Liu Hongfang of Dongzhimen Hospital in Beijing says the situation is only going to get worse as living standards improve and more people can afford to eat high-fat foods more often.

As a result, the number of diabetics will keep increasing.

The World Health Organization estimated that in the period lasting from 2006 to 2015, China would lose 558 billion dollars in national income due to heart disease, stroke and diabetes combined.

Thanks to government reforms in health care in 2009, more than 1.2 billion people now have some form of basic medical insurance. However, this health coverage is often minimal and diabetes costs more than the health care covers.

Discover China’s Health Care Today

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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of the concubine saga, My Splendid Concubine & Our Hart. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too.

If you want to subscribe to iLook China, there is a “Subscribe” button at the top of the screen in the menu bar.

Leave a Comment » | America, American culture, business, China, Chinese food, Chinese middle class, food, health care | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Lloyd Lofthouse

Changing China through its Youth – Part 5/5

February 3, 2011

As PBS’s Frontline started its fourth year of filming in China, the subjects of their documentary were still restless rethinking their lives, their ambitions and values.

One Chinese woman (not identified) talks about a survey called the “Happiness Index”, which is practical.  It has nothing to do with the individual and society. She says, “When Chinese talk about happiness, it’s about affording the things they want to buy, the housing they want, and if they like the work they do…”

Lu Dong, who started an Internet tailoring business, says, “China is a country with no beliefs and there are no role models. All the models are materialistic.”

Although Lu Dong’s opinion may be true for many Chinese in the rising middle class, I disagree that it means everyone in China. There are role models in China’s history, and even today, there are others who will look to them as an example.

He says, “Chinese are very hungry now and hard to satisfy,” which may be a better way of stating the situation today and goes a long way to explain why rural Chinese are willing to sacrifice so much to migrate to cities and work long hours in factories for low pay.

Lu Dong says, “The water is still dirty. What I can do is make the water in my company clean… Although when I deal with the outside world I still have to deal with business the way others do. That’s another reason why I became a Christian.”

Then Ben Wu, who launched the Internet cafe, says he won’t be in the Internet cafe business for the rest of his life. His real passion is renewable energy. His father’s expertise in is solar cells. He wants to start a factory to build this product.

Dr. Zhang Yao works in a large hospital and feels an obligation to do public health work. He thinks residents in large urban hospitals could provide training in rural ones.

Zhang Jingjing is a public interest lawyer. She represented more than a 1,000 families over a power line built for the (2008) Olympics. She wants to protect China’s environment and natural resources. However, she wants to meet the right man too.

Meanwhile, the rapper, Wang Xiaolei, is achieving his dream of becoming a star. He says he has 20,000 fans. He wants to be the head of a record company. He says he firmly believes that if you work hard your dream will come true.

Wow! That sounds like many of the American children I taught during my thirty years in the classroom. How many do you believe actually achieve their dreams?

In conclusion, this PBS Frontline documentary shows us that there are no stereotypes in China. Even in a collective culture such as China, there are individuals.

Return to Changing China through its Youth – Part 4

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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of the concubine saga, My Splendid Concubine & Our Hart. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too.

If you want to subscribe to iLook China, there is a “Subscribe” button at the top of the screen in the menu bar.

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Posted by Lloyd Lofthouse

Changing China through its Youth – Part 2/5

January 31, 2011

In Part 1 of this series covering a PBS Frontline documentary of how China’s youth is changing the country, we ended with  Ben Wu who had been away for more than a decade gaining a business education in the US and New York.

Recently, a Chinese-American friend returning from China after a long visit complained of the younger people (under 30) not saving money and using credit cards running up debt to buy consumer items (what I call mostly junk).

What Neil Genzlinger of the New York Times wrote of this Frontline series was true. “Soon it becomes clear that everything about them (the younger Chinese) is just like us. …” Learn more of The University Influence from the US and Europe.

This is scary since Money-Zine.com says, “The total amount of consumer debt in the United States stands at nearly $2.5 trillion dollars – and based on the latest Census statistics, that works out to be nearly $8,100 in debt for every man, woman and child that lives here in the US.”

Imagine what would happen to the world if China and America both had economic meltdowns equal to what started in the US in 2008? Instead of $64US trillion lost globally, the numbers would have been much higher.

Anyway, back to Ben Wu and his venture to start up an Internet cafe franchise. After months of living on caffeine and cigarettes (working two jobs–one to earn money and the other starting up the cafe), he opened for business.

By then it was probably 2005 or later. Soon after opening, Ben Wu reported, “The cafe is doing very well. It’s pretty much what I estimated.”

The next Chinese youth Frontline focuses on is Wang Xiaolei, a Chinese rapper using his music to express “his” dark view (opinion) of China’s new boom times.

In my opinion, Wang Xiaolei’s ignorance is on display. Since he doesn’t know how dark it was in China before the economic miracle, he has no idea what he is talking about. His own music says he’s never been to the US but it is apparent that he must have a gold plated perception of the US.

Facts say otherwise. Even the CIA reports that only 2.8% of China’s population lives in “absolute poverty”.

Meanwhile, in the US, the latest Census numbers reported by the Associated Press say “The number of poor people in the US is millions higher than previously known, with 1 in 6 Americans (almost 17%) – many of them 65 and older – struggling in poverty…”

Wang Xiaolei says, “There is a lot of discrimination in China. Like, if you don’t have money, people look down on you.”

How is that different from the US?

Try walking the streets of downtown Berkeley, California and see how many homeless beggars ask for money. Then drive around San Francisco and see if you can keep count of the homeless that live on the city’s streets.

In fact, “There is anecdotal evidence that many Americans complain about the presence of homeless people, blame them for their situation, and feel that their requests (begging) for money or support are unjustified.” Source: Wikipedia

Several years ago in this report, Frontline said that 70% of Chinese had no medical insurance. That was before current plans to improve medical services in urban and rural communities from 2011 to 2015. Source: Xinhuanet.com

What Frontline doesn’t say about health care in China is also important and puts the situation into perspective. The CIA reports that life expectancy in China for total population is 74.51 years. In 1949, life expectancy was a meager 35 years.

Return to China Changing through its Youth – Part 1

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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of the concubine saga, My Splendid Concubine & Our Hart. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too.

If you want to subscribe to iLook China, there is a “Subscribe” button at the top of the screen in the menu bar.

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Posted by Lloyd Lofthouse

“Cupping” – Another element of Traditional Chinese Medicine

January 29, 2011

I’ve been aware of “cupping” for some time since I married into a Chinese family and one of my wife’s sisters uses this method of Chinese medicine.

However, I didn’t pay much attention to “cupping” until I wrote the piece about Gwyneth Paltrow Popular in China, which appeared on January 7.

Researching the Gwyneth Paltrow post, I discovered that she believes in Chinese medicine and has used “cupping”. She even told Oprah, “It feels amazing and it’s very relaxing, and it feels terrific. It’s just one of the alternative medicines that I do instead of taking antibiotics.”

The history of Chinese cupping dates from 281 AD. It was an ancient Taoist medical practice and was widely used in the courts of Imperial China at the time.  Its administration was first recorded by Ge Hong in an ancient tract called Handbook of Prescriptions for Emergencies.

In fact, medical education in China was elevated to a higher standard in 443 AD when Qin Cheng-zu petitioned Emperor Wen of the North and South Dynasty period to appoint physicians to teach medical students.

By 493 AD, the Imperial Academy had expanded to include lectureships and chairs for teaching Chinese medicine. Source: Shen-nong.com

Chinese medicine from the beginning focused on prevention to avoid illness where Western medicine has always focused on cures for illnesses after a life is threatened by diseases such as cancer, diabetes or heart disease.

However, the focus of western medicine may be changing with programs such as the Dr. Oz TV Program leading the way.

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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of the concubine saga, My Splendid Concubine & Our Hart. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too.

If you want to subscribe to iLook China, there is a “Subscribe” button at the top of the screen in the menu bar.

1 Comment | China, Chinese Culture, Chinese history, cultural differences, health care, history, science, Taoism | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Lloyd Lofthouse

Stem Cell Research in China

December 15, 2010

Who would have thought that the future health of humanity might depend on China? 

In fact, it may be true.

Fox News.com reported on The Cases For and Against Stem Cell Research, “Opponents of research on embryonic cells, including many religious and anti-abortion groups (in America), contend that embryos are human beings with the same rights and thus entitled to the same protections against abuse as anyone else.… Anti-abortion groups also oppose research on stem cells derived from aborted fetuses.”

However, Croatian Medical Tourism.com reports, “China (a country that refuses to allow religions to have a say in government affairs) has pushed hard for years to become a world leader in the fields of stem cell research and regenerative medicine.”

And China’s efforts appear to be paying off. Discover more at China Stem Cell News.

Parent Dish.com reports that James Evans and Hollie McHugh, both 24, saved money for more than a year to send their daughter Isabelle Evans to China for stem cell treatment. Newspaper reports say the results of the treatments were soon worth the pain caused.

Discover The Magic of “Puer” Tea

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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of the concubine saga, My Splendid Concubine & Our Hart. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too.

If you want to subscribe to iLook China, there is a “Subscribe” button at the top of the screen in the menu bar.

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Posted by Lloyd Lofthouse

Opposites Attract

November 1, 2010

If the old saying that opposites attract is true, China and the US are perfect for each other.

The Huffington Post’s Robert Lenzner writes that China Needs to Hit the Brakes; US Needs to Step on the Gas.

Lenzner explains that China’s economic goals are to avoid what happened in the US when subprime mortgages burst the real estate bubble and almost brought down the West’s house of cards.

To succeed, China is attempting to slow its economic growth and smother inflation.

However, in the US, the opposite it happening as the US wants to add to the national debt to avoid deflation and stimulate the economy at the same time.

Lenzner points out why China has everything to lose if this doesn’t work. China’s current 12th five-year economic plan is concentrating on the rural poor, and it is about time.

In fact, smaller cities are being built for some of the rural poor while extending electricity to remote villages across China.

At the same time, China is expanding the rail system and building more roads to reach people that haven’t been touched by China’s economic progress.

To avoid unrest, China’s future depends on improving the lifestyles of about 700 million rural Chinese.

Learn more at Volting all of China into the 21st Century

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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of the concubine saga, My Splendid Concubine & Our Hart. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too. 

If you want to subscribe to iLook China, there is a “Subscribe” button at the top of the screen in the menu bar.

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Posted by Lloyd Lofthouse

Sun Yat-sen’s Last Days – Part 2/3

October 26, 2010

After arriving in Beijing, Sun Yat-sen saw a French doctor who gave him injections to help with his illness.

With his health growing worse, a nurse that worked at a German hospital was sent to his Beijing hotel to care for him.

His condition was so bad that at times he could not talk.

Since the Western medicine wasn’t improving his health, he was convinced by advisors to talk to an herbalist doctor, Ge Lianfu.

Sun Yat-sen told Ge Lianfu that he would give the Chinese medicine to the Western doctors to see if they could copy it. 

Ge said he wasn’t sure if Chinese and Western medicine were interchangeable.

Since Sun was a trained Western doctor, he did not believe that Ge’s treatment was going to work. Ge Lianfu concluded that Sun had liver disease but Sun did not trust the diagnosis.

While staying in the Beijing hotel, Sun was treated by doctors from the US, Germany, Russia and the Peking Union Medical College Hospital.  However, the treatments did not help and his condition worsened.

The western doctors concluded that he needed exploratory surgery. After they cut him open, they discovered liver disease as Ge Lianfu had diagnosed without surgery.  

In fact, Sun was in the final stages of liver cancer. At that time, Western medicine had no treatment to deal with a disease that he must have had for years.

In 1916, Sun had often suffered from abdominal pain and the Western doctors treated him as if he had stomach trouble.

Learn more about Chinese Herbalism (Eastern Medicine)

Return to Sun Yat-sen’s Last Days – Part 1 or continue to Part 3

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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of The Concubine Saga. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too. This is the love story Sir Robert Hart did not want the world to discover.

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Posted by Lloyd Lofthouse

One Tough Mezzo-soprano from China

September 18, 2010

She describes herself as a girl from China who came to America with $45 and knowing two words of English, “Merry Christmas.”  Source: SFGate

When Zheng Cao burst onto the San Francisco Opera scene in 1995, she played Siebel in “Faust.” Since then, she’s performed in opera houses throughout North America, Europe and Asia.

Today, an inspiration, the Shanghai-born Mezzo-soprano has defied the odds of surviving stage four lung cancer and a diagnoses that said she had six months to live.

More than a year ago, she received a death sentence when cancer was discovered to have spread through her body. Months later, she would learn that the rigorous treatment plan had dramatically reduced the cancer threat.

“This is the most impressive response I’ve seen in my life,” Dr. Rosenbaum said.

Zheng Cao’s tumors either had decreased in size, were no longer visible or no longer considered active.

To learn more about Zhen Cao’s journey, visit her Blog at Caring Bridge.org.

Zheng Cao holds degrees from the Shanghai Conservatory and the Curtis Institute of Music.

While studying, she worked as a singer on the Holland American cruise line where she met Troy Donahue in 1991.

Donahue said that “We were very serious, very committed to each other. It’s the greatest relationship I’ve ever had in my life.” Source: Troy Donahue at encore4.net

Zheng Cao and Troy Donahue were engaged until his death in 2001. She turned 44 on June 9, 2010.

See China’s Got Talent Too

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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of the concubine saga, My Splendid Concubine & Our Hart. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too. 

If you want to subscribe to this Blog, there is a “Subscribe” button at the top of the screen in the menu bar.

Leave a Comment » | America, China, Chinese women, disabilities, health care | Tagged: , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Lloyd Lofthouse

Poverty and China’s Peasant farmers – Part 3/3

September 12, 2010

In rural China, the peasants do not earn much money.  They live in what the West calls poverty, but they have a home and a roof over their heads.  They are not homeless and seldom are hungry as the poor in India, which is touted as the largest democracy on the earth.

The peasant farmers in China grow most of the food they eat and sell what they do not need as the Amish do today in America and as 90% of Americans did before the Industrial Revolution.

If Chinese peasants, go to school, eat a nutritious diet and have access to basic medical care as China’s central government has promised, health will improve and life spans may surpass urban China where the air pollution is bad.

China is extending the electric grid and improving public transportation so rural China will have access to the same luxuries that urban people have. Before 1980, rural Chinese lived as most Americans did before the Industrial Revolution.

For thousands of years, the backbone of China has always been the peasant farmers and their collective lifestyle. What will happen to China if they all join the consumer oriented middle class?

Rural America must have been a collective culture before the Industrial Revolution. Consumerism and credit cards changed most Americans, except the Amish, into an individualistic culture where “I” is more important than “We”. 

The Amish are still a collective culture with free will to leave and become a modern American consumer. Why don’t they?

See Climbing the Dragon’s Back

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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of the concubine saga, My Splendid Concubine & Our Hart. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too.

If you want to subscribe to this Blog, there is a “Subscribe” button at the top of the screen in the menu bar.

Leave a Comment » | capitalism, China, Chinese Culture, Chinese middle class, cultural differences, education, family values, food, health care | Tagged: , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Lloyd Lofthouse

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