Chinese basketball "Tiger Mother" met with rebellion
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Yale law professor Amy Chua may get rewarded with her tough Chinese-style parenting while sharp-tongued Chinese junior basketball coach Fan Bin was left with a bitter pill to swallow.
Like Chua, whose strict parenting finally led one of her two daughters to be accepted by two U.S. Ivy League schools Yale and Harvard, Fan, with his stern coach methods, led his team to achieve good results in world level tournaments.
Also like Chua whose methods in her book "Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother" sparked an online backlash among parents who thought Chua's methods were extreme, Fan was met with rebellion from his players and temporarily removed from his post.
Thirteen national junior players signed on a letter to the Chinese basektball association, asking for Fan's stepdown and the content appeared in Guangzhou Daily Sunday.
"Head coach Fan Bin has given us verbal insults and beating time and again in the past three years which we can no longer bear," read the letter. "We are here to protest and ask for a change of head coach."
It was reported by Shenyang Evening News that players will be harshly scolded, often with dirty words, once they made little mistakes or failed to achieve results as expected.
The news drew a quick reaction from the basketball governing body.
"Fan Bin has not managed the team properly for a long time. The Association was aware (of their conflicts) and criticised his coaching methods many times but received little effect," said Li Jinsheng, vice president of the Association, on Monday night.
"We decided to temporarily suspend his work as the junior coach," he said.
But Li admitted that Fan was a capable coach.
Fan brought the team to a seventh place finish in last year's U17 world championship to create the best result from any level of the national teams in the world championships.
"In the past three years, Fan worked very hard and set high standards for his players. He is devoted and contributed a lot to the team," said Li.
The incidents soon split the basketball fans into two groups.
Some of them supported Fan's harsh ways as in Chinese tradition, strict education methods are thought to be effective ways to raise children, just like the saying goes, "It is the bridle and spur that makes a good horse."
A retired basketball player was even surpised at the team's behavior. "Everyone of us experienced similar things. We were scolded, yelled at or beaten by the coaches. But when I reflected, I thought they did all those thing for our good," he said.
Players born after China's reform and opening up are thought to be more open-minded and rebellious. Compared to the older generation, they are more distinctive individuals.
Chinese athletic head coach Feng Shuyong once commented on the new generation, "they don't know what's fear and they don't want to hide their discontent."
Therefore, many people root for new and more skillful education methods when facing the new generation.
"Fan Bin just followed his predecessors' steps and his training methods are adopted in many well-achieved sports teams but nowadays, coaches need some reflection," said a net user with an ID "sports make you fit".
"Time has changed. Please abandon the old habits," said freestyle skiing world champion Li Nina.
Even the Tiger Mother, who used to spur her piano-playing daughter by saying "you're just getting worse and worse", found out the costs of her ways and later adopted a softer approach.
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