reading response #4

The Triple Package by Amy Chua—4/19/2014(58 pages read)

 

I have been reading about the second item of the triple package, “insecurity”, in all of America’s most successful groups, people tend to feel insecure, inadequate, and have the need to prove themselves. Mormons have a tradition of being persecuted for their beliefs. During the restoration of the Church Mormons were attack by mobs and driven out of their homes. Mormons were not welcome or trusted in America society. They had to prove themselves by working hard and smart to be included in main stream society.

Similarly, the first Cuban immigrants, who arrived at the shores of the United States of America, were not liked because of the great numbers, their poverty and because they didn’t speak English. They were professionals and elites forced by Fidel Castro to abandon their property, businesses, social status, and political connections.  Many of them were used to living in mansions and having servants. Some of them were doctors, engineers, and because they didn’t speak English; they had to take jobs that didn’t require an education, such dishwasher, house cleaning, janitor and yard keeping. This loss of status cause great insecurity in the Cuban immigrants which push them into hard work and more risk taking, and as a result of these they went from poverty to great prosperity in one generation.

More recently, after the terrorist attack of 9/11, there was an anti-Arab Muslim hostility so Iranians choose to be identified as Persians rather than Arab Muslims, tying themselves to the ancient great power of Persia instead of the terrorist extreme Muslims.  Iranians also try to prove themselves to be civilized so maybe that it one reason why they hold more masters and doctorate degrees than any other group in America.