Virginia Tech’s Seung-Hui Cho had a biography that reads like the all-Korean American success story. An assimilated 1.5 generation immigrant, Cho was still trapped in a living stereotype: Christian two-parent family moves from poverty in Korea to affluent, high test-scoring Fairfax County.
He was poor only compared to the rich kids he hated. He was teased by white kids. He disliked his mother’s Korean church. His mother worried about him, asking his roommates to help out. He fell between the cracks.
In a culture hungry for success, Virginia Tech was like the B+ grade that drove that mother crazy when the Korean paper posts names of kids like his sister that go to Princeton.
My father told me it was important to mix with kids, but I still felt the Asian urge to put study ahead of making lots of friends. Asian culture often bases networks on family, but it’s American parents who put in a lot of effort to organize play dates, birthday parties, ball games and dances. Two parents in the dry cleaning business means long hours out of the house, which sounds more like Cat’s In The Cradle than Leave it to Beaver.
The real moral of this story? Something went terribly wrong in this pursuit of the American Dream. His sister made a statement, but his parents have abandoned their home to hide from the press. If your parents were strict or didn’t hug, that’s just how Asians show their love.
Somebody forgot what is REALLY IMPORTANT. It’s not the right house or the right college. The best SAT scores mean nothing if a boy feels unloved and cannot bring himself to love others.
When the cops knocked on his door, he felt cornered with no choice but to shoot everybody. Whatever grades your kids bring home, be thankful if they don’t end up as a psychotic mass murderer. Asian parents, we have much to be proud of, but let us pray for guidance from above that we never mess up like this again.