Hacienda Heights Chinese Classes

It's sad to hear a neighboring community call Chinese language learning communist. Jay Chen recently did a guess post at Angry Asian Man about the situation. From what I can tell from the opponents is that the program is funded by the government of China. Which is "communist". Which means that what is taught in the classroom will be communist. Which means that the children will be communist. But this is America! Where communist are not allowed.

If you follow that chain of thought, you should be an opponent! No doubt, fight it! But I ask you if that will happen? Will your children become communist if they were taught communist doctrine?

I don't know about you, but my two daughters wouldn't become communist even if they were to head over to China and start classes there. Heck, 2 junior high aged students from the Sichuan area spent two weeks here during the summer as part of a host family program, and I felt more communist than them.

I haven't reviewed the materials, but I'll take Jay's word that the materials do not promote communist agenda. They promote Chinese language learning. I feel sorry for the students too, they'll forget it all when they goto high school where there are no Chinese classes. As a lifelong speaker of Chinese, since moving out of my parents house, my Chinese continues to deteriorate. These kids won't remember the material nor their Chinese language, nor communist doctrine.

I am not for or against the class. If it were offered at my kids school, they probably wouldn't want to be in it. Because I'll already have been sending my kids to private Chinese school for years before that and they'll want to run away from it. They'll say in Chinese to me, "I already speak and write Chinese, I've been in Chinese school for 6 years already and you make me speak Chinese to you." I can hear them already. Ah, the defiance against speaking Chinese.

BTW - the chinese school students these days aren't just Chinese. A fourth are from non-Chinese speaking families that want their children to learn Chinese.

BTW #2 - Jay's use of "Confucius Says" sickens me. It's a reminder of the stupid fortunate cookie racism of the US. I don't know about you, but when I hear it, it's always with a stupid faux accent. But Jay's trying to reach an audience that might relate to what I perceive to be a racial slur.