I can accept that pushing a child beyond their limits might be detrimental in more than one way, but why do so many commenters consider creativity to be opposed to academic achievement? In my experience quite the opposite is true.

There seems to be a weirdly pervasive misconception in our (American) culture that creative pursuits spring out of leisure, not hard work. But you can rest assured that Michelangelo spent very few days lounging in his condo, sipping pinot noir and staring at a blank canvas.

My sister teaches fashion design, and she's told me that a disproportionate number of her most successful students are Asian females. We can't draw specific cultural conclusions, but Chua's references to the Asian-American immigrant community's generalized work ethic hardly implies a suppression of creative outlets.

A bit slow on this one. You can see Lady Gaga wear these in her "Bad Romance" music video.

Don't quit your day job, Tim.

Geez Laura, could you be more sexist?

Poor kids. They don't stand a chance.

Points for redundancy, at least.

Bravo, sir!

Does it yell if the comment is all in caps?

Christ, that's scary. He'll have bodies buried in the basement by the time he's 18.

Oh, Grace. It's not the tree-huggers you're hurting. You're cutting off your nose to spite your face.

I'm with Murphy. I've done enough time in the food industry to feel that leaving a mess for others to clean is rude and childish.

That's it. I'll never sleep soundly again.

Alf - what part of "no pain" don't you understand? The cat is perfectly healthy, though deeply unattractive. I think that reflects a disability in the people who would rather kill a healthy creature than look at it.

Keep the cat stories coming, they build character.

An homage to Gary Larson's infamous "Cow Tools."

One of these has been featured on Neatorama before; the Ikea bus stop.

http://www.neatorama.com/2006/05/28/ikea-bus-stop/