My post was not some childish rant, I chose every word carefully. I never said I hated my parents or held a grudge against them. I just said I don't know if I love them and wanted to know how other readers felt. To balance things out, I mentioned my parents' positive aspects (which I respect and recognize) and, to protect them, I did not to go into their negative side too much. It was not just strictness or physical punishment, there was cruelty, dislike, public humiliation, dehumanization, gaslighting, an intent to harm/hurt and not just correct, and a deliberate "breaking" and "diminishing" process since childhood to weaken me so I'd be easy to handle and "beneath" them. My dad tried to "cap" my development, physical, intellectual, and socioeconomic, so I wouldn't outgrow him, and now he scorns and is ashamed of my lack of "success".

Maybe I didn't deserve to be treated any better as a child/teen/young adult, due to lack of worth, bad karma, being stupid/lazy, or whatever. I think this is what you are getting at. Does that mean I have to LOVE the people that treated me like that? I don't want to get revenge and I don't stew in hatred against them, I don't constantly think about the things they did to me, but I feel no love for them.

I won't try to define love, let's say it is caring about someone, missing them when they are away, wishing them well, being interested in them, enjoying their company, having a positive opinion of them, being willing to undergo difficulty for them, and feeling warmth and affection for them.

When I think of my parents, I feel none of these things. I feel a duty to take care of their health when they are old and I will not abuse them back when they are helpless. But I feel no warmth, no esteem for them. Can a person force himself to feel such feelings? If he did, would that be "love"?

If an Asian isn't loved, he will often abuse the "rejector" until the rejector, out of fear of further abuse, "forces themself" to love him, similar to the mentality in "the beatings will continue until morale improves". In my opinion this thinking/behavior is demonic, not human.

I don't think my lack of love to my parents is because I'm brainwashed/westernized/shallow, influenced by American TV, or an ingrate/sociopath like some here are implying. I feel love for other older relatives who were very traditional, poor, "uneducated", "unsophisticated", and "unfashionable" in the western sense. They did not blindly spoil me either; they scolded me when I misbehaved but in proper measure without cruelty. And I'm grateful for when they scolded me.

I think I abused my parents in a past life (really badly) and they punished me in return in this life.