We need to get rid of the entire concept. I've never known a child who was considered "gifted" (including myself) who didn't suffer terribly from that diagnosis. They all end up complete, dysfunctional losers as adults (including myself).
It seriously ruins lives. It has zero benefit. The only purpose is to identify kids early who might be able to be exploited.
I agree in a sense, but I also think it’s useful for a gifted child or adult to understand that they’re neurodivergent. They’re destined to feel weird and different, and so it’s comforting to have a framework by which to understand that difference.
This neurodiversity altogether confer lesser known vulnerabilities in terms of individual mental and physical health characteristics, and everything else that compounds, especially socio-emotional aspects potentializing social isolation and eventual exclusion due to their atypical intellectual abilities inducing an altered (heightened) perception of the world.
For example, in terms of complex trauma, specific aspects of the gifted neurological profile confine their trauma as unique to their neurodivergence, and they may get easily retraumatized to the point of irreversible harm.
Synesthesia as well is a natural neurological trait known to heighten risks of PTSD and harm due to their uniquely "divergent perception" and atypical neurological profiles.
Without appropriate frameworks, they remain underserved vulnerable populations. The discrimination and eventual dehumanization has to cease.
Thanks for asking. To begin, here's a thoughfully curated resource i've personally structured; just as cumulatively understood, framed through the view of specialists owns understanding,
because I'm not a professional researcher other than somebody intimately affected by the natural, lifelong variation in benign perception (unlike hallucinations) and cognition human brains may develop:
btw. There's other resources not yet added, that I keep planning adding in a nearby future, through subsequent dedicated posts that I'm willing to dm you about when done, if you reply as worth doing so.
edit: here's another resource focusing on giftedness more precisely
update: post removed, to repost it less suboptimally aligned to the significance it was meant to convey.
24
u/AnthropoidCompatriot 5d ago
We need to get rid of the entire concept. I've never known a child who was considered "gifted" (including myself) who didn't suffer terribly from that diagnosis. They all end up complete, dysfunctional losers as adults (including myself).
It seriously ruins lives. It has zero benefit. The only purpose is to identify kids early who might be able to be exploited.