I've watched a good writer friend get crucified for what started as an innocent post making an observation about her own biases. It was republished to Huffington Post, and the comments came so fast and furious at first, you could literally watch them grow in real time. She was devastated at first by those who misunderstood her motives and those who judged her and said horrid, nasty things about her. Essays for major pubs are usually in this breezy, pithy tone that gives them a certain worldly tone but often leads to an interpretation of callousness and shallowness that may or may not be true.
So, I really do feel for this parent who wrote honestly about her own issues and how they affected her child. And I guess my only question is why she finally felt like she was a bad mom. She never explains that. I wish she would have explained what she learned so the reader could carry away something more valuable than just being horrified for the kid's loss of privacy and the mom's depicted dysfunction.
I write about my kids, but it is always with their prior screening and approval. If they nix a post, it doesn't publish. Ever.
As to the perceptions themselves, I've had counselors accuse me of the same thing - of wanting my kid in gifted for the validation and ego. And I had one counselor who was just as horrified when I told her I wouldn't wish Giftedness someone's kid, because it came with a boatload of problems that most people never understood. Gifted signifies elite, special, better than, and I think that is where all of it goes wrong. Because then the opposite starts to happen - when one isn't "gifted", the tendency can be to tear down the value of that person with comments like, "they may be smart, but they can't even figure out how to...". It sets up a destructive us-versus-them dialogue that harms all sides.
Then again, this parent has already written one book addressing a controversial issue, so maybe this post was more about trolling for reaction for the sake of publicity. If so, it will likely be a successful marketing ploy.
