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Joined: Jul 2010
Posts: 948
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And IMHO saying "my kid is remarkably beautiful" is not at all the same as saying "your kid is ugly," or even "ugly by comparison to mine." If you are a mother of an "ugly" baby, you aren't going to want to hear any of those statements and you certainly won't thank the other mother for saying the first one instead of the second or third one. The first statement implies the other--it's just a more polite way of being insensitive or even cruel if that's your thing. I'm sure someone is going to respond by saying, "there's absolutely nothing wrong with being sleepy / lazy / glazed / slow / ADHD / blank / sedated / wrong / zombies / handbags / lumps / drugged / babyish / OMG I'm not even halfway through the thread." There's absolutely nothing wrong with being ugly, either. That still doesn't make it polite to point out. Absolutely agree ... in a different context. Good thing this is a gifted forum! If I was the mother of an unattractive child and I went on a forum for remarkably beautiful children. What right do I have to complain when they talk about first noticing that their child was different and how, in specific, they were different? If this talk makes me uncomfortable, maybe I shouldn't be frequenting this forum? If hearing about how everyone commented on their infant's amazing beauty or perfect features offends me, why am I reading it? If hearing about how other children just didn't have that same perfect symmetry offends me, why am I reading it? And why shouldn't those parents have a forum to find others like them. More power to them! Why are we acting like it's not OK to notice that gifted children are different, or to talk about it with other gifted parents? So silly. NO one is acting like it isn't OK--there a million posts doing just that, it is the purpose of this forum. Every parent here is one extra chromosome (although I suppose that brings up a 'whole nother issue better not getting into here), one head injury, one car accident away from finding out what it is like to have a kid on the other end of the curve. And there are already other parents here who live it daily. Just because I happen to have a kid with special needs doesn't mean I don't need a place to discuss his two gifted sisters.
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Joined: Jan 2012
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Why are we acting like it's not OK to notice that gifted children are different, or to talk about it with other gifted parents?
So silly. Noticing gifted children are different doesn't require insulting others. Perhaps there are parents on this forum who have a gifted child and a non-gifted child? Perhaps there are parents on this forum who have gifted children who had a 'glazed' look as an infant. Even parents of gifted children may find the comments insulting and tactless.
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Worse is the fact that at least a couple people don't really seem to get (or care) that what they said is crass and belittling. Why would a person feel a need to belittle another? This is not something I get. As I said, people can (disingenuously IMO) claim that they're just being "honest" or engaging in free speech, but I think that other people may see through that. And I'm thinking that this attitude probably comes across in a general way if it's expressed so bluntly here.
So, yeah, a right to free speech includes a right to belittle other people's kids because they aren't as stupefyingly, electron-splittingly jelly-doughnut brilliant as your own little megabrained toddler and his IQ of ten to the power of six. We are all so small in comparison, I just hope my kids don't go blind from the sheer reflected magnificence of it all. We're just trying to muddle through as best we can, you know?
I guess I'm just voting that you want to belittle others, I'd prefer you do it somewhere else. PM each other. Call each other. Talk at the water cooler. Be as vicious as you please in private. Just don't give people like the woman who wrote that sick-of-hearing-about-your-gifted-kid-blog a valid reason to complain about parents of gifted kids. Please? Your argument would come across better if you set aside all your negative assumptions about others. You are so concerned with how "vicious" everyone else is that you are blind to your own viciousness or belittling. I'm interested in your thoughts, otherwise I wouldn't have commented. I liked that you brought up a different perspective. I wouldn't be arguing so strongly if I didn't think I had something to learn from you. Personally, I wouldn't be offended if someone remarked that their child was remarkably beautiful. It's OK that DS isn't remarkable beautiful. It's OK that other parents have something to rally around. I'm happy for them. I don't find it offensive when other parents talk about the areas my DS is weak in. I don't find it offensive at all. Why would I? I'm not insecure. Would they be displaying a lack of tact, sure. But that doesn't make someone mean or vicious. You can't see someone's heart by guessing at their intentions. Why so defensive? Why so attacking? It's a friendly discussion, no?
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Joined: Jun 2010
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And IMHO saying "my kid is remarkably beautiful" is not at all the same as saying "your kid is ugly," or even "ugly by comparison to mine." If you are a mother of an "ugly" baby, you aren't going to want to hear any of those statements and you certainly won't thank the other mother for saying the first one instead of the second or third one. The first statement implies the other--it's just a more polite way of being insensitive or even cruel if that's your thing. I disagree. The first is an (accurate or otherwise) judgement of Kid A, and the second is an (accurate or otherwise) judgement of Kid B. If I say that Kid A is remarkably beautiful, that tells you nothing about Kid B (and something about the speaker). If I tell you Kid B is ugly, that tells me something about Kid B (and something about the speaker). Every parent is kind of expected to think their own kid is beautiful. That doesn't really mean that every parent is expected to think that everyone else's kid is ugly.
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Joined: Jan 2011
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And IMHO saying "my kid is remarkably beautiful" is not at all the same as saying "your kid is ugly," or even "ugly by comparison to mine." If you are a mother of an "ugly" baby, you aren't going to want to hear any of those statements and you certainly won't thank the other mother for saying the first one instead of the second or third one. The first statement implies the other--it's just a more polite way of being insensitive or even cruel if that's your thing. I disagree. The first is an (accurate or otherwise) judgement of Kid A, and the second is an (accurate or otherwise) judgement of Kid B. If I say that Kid A is remarkably beautiful, that tells you nothing about Kid B (and something about the speaker). If I tell you Kid B is ugly, that tells me something about Kid B (and something about the speaker). Every parent is kind of expected to think their own kid is beautiful. That doesn't really mean that every parent is expected to think that everyone else's kid is ugly. AlexsMom, I quite agree with you and I'm glad you posted. The Mother in question may still find the first statement offensive. She may be sensitive to her child's looks and find the speaker cruel. This illustrates my point perfectly. When statements are easy to misinterpret ("other babies looked glazed"), it is our own insecurities and projections that determine our interpretation of them.
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One thing that's always attracted me to this forum is that the quality of conversation here tends to be pretty high. Different people have different perspectives, and interesting articles or ideas get posted all the time. I really like that.
This thread has shown a lot of disrespect and a lot of nastiness. A couple of members have tried to justify their posts by writing that "I'm just making an observation," but this seems rather disingenuous and an excuse. As others have observed, there's big difference between saying,
My baby was really alert when he was a week old. Did anyone else notice that? and Other kids look like they've been dosed with sedatives compared to mine.
These two sentences could easily be interpreted as meaning:
My baby was really alert when he was a week old. Did anyone else notice that?
and
Other kids are so brain dead compared to my uberchild.
Emm. I kind of got the impression that this was what Iucounu was trying to communicate.
This thread has been disheartening for me not just because people here actually wrote that other children are zombies/dazed/glazed/drugged compared to their little geniuses. Worse is the fact that at least a couple people don't really seem to get (or care) that what they said is crass and belittling. Why would a person feel a need to belittle another? This is not something I get. As I said, people can (disingenuously IMO) claim that they're just being "honest" or engaging in free speech, but I think that other people may see through that. And I'm thinking that this attitude probably comes across in a general way if it's expressed so bluntly here.
So, yeah, a right to free speech includes a right to belittle other people's kids because they aren't as stupefyingly, electron-splittingly jelly-doughnut brilliant as your own little megabrained toddler and his IQ of ten to the power of six. We are all so small in comparison, I just hope my kids don't go blind from the sheer reflected magnificence of it all. We're just trying to muddle through as best we can, you know?
I guess I'm just voting that you want to belittle others, I'd prefer you do it somewhere else. PM each other. Call each other. Talk at the water cooler. Be as vicious as you please in private. Just don't give people like the woman who wrote that sick-of-hearing-about-your-gifted-kid-blog a valid reason to complain about parents of gifted kids. Please? Yup esp. on the last sentence.
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Worse is the fact that at least a couple people don't really seem to get (or care) that what they said is crass and belittling. Why would a person feel a need to belittle another? This is not something I get. As I said, people can (disingenuously IMO) claim that they're just being "honest" or engaging in free speech, but I think that other people may see through that. And I'm thinking that this attitude probably comes across in a general way if it's expressed so bluntly here.
So, yeah, a right to free speech includes a right to belittle other people's kids because they aren't as stupefyingly, electron-splittingly jelly-doughnut brilliant as your own little megabrained toddler and his IQ of ten to the power of six. We are all so small in comparison, I just hope my kids don't go blind from the sheer reflected magnificence of it all. We're just trying to muddle through as best we can, you know?
I guess I'm just voting that you want to belittle others, I'd prefer you do it somewhere else. PM each other. Call each other. Talk at the water cooler. Be as vicious as you please in private. Just don't give people like the woman who wrote that sick-of-hearing-about-your-gifted-kid-blog a valid reason to complain about parents of gifted kids. Please? Your argument would come across better if you set aside all your negative assumptions about others. You are so concerned with how "vicious" everyone else is that you are blind to your own viciousness or belittling. I'm interested in your thoughts, otherwise I wouldn't have commented. I liked that you brought up a different perspective. I wouldn't be arguing so strongly if I didn't think I had something to learn from you. Personally, I wouldn't be offended if someone remarked that their child was remarkably beautiful. It's OK that DS isn't remarkable beautiful. It's OK that other parents have something to rally around. I'm happy for them. I don't find it offensive when other parents talk about the areas my DS is weak in. I don't find it offensive at all. Why would I? I'm not insecure. Would they be displaying a lack of tact, sure. But that doesn't make someone mean or vicious. You can't see someone's heart by guessing at their intentions. Why so defensive? Why so attacking? It's a friendly discussion, no? I'm just saying we're using syfy channel & nickelodian words- zombie, drugged, glazed donut. (I lol'd again.). I'm learning grown up words for a lot of things. Wait a minute and let me think., I'll come up with the grown up mommy way to describe what you're talking about. I'm trying to understand what you're saying, I'm usually very good at that, but I'm trying to use my new grown up mommy brain, so give me a minute. My quick gifted ageless gifted brain was so much more efficient. Meanwhile, props to Alexmom's great anology of parenting mixed-race kids to illustrate the difference between "gifted babies are alert" and "other kids are sluggish".
Youth lives by personality, age lives by calculation. -- Aristotle on a calendar
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Joined: Jul 2011
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Hmm...
I agree with the poster who pointed out that saying "Gifted babies are more alert" is the same as saying "Normally developing children are less alert."
You can't be "more alert" without someone being "less alert".
It is kind of like the debates I've been a part of where people agree that... "Breastfeeding may lower the risk of certain diseases."
But they get very angry when you say "The absence of breastfeeding (and in the case of all the studies, that means the presence formula feeding) may increase the risk of certain diseases."
They don't want to hear or agree with the fact that, stated another way, breastfeeding is technically the normal way mammals feed their young and that anything deviating from that could, potentially, result in a higher risk for certain things (in this case, diseases or infections because the child doesn't get the benefit of mom's antibodies.)
They get upset about making formula feeding moms feel bad when that has nothing to do with it.
I strongly dislike arguments that revolve around how to say things "politely" or in a politically correct way. It really irks me.
But if we are going that way... I suppose zombie or "glazed look" might be a little strong, but sleepy isn't.
And it would make me pretty mad if someone called my baby ugly... but when my daughter was small I had several people (once, women I didn't even know taking a walk by our home), tell me that my baby was pretty and that they were "sorry", but some babies are kind of ugly. It's like they wanted to confess that to me because they thought my baby didn't fit the profile and I would be flattered or agree with them.
I've heard lots of normal, usually nice people confess that they think some babies are "ugly". It isn't very nice and you should not tell someone that you think that about their baby. But in the right context, praising one baby for being beautiful and not the other is technically calling the other less good looking, if not actually ugly. People just don't normally admit it out loud!
Saying a bright child has a bright, alert look about them is also comparing that child to the children around him and it very obviously suggests that the children around him don't look so bright.
Last edited by islandofapples; 02/18/12 02:44 PM.
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Joined: Jul 2011
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When statements are easy to misinterpret ("other babies looked glazed"), it is our own insecurities and projections that determine our interpretation of them. Technically, it's the reader's level of offensensitivity. See the Bloom County comic strip in the first comment of the following link: http://worldofsuck.net/index.php/offending-the-easily-offended?blog=10
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Joined: Aug 2010
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Here is a thought to consider: if one is to protest vociferously the right to make unfiltered comments that others may find offensive, it must also be just as valid for others to freely state that the comment was offensive.
Our choice of words, especially in a forum where context is difficult to interpret, ought not be filtered by what may get us banned or a thread shut down but by respect for the community as a whole.
This is a gifted forum where parents ought to be able to brag and rejoice in the successes and unique capabilities of their children. But in my humble opinion, that freedom ought to come with the obligation to be sensitive in our word choice to make every effort possible to not mock or degrade others in the process.
That has been my concern with this thread.
(and I did totally misinterpret loconou's comments; for that I am sorry)
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