#giftedness

‘Stereotypical’ autism exists.

People who flap their hands exist.

People who can’t make any form of eye contact exist.

People with special interests in trains exist.

People with Savant-like mathematical abilities exist.

People who can’t mask exist.

The EU AI Act is often perceived primarily as a regulatory challenge, as another layer of compliance requirements, documentation obligations, and control mechanisms that organisations must integrate into their existing processes. This perspective, however, remains incomplete. The deeper significance of the EU AI Act lies not only in the requirements it imposes on AI systems, but in the structural…

On the one hand, I think the name "gifted" in itself is too hierarchical both for my liking and for the phenomenon it describes to be taken as anything more than "people trying to be special". Like, with a name like "gifted", yeah, I see where people draw that conclusion.

On the other hand, the phenomenon the term describes is very much real. It's part of mine and many other peoples' lived experiences - a heightened inquisitiveness and awareness of/preference for complexity. Gifted/multi-exceptional spaces are some of the only in which I feel like my true experiences and needs are reflected and affirmed. If it's all just "privileged nonsense" (which it isn't - many people who have these traits are often underprivileged in many ways and will have a very different, usually negative experience with these traits as opposed to people who have the same traits but are better-off, better-liked, and tick fewer minority boxes), then all my feelings and needs and those of thousands of other people are, what, nothing? That is an incredibly ignorant stance, and if you hold it, I hope my words can make you reconsider.