[downerending]

No one deserves to be bullied. And I'd be pretty okay with permanently removing bullies from the general population.

That said, in my experience, the gifted/nerdy/aspy kids got the lion's share of the bullying. I still carry it with me decades later, and at least one of my comrades in misery killed herself because of it.

[wwright]

Do you not feel that gifted/nerdy/aspy kids reciprocated?

It might just be that I’m a complete asshole, but I grew up in Mississippi feeling very isolated and estranged from everyone around me. I think I definitely felt like I was bullied when I was very young. But by high school and college, I was being outright toxic to people.

If I am generous to myself, a lot of that could be attributed to anxiety, depression, lack of examples of how to behave pro-socially in my life, being in Mississippi (which as far as I can tell might truly be the worst place in all of the US). But I was still as much of bully as a lot of other people, maybe more.

I don’t think that’s an isolated event.

[catalogia]

In my school, the 'gifted/nerdy' group had significant (but not complete) overlap with the 'socially/athletically outgoing' group, with the 'aspy' kids sprinkled around and generally respected by their peers. A lot of the dichotomies being described in this thread are therefore alien to me.

The bigger divide was between the 'gifted/nerdy/popular/athletic' group and the 'prone to violence, nihilistic body modification and hard drug use' group. Those kids weren't cool though. Drug use, poor grades, and criminal records all disqualified people from participating in sports, which negatively impacted their ability to socialize.

I think sports are a big equalizer. Through a shared enthusiasm for a sport, a stereotypical 'aspy nerd' and 'popular jock' can come to understand and respect each other. I don't think there is much else in the public school system quite as effective at tearing down these barriers as a healthy athletics program.

[nitrogen]

Sounds like a good school.

In my home town, sports were incredibly divisive, and football was the worst. Teachers were expected to go easy on football players. Football players got mostly ignored for shoplifting and other misbehavior. Football players even excluded other football players if they seemed too nerdy. Football players dumped a swimming pool full of sand on student body officers during a school assembly. Every student was forced to attend pep rallies to promote the football games.

Not every athlete was an athhole, but the general tenor was violent and rude to anyone not in their peer group.

[Kaiyou]

I never had any enthusiasm for sport, though and felt trying hard to win at a sport is stupid. Always tried to sit everything out. On the other hand, I also felt trying hard to achieve good results in other subjects isn't worth the effort, since the material was mostly useless with the exception of math. But there I never had to try hard, though, I probably would have, if it was more challenging and also interesting.

[chimi]

In toxic environments, the individual is forced to choose to be a target or be a bully. You chose to be a bully to survive. That is expected. If you'd chosen to be a target, you might be dead.

Unfortunately, it's very difficult to unlearn those bully behaviors that enabled you to survive. Had you instead been able to focus your attention on developing your gifts and confidence, you would be much better off right now and society too, I imagine.

[downerending]

I'm sure that happens, but it didn't in my cohort. If you whip a dog for a while, it'll fight. Whip it for long enough, though, and it will just lay down helpless. That's what I saw.

[seamyb88]

Do you have kids?

Suppose you have two. One's into javascript and dungeons and dragons. The other's not great academically. No good at football either, and they still behave in a slightly awkward way. But great person, all the same.

So, you condemn the latter child to the cesspit that is public life and protect the former? Or think up a better policy?

[chimi]

The gifted kids are bullied by their very nature, because they are different. They have abilities that create envy in others. That envy prompts bullying to neutralize their abundance.

Someone with abundance in a community of scarcity is a target for bullying. That bullying robs the individual and society of those gifts.

So, yes, we protect the gifted, precisely so their gifts survive to benefit all of society, including the bullies. That's the irony. The gifted want by their nature to share their gifts and do so -- even with the bullies and at their own expense.

The average individual is much less likely to be bullied and thus need less protection.

[seamyb88]

I went to a Grammar school and am finishing a PhD. Pretty damn nerdy. These gifted wonder kids you speak of... you reckon they aren't going to bully? I was selected at the age of 11 and told how magnificent I was. Growing up was still tough.

"It'll all be ok if we keep away from the riff-raff" doesn't do anything but say "we can only really afford to educate X amount of kids". This lot are brick layers.

Of course who am I talking to? I don't know. Might be somebody who thinks gifted means Daddy has a yacht.

[chimi]

I had a single mom with a government job. Being discovered as gifted saved my life. I am still bullied to this very day. Most recently I was fired by bullies for refusing to write illegal software and now the company could be in serious legal trouble.

Gifted people don't escape bullying by growing up and it has immeasurably costly ramifications for society at large.

[marcusverus]

Allowing kid A the opportunity to move at an accelerated pace with other high achieving kids does not affect the opportunity afforded to kid B. Education is not a zero-sum game.

[ls612]

But social status is a zero sum game and that’s the dirty little secret of the people opposed to tracking. They can’t seem to improve their own kids’ lot so they hurt other kids’ opportunities instead.