On Geeks and Prides

[digitaldiscipline]

Let us put an end to Geek Pride

Fair and good, but let us not put an end to focused passion, pride in achievement, joy in shared interests, and the drive to do new and interesting things. Bland automatons are no good thing (and that includes unthinking allegiance to geekdom, or fandom, or brand-dom).

The geeks may or may not inherit the earth (or, as postulated by Doctorow, be the only ones to survive a plague outbreak).

Comments

[mimerki.livejournal.com]

I think there's a vast difference between being happy and proud of one's interests and being an asshat about that. I enjoy comic books. Get me started on them and I can, in fact, overstep into the area in which it's clear that I take this shit too seriously. Except that I don't. I totally enjoy the various comic book movies (usually) for what they are. I don't need to pull out the originals and explain how it's wrong. I will sometimes point out ways I think it could have been better, but that's not always by hewing closer to the original material. I also think they could be better by hiring better writers and such...

All of which is to say: Liking things is good. Being an asshat is bad. If you were an oppressed nerd in high school, you should know that being an asshat is bad. Go back to liking things.

(Also, I totally dig the Felicia Day geek-chic song. It does speak to my experience, and it's fun and boppy.)

[y2kdragon.livejournal.com]

This, one million times this. Oppressed geeks can easily turn into that which we despised in high school.

[sloot.livejournal.com]

radical extremism is always a problem.

[cheez-ball.livejournal.com]

There are snobbish assholes in every group of people, including those who self-identify as geeks. This essay is no better than what it's criticizing and just self-identifies the writer as a self-entitled asshat.

And those people who know every last detail about baseball; they're often referred to as baseball geeks.