So there was this video that popped up earlier in the week called “I am a Geek!” starring a bunch of internet “celebrities” (mostly twitter and web 2.0 celebrities) declaring that they’re geeks. Their definition of geek being that they use technology but don’t specifically live in their parents basements or play D&D. Since then a bunch of people have come out against it, including Wil Wheaton (who was actually in the video) and Z. from Hipster Please. Here’s another post about what’s going on.
My initial take on this is one of annoyance; now that being a geek is ‘cool’, the label which we, the oddballs, have defined ourselves by has been appropriated by the mainstream. As Wil Wheaton said:
we know what at least some of those things are, and Cool Kids have teased us for it our whole lives. It feels to me like those same people are now trying to take our culture away from us and make a quick buck off of exploiting it, and us.
What Wil said there about our culture originating from a place where we were outsiders is repeated by Z:
This enduring “geek chic” that the mainstream media has become so fixated upon is key to spreading our message of hope, but it can also prove a destructive element if we lose site of the fact that we are all but defined by some of our most unsavory experiences and inclinations. Whether geek or nerd, we each spent a lengthy season being abused, neglected, isolated. We know what it’s like to be bullied and to be made to feel insignificant. We know what it’s like to be outsiders. But while this pain is certainly not ours alone, it is also a defining force that we must not lose sight of.
This is, to me, what is is to be a geek. Being part of a group of people who’ve passed through rough experiences because of their interests, their attitudes and even their appearances. I’ll be the first to admit that we might have issues with people who’ve never experienced that kind of thing and claim they’re a geek because they use twitter and have a blog.
Yet on the flip side, these things becoming mainstream takes the heat off. We might have a new generation of geeks; who program, or play D&D, or magic, or maybe just love science; and are able to go through high school being respected rather than mocked. However, is that what’s happening lately? I don’t think it is, Science continues to be dismissed and misunderstood by the media and mainstream culture – someone who works as a physicist is still not as ‘cool’ as a football player or actor, yet the actor is a ‘geek’ who uses twitter.
I’ll keep my Nerdcore; my DVDs of genre shows; my slashdot account; my RSS reader filled with geoblogs; my shelves stacked with sci-fi, fantasy, RPG and science textbooks; hell, I’ll keep my glasses. You can even keep sneering at those of us who play D&D. I’ll be happy regardless, because I’m part of a culture where diversity, intelligence and being different is a good thing. I fit in with them because I don’t fit in – and I like it that way. Join in if you like, but don’t claim to be one of us, and dismiss those of us who’re into the weirder bits of our culture at the same time (except for LARPers, even we mock them ;)).