What do you think of geeks and are you one?

Catégorie : Pop culture

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20 avis

22/2/2012 Nick "Closet Foodie" P. dit :

Being a geek in todays society is a very hip trend. Shows like Big Bang Theory, Comic Book Men(pawn stars for geeks) and Walking Dead are dominating the tube. Superhero movies are breaking records and everyone seems to think they are Batman historians after watching two crappy bat movies. I am a true geek, I love comics,toys,video games,manga, sci-fi and books. While I appreciate societies new found love with geekdom, it's very frustrating to see Hollywood try and change what being a geek means.
So my questions are:
What do you think of geeks and todays culture?
Are you a true geek?

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22/2/2012 de Yelp pour iPhone Vincent "The Entertainer" P. dit :
I think there are so many different kinds of geek/nerds it is hard to quantify. I am a computer geek and I like to think I am a true geek, but others may not think so. Plus, there's some antisocial aspects of geekery that most shows seem to gloss over. Be your own individual just like everyone else!
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22/2/2012 Karl "Cream Pony" R. dit :
I did not notice Greeks are the hip trend in TV shows. Don't get me wrong, I like Greek food as much as the next guy and I sympathize with some points in Closing of the American Mind. The Greek classics are classic. But... oh wait. That's GEEKS. Sorry.

Yes, I'm a geek, an old geek, and I was born too early. I used to go to role playing conventions back in the 1980s. There were no women there. There were 14 year old boys like me and retired Navy guys. I look at rpg/comic cons today and it seems wall to wall babes. Sigh.

We're an information based economy. The warrior is less important to our survival. You make money using your brain. Geeks are all grey matter. Geeks make serious coin. I used to work with this guy who sold his dot com for several million. He went from being a ramen noodle survivalist to owning two porches and a beautiful house. At the age of 28. The women he was totally hung up on and wouldn't give him the time of day suddenly started warming up to him once she noticed he had, presumably, his and hers porches and no her to drive the hers. He was rather conflicted about her sudden attention. "Does she just like me for my money?" Ummm. Mebbe. Not to make it seem like some women are money grubbers. Of course. He now has the trappings and attitude of confidence. Nearly any woman will tell you, confidence (without crossing into arrogance) is sexy.

All is not lost for the alpha male sex barbarian (I'm looking at you, Tony). There seems to be some evidence that when women are ovulating, they find your basic male sex barbarian much more attractive. After ovulation, the good provider/nurturing father swings back into fashion.
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22/2/2012 Chris "Burrito Whisperer™" P. dit :
@Karl: I love how you are always able to spin any topic of conversation over to trying to get women and/or sex.
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22/2/2012 Lynn "City of Sin" C. dit :
Similar to what Vince P. said, i think being a geek has to do with being extremely passionate about something or specific things and not so good at social relations. I mean no one wants to date a Sheldon. We all love him cuz he's funny and intelligent, but irl ppl wouldnt really put up with him. In fact, the only datable guy on the show is Leonard because he's generally pretty good with knowing what to say to people in general. The show makes him mess up around girls mostly but overall he's very sociable and less of a "geek" than everyone else. So for me, its not about whether or not I like geeks per se but it's more about whether or not you mesh socially. You dont need to be a social butterfly for me to like you, as long as we mesh in some ways and share interests.
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22/2/2012 Martin S. dit :
True geeks wouldn't be on a social site like this, and are off in their own world oblivious to most everything.
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22/2/2012 Lauren "Lo-BAL" M. dit :
@Karl - are you saying there are no alpha male sex barbarians who also have lots of money? I beg to differ :)

@Chris - I was thinking the exact same thing before I read your comment :)
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22/2/2012 Karl "Cream Pony" R. dit :
Why do we even get out of bed, Chris, if not to land a lady? There's a whole theory that great physicists and mathematicians really knock out their best work when single and young. They're trying to be the alpha male in their own domain and impress the ladies. Their ability to create break throughs noticeably declines after marriage.

Lauren, true, there are.
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22/2/2012 Chris "Burrito Whisperer™" P. dit :
@Karl: So what you're saying is that once a guy settles down with a woman she kills all of his creativity and ambition?
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22/2/2012 Martin S. dit :
Most people do better in relationships, including the brains, due to less anxiety and stress, distraction, etc.
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22/2/2012 Mauricio A. dit :
@Chris As a side note, I would like to say that having read a good deal of history, when it comes to the greatest, but I mean the greatest echelon and most dramatic influences in history, where mostly asexual, complete human whores, or had really, really crappy marriages. :P
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22/2/2012 Martin S. dit :
Einstein married at age 23 and had a couple kids sounding fairly normal considering people's lives in those days. I like this line about his love life: 'Over the next few years, Einstein and Mari's friendship developed into romance, and they read books together on extra-curricular physics in which Einstein was taking an increasing interest.' http://en.wikipedia.or...
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22/2/2012 Tony "tells the truth, even when I lie" F. dit :
Umm.. Roar?
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22/2/2012 Jane M. dit :
@Martin Do you honestly believe that a 'true' geek wouldn't be on a site like Yelp? Why is this? Because it's not geeky enough to interest them? Because the social aspect of it would bore them? (I only suggest this because you specified that geeks would not be on a 'social site like this.') Curious to hear your answer...
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22/2/2012 Phillip Jessie "PJ" j. dit :
I Don't understand these social distinctions
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22/2/2012 Martin S. dit :
The geeky people I've made friends with weren't socially adept, or interested in gaining acceptance by others. Growing up these were the guys with bad hygiene and not interested in girls, clothes, being seen as cool, etc. People like that have always fascinated me and made me ask questions, like why? Of course not all of them are like that but have certain facets that are easy to spot. A friend of mine over the last few years is a brainiac with over 160 iq and is into engineering/inventing stuff and I think that is so cool (he does chase girls tho :)
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22/2/2012 Chris "Burrito Whisperer™" P. dit :
@Martin: I think maybe you're confusing "geek" with "nerd". http://www.geeksaresex...
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22/2/2012 Elaine "Danger Zone" K. dit :
The mass media has discovered that young and grown people will pay a lot for geeky things and they may have figured out that we'd rather see stories of people that we can relate with or look down on a little bit. Who among us doesn't feel socially awkward at times, or desperate or obsessive? And who the hell wants to watch people who think they're better than us?

I was a pretty run-of-the-mill geek in high school... very few friends, withdrawn personality had an obsessive enjoyment of specific things (did you know the X-Files had trading cards?) and spent all my time doing stuff that wasn't all that cool, like building websites or reading lots and lots of books. Things have changed since and I would find it disingenuous to consider myself a true geek, since I'm not really that awkward anymore and don't have the cash to feed my graphic novel habit.

I have a love-hate relationship with mass culture's embracing of geek culture. On one hand, the new Batman movies are amazing and graphic novels can be found in any bookstore. On the other hand, now I have to listen to people try to one up each other about being geeky.
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22/2/2012 Lynn "City of Sin" C. dit :
IMO, it is totally possible to be a Yelp geek, know everything about the site, spend all your time on it, etc.
In fact, my friends consider me somewhat of a yelp geek, since I regularly review, participate in forums, has a badge, go to events, and know a bit more about the system then my friends who just use it to look up restaurants.

And none of them think it's cool that I'm active on Yelp...lol...we don't even talk about it other then, hey guess what, i looked up a restaurant and you had the first review on top. I actually get embarrassed.
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22/2/2012 Martin S. dit :
Chris you are right! I was thinking of 'Revenge of the Nerds' maybe? http://www.imdb.com/ti...
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23/2/2012 Sara K. "Shoeslut™" P. dit :
I think everyone has geek tendancies within them, regardless of how they look,act etc. Prime example my hubby looks like your typical alpha male played high school football jock, partying DJ type, but his hobbies include collecting rare Phillip K Dick novels and is a huge fan of "speculative fiction". Even myself I may look like a fashion snob, but I love HR Giger, Leiji Matsumoto (illustrator Star Blazers, and Junko Mizuno ( Japanese graphic novelist). I think with the advent of the internet the geek culture has just enabled people on a larger scale to share their love of geekery, so it doesn't make sense to get upset about it, we should happily embrace it!May the geek force be with all of us!
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23/2/2012 Nick "Closet Foodie" P. dit :
Lots of interesting views. Thanks for taking the time to answer my questions. Very friendly community here:)
@Martin, Sheldon has over 400 friends on his Myspace page and that's a social network. I think social networks interest geeks more than the average person because you can voice your opinion without having to actually meet anyone in person.

@Vincent, Yes are correct on both points. One of the reasons why I dislike how Hollywood portrays geeks.

@Karl, I don't think ALL men are only interested in grabbing girls. It may be the geek in me but I've never been one to succumb to my sexual urges. I don't believe studies that say men think about sex every 8 seconds either. I can say I honestly don't, most men I ask also say they don't think about sex every 8 seconds. Now that I am a father/husband I have tons of things to think about every day but even before my family, I was always thinking about others things during the course of my day. There's more to life than sex or getting girls. Men that say otherwise haven't matured yet, in my opinion of course.

@Sara K, don't let Mayweather see what you wrote, he'll cry,lol. Happily embracing Hollywood destroying everything we grew up with doesn't make sense to me. From movies, to comics and to how geeks act in society,they are trying to change geekery to fit societies mold. That's something geeks have always fought against. Most geeks don't conform to socities standards, if you think they do then that just shows how Hollywood has changed your perception of geeks. 20 years ago you wouldn't have wrote the same thing. Geeks were outcast, unwanted, sometimes unwashed(jk), cast aside for being passionate about the arts/science.
Now everyone wants to be a geek? Wannabe's are never cool. Like Vincent said be yourself, don't pretend to be someone else. Fake people are terrible.

@Lynn, I don't think being passionate about something makes you a geek. If someone was passionate about shoes, would that fit into the geek definition? There's tons of definitions here:
http://en.wikipedia.or...
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23/2/2012 Sara K. "Shoeslut™" P. dit :
"There's more to life than sex or getting girls. Men that say otherwise haven't matured yet, in my opinion of course" If that's your opinion maybe its not a great idea to have "women" as one of the things you love in your profile?
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23/2/2012 Karl "Cream Pony" R. dit :
"I don't think ALL men are only interested in grabbing girls."

Cool. Because I didn't say that.
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23/2/2012 Karl "Cream Pony" R. dit :
What I find most fascinating about Einstein is most people know he won a nobel prize but few know what he did with the money. Most people assume he used it for research or gave it to poor children or something. Truth is he knew he was going to win the prize pretty soon (confidence!) and wanted to dump his wife and take up with his lover. So he cut a deal with his wife. She'd get the prize money, grant him a divorce, and then he could take up with his mistress.

Einstein swung.
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23/2/2012 de Yelp pour iPhone Martin S. dit :
Haha. And the lover was his cousin. A trashy guy at heart.
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23/2/2012 Nick "Closet Foodie" P. dit :
Loving women and being obsessed with getting one are two different things. I put that in my tags only because I've seen others use it on here. They love boys, girls, guys etc.... You are right though because if you are confused by it then others might be as well.
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23/2/2012 de Yelp pour iPhone Eliah "on the run from Thinkpol" H. dit :
Ah yes I remember the 80's war between Nerds and Jocks...
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23/2/2012 Lynn "City of Sin" C. dit :
@ Nick: from your link, this is the def'n i was referring to "A person with a devotion to something in a way that places him or her outside the mainstream. This could be due to the intensity, depth, or subject of their interest."
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23/2/2012 de Yelp pour iPhone Martin S. dit :
Geeks/Nerds out there might want to check out this new movie.http://psychcentral.com/ blog/archives/2011/12/18/revie w-of-jung-vs-freud-in-a-danger ous-method/
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23/2/2012 Edwin "the secret ingredient" A. dit :
How do you define a geek.

Your definition may be entirely different from another.
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23/2/2012 Chris "Burrito Whisperer™" P. dit :
@Edwin: Check out the link I posted above. I think the definition is pretty good.
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24/2/2012 Edwin "the secret ingredient" A. dit :
Cool. lol that's a pretty good study of the difference between a Geek vs Nerd

I see it this way for the most part.
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24/2/2012 Eric "it's not hipster, you're just boring." M. dit :
@Chris - that info graphic makes no sense. Chunky bass? Will Farrel movie references? Owning a Mac? Malbec? All of those "geek" traits are main stream tastes. That graphic is basically saying that everyone with a smart phone or glasses is a geek that's actually a hipster but would rather be called a geek. The dude that put that together deserves a punch in the neck.

My apologies but I've managed to take this thread really personally which is stupid but I can't help it. Martin seems to be about the only person that hit it on the head. Geeks are outcasts. That's the plain and simple definition. People look down on them for a number of reasons and it doesn't have to have anything to do with whether or not they like comics or video games or anything for that matter. Geeks have always been people that were outside the mainstream in an uncool way. While some groups of people define themselves by being different and are looked up to as being trend setters geeks were always the ones that just wanted to be invited to parties or actually get picked for a team.

I was a geek as a kid and it was honestly the most horrible thing you can imagine. I was not awkward or dressed oddly nor did I have hygiene issues but I did move to a new school in a new city half way through grade school. I played baseball instead of hockey and I'm dyslexic and that's all it took for me to be a geek in their eyes. Playing the wrong sport and seeing letters backwards obviously makes me the devil. I had no friends till high school. There were two other kids in my class that were called geeks as well and there was nothing wrong with them either. Sure, one of them had an annoying habit of making explosion and fart noises all the time but otherwise he was just a normal kid. Imagine that for a second, having literally no friends and people going out of their way to be horrible to you (I'm talking spitting on you, putting gum in your hair or trying to set you on fire) and make you feel like you have no right to exist. Now ask yourself if you were actually a geek.

I get mad when people say things like, "I'm such a geek." because you have a smart phone and play angry birds or you watched the Matrix. You aren't a geek and you never were and what you're really doing is making fun of people that it actually happened to.

You may have been a nerd though. Lousy nerds with their book smarts and cool bow ties.