Car News

Speak out with your geek out!

(Cut and pasted from The Escapist Blog - www.theescapist.com/blog )

If you are a geek of any degree, you've probably heard the story about
the journalist who dated a Magic: the Gathering champion by now. But
if not, here's the nutshell version - an internet journalist went on
a date with someone she met through a dating site, found out that he
was a Magic: The Gathering champion, and felt the sudden need to take
a long, hot shower and blog about how gross and icky the whole
experience was. Geek rage ensued, and the whole thing turned out to
be quite profitable for the judgemental journalist, who was getting
paid for each click on her screed (in fact, that may have been the
purpose of the whole thing, which is why I will not link to it here).

In a similar vein, Joe Elliot of Def Leppard</a> recently referred to
his more angry and unappreciative fans as "idiots who sit in their
mother's basement eating Doritos and playing Dungeons and Dragons all
day," using a popular pasttime to paint the image of unsocialized,
unwashed loners holed up in dark basements, typing furiously on
keyboards about how disappointed they are that the band doesn't vary
their set list between shows. ( http://www.spinner.com/2011/08/23/def-leppard-interview/
)

These aren't the only examples. Every day, I find more in my inbox -
usually ESPN editorials accusing unpopular athletes of playing too
much D&D. While flipping through TV channels about a month ago, I
chanced upon two shows airing simultaneously - a reality program with
repo men trying to collect a vehicle from LARPers who refused to break
character, and a Disney Channel show in which a tween girl was
horrified to discover that the boy she liked played a popular fantasy
card game (no big surprise here - the Disney Channel actually has a
long history of this sort of thing).

Now realistically, this is minor compared to other, bigger injustices
that are going on in the world. We're not some kind of tragic victims
here. We'll live through this, certainly. But that doesn't mean that
we can't do something to correct it.

My friend Monica Valentinelli has started an event in response to this
type of hatred: Speak Out With Your Geek Out, in which geeks of all
types make their status known to all on blogs and social networks and
anywhere else they want to let their geek flag fly. Monica explains it
much better than I could:

"Sometime during the week of Monday, September 12th to Friday,
September 16th post about what geeky hobby you love. Then, tell us why
we should try it, too. Leave your fears (and edition wars) at the
door. Forget about your latest rant. Tap into that well of positive
energy and share in the excitement of all things geek."

Let us invite those who would stereotype us to sit at our table and
share our interests. Let us combat being used as pawns for internet
gaffes with the reasons why we're awesome, why we love what we love,
and why it's good to be a geek.

The Flames Rising blog ( http://www.flamesrising.com/speak-out-with-your-geek-out/
) has more on the event. If you are on Facebook, you can join the
event there - http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=190025581068159 -
and Twitter users are encouraged to use the #speakgeek hashtag in
their tweets.

(The idea is similar, but not identical, to another geek-related event
that will be coming up soon, one that was concocted on this very site
- http://www.theescapist.com/readrpgsinpublic - Read an RPG Book in
Public Week - and I encourage any and all participants in that event
to participate in this one - and vice versa!)

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