The likelihood that you are *actually* a nerd is pretty fucking slim.
I’ve been marinating on this for the last few weeks, but something this past weekend really kind of got under my skin and now I feel compelled to say something about it.
A few months ago, this girl who is the daughter of some family friends made a post on Facebook about how she was excited that a book she enjoyed as a child, Mr. Popper’s Penguins, was being made into a movie. She followed this statement up with an (incorrect) observation that “I’m a total nerd, I know.”
Girl, no. No you are not. You are fucking literate. You are EMBARRASSED of your literacy and are passing it off as nerdiness because to you, the idea of enjoying books is kind of weird because none of your friends read anything that isn’t posted on TMZ.
I don’t know when it was decided that anything nostalgic or vaguely intelligent was “nerdy.” If you go to Urban Outfitters and you buy a ratty “My Little Pony” t-shirt for $35 because you had a hundred of those figurines as a kid, you’re not a nerd - you’re nostalgic. Wearing glasses with vintage or oversized frames doesn’t make you a nerd. Liking science doesn’t make you a nerd.
I grew up with a father that liked computers. I knew how to program things in DOS by the time I was 8. I grew up playing first-person shooters. My first job was being a wench at Medieval Times and my coworkers and I would go to the Bristol Renaissance Faire in full-on garb with swords and everything. I was in charge of all lights and sound for all high school staged events - the plays, the musicals, anything that involved the use of the stage. I did mild tech support for MS Word for a stretch of time and maintained an entire community of friends that I only knew online.
Would you call that a nerd? I would.
My best friend Jen is in grad school right now to learn how to design/program videogames and is currently a software developer at a major corporation/bank/soul-sucker. Prior to going into development, she was planning to be an actuarial scientist. And like me, she went to renaissance faires, but she made her OWN damn historically accurate garb. Currently, she spends all her free time designing iPhone apps and hanging out in comic book stores when she’s not actively coding her face off and/or longing for her old Magic The Gathering deck.
Nerdy? Yeah kinda.
Adopting the word “nerd” to talk about how you like your computer is misleading. Spending too much time on facebook doesn’t make you a nerd, it makes you someone who spends too much time on facebook.
I met a girl this past weekend who described herself as “OMG THE MOST EPIC NERD” - when she was anything and everything but. She chose “nerdy” as a self-descriptor to appeal to boys because she read something that said that “nerds are going to be hot.”
And good on her for taking an idea like that and turning it into a personal brand/business. And double good on her for having the sheer force of will to take her life and make it kind of awesome (and corporate-sponsored in every way). But sitting at a bar, updating twitter about how no boys will come and talk to you and then tagging it with “#nerdsunite” seems kind of hollow and also stupid.
“Nerds Unite” is a rallying cry. Whining about a lack of attention is anything but.
I realize this whole rant has been terribly disjointed, but the simple fact of the matter is that liking something doesn’t make you a nerd. And gunning for attention by appealing to those people who falsely categorize themselves as nerds doesn’t make you a nerd, either.
Why are people so quick to lump themselves into a single descriptive category? Why do they have to be nerds? Will that make a less popular interest somehow seem less personally embarrassing? I have no real ending for this whole pile of words - it just struck me as terribly odd that SO MANY PEOPLE who are maybe a little bit socially awkward or introverted or really like things that used to be popular and now aren’t or whatever are just saying “nerd” as a way to sort of make it “okay.”
Guys. It’s okay without you calling it nerdy. It will always be okay to get excited about a book or a thing you’re passionate about or something that reminds you of your childhood or piques your interest or whatever. Like what you like. Say weird things because that’s what kind of words your brain gave you to say. Make some mistakes and feel embarrassed. Like that thing that other people don’t like. Like that thing your parents liked because now it’s “vintage.”
But the likelihood that you are “actually” nerdy? Is probably pretty fucking slim.
