UnLoser wrote:
Does anyone really identify with the word "nerd"? I mean it is rather negative. I don't identify with it, even though I have poor social skills and am into "nerdy" hobbies like video games and game design.
I wear the badge with pride! I was in a conversation with a girl just the other week, and I told her 'I'm a bit of a nerd', and she said 'Don't call yourself that! It's such a negative thing for people to refer to you as' and I reassured her that I identified as a nerd perfectly fine, and had no problem with the media stereotype of the shy kid who enjoys reading about dinosaurs and the universe, and who collects Transformers toys and puts them on display.
If I am posed the question which group or subculture I primarily identify with, it is in fact 'as a nerd'. As a person, I don't identify quite as strongly with my ethnic, cultural, or sexual identity, although I consider myself part of each demographic, I do not consider myself part of the 'culture'. With nerds, it's a whole nother story. If there were several rooms filled with people from each 'minority' I can count myself among (and that's a LOT), I would pick the room of the nerds. Because I'm likely to have the best connection with people in there!
I hope this doesn't sound crazy or anything, I don't go tramping about the streets wearing a NERD POWER t-shirt, waving a flag, or having a constant need to spout random trivia or make sci-fi references- not at all. But I identify strongly with the roots of reality that lie at the base of the nerd stereotype in pop culture (the socially awkward 'little professor' who prefers to sit in the garden watching ladybirds to going out drinking and dancing).
So yesh, I consider myself a nurrrd.
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