This is why I hate "Fake Geek/Gamer Girls"

[The Last Parade]

yeah no, I've been playing games since I was 4 (Age of Empires ftw), I have about 300 games on steam and about 30 on my xboox and I never suffered because of my gaming hobby... ergo I'm not a gamer? fuck that, if you suffered I empathise with you but it doesn't give anyone a seal that proves they can be an elitist club.

Gamers are people who love games and the culture surrounding it, there isn't a citizenship test. deal with it chaps

 

[a ginger491]

The video is making a solid argument about the commodification of geek and nerd culture and how it is being usurped by people who think proclaiming themselves as geeks or nerds makes them smart or quirky, all the while not realizing that they are using epithets that once were very hurtful (I know it's extreme but just roll with me on this.) Playing and enjoying games used to be intertwined with being a geek or nerd, but no longer. Gaming has erupted into mainstream culture, and it's going to stay that way for a long time. I think "Gamer" is just a word similar to that of "movie buff" or "bookworm," they can be used to tease someone, but for the most part I see them as compliments or recognition to a person's immersion in a topic.
However, I believe in the case of the words "nerd" and "geek" it is only acceptable if they are used by those of us who were outcasts because they love books, video games, anime, robotics, are in varsity chess, dream to become a statistician one day, or whatever other thing they do that deviates from the norm. What I mean is a popular kid calling themselves a geek just because they don thick rimmed glasses, start playing video games on weekends, and use Reddit is like a white man greeting people by saying "What's up? my n***a?" when they sag their pants, wear a snap back sideways, and start listening to hip-hop. I know it's an extreme comparison but I couldn't think of anything else that would get my point across.

 

[IamLEAM1983]

The video is making a solid argument about the commodification of geek and nerd culture and how it is being usurped by people who think proclaiming themselves as geeks or nerds makes them smart or quirky, all the while not realizing that they are using epithets that once were very hurtful (I know it's extreme but just roll with me on this.) Playing and enjoying games used to be intertwined with being a geek or nerd, but no longer. Gaming has erupted into mainstream culture, and it's going to stay that way for a long time. I think "Gamer" is just a word similar to that of "movie buff" or "bookworm," they can be used to tease someone, but for the most part I see them as compliments or recognition to a person's immersion in a topic.
However, I believe the words "nerd" and "geek" should only be allowed to be used by those of us who were outcasts because they love books, video games, anime, robotics, are in varsity chess, dream to become a statistician one day, or whatever other thing they do that deviates from the norm. What I mean is a popular kid calling themselves a geek just because they don thick rimmed glasses, start playing video games on weekends, and use Reddit is like a white man greeting people by saying "What's up? my n***a?" when they sag their pants, wear a snap back sideways, and start listening to hip-hop. I know it's an extreme comparison but I couldn't think of anything else that would get my point across.

Think about it for a second. Nobody has ever been able to enforce rules on word usage. The closest thing we have to that is grammar and spelling, and these two concepts shift all the time. Culturally, saying we're the only ones worthy of calling ourselves nerds is a pretty destructive attitude. It stratifies and crystallizes word usage and freezes the perception of the word in one very specific direction. It's as if I said Neo-Impressionists are usurping Claude Monet's school, when Neo-Impressionism was basically a stepping stone for people like Picasso. You're condemning something that has no real bearing on your life.

As it's not destructive. These people you'll catch calling themselves nerds on Facebook because they binged on a social network's selection of games are as worthy of using the term as we are. The word "nerd" refers, at least in its modern incarnation, to people who have a very narrow band of interests. People who border on obsessive behaviour about one or two things. As for the supposedly important part about being socially maladjusted? That's changed irrevocably.

The gawky teens of yesteryear grew up into professional thirtysomethings. They have families of their own, they're probably successful and don't adhere to the idea we entertain of the average nerd anymore. Of course, the younger ones are always going to discriminate against their betters. It's human nature. There's always going to be a new batch of marginals waiting around the bend to claim an insult and turn it into a badge of pride or to reuse an older icon.

If they end up re-purposing the word "Nerd", then its intrisic meaning will have changed.

Trying to police that by saying that our group or some other group has exclusive rights to a word is like trying to stop a tsunami with a beaver's dam of sticks and branches. Good luck with that, man.

 

[The Unworthy Gentleman]

I hate them because they use the term "gamer girl" as a grasp for attention by trying to stand out based on their gender rather than just expressing their interest in games.

That said I hate the people that harass them for boob shots even more. Unless they deliver, of course.

 

[bug_of_war]

i refuse to call myself a gamer periode . I don't want to be associated with the "gamer" culture anymore

You and me both. Gamer's can be the worst people some times as they seem to feel as though they're more entitled than other people. Good example was the neckbeard/huge baby tantrum outrage over the Mass Effect 3 ending. They were demanding a new ending be made from scratch and made the "Retake Mass Effect" movement all so they could change SOMEONE ELSES piece of art. It was disgusting to see these self absorbed whining people turn against a publisher and developer all because they didn't like the ending. Imagine if someone said they demand the end of a book or a film to be changed because THEY didn't like it, wouldn't happen. Gamer's are lucky that developers try and listen to their audience and implement public ideas into their games in order to please their audience.

Gamer's need to grow the hell up, especially seeing as how the average age of gamers is supposedly 30, although the mental age seems to be more like 14. Who the hell cares if someone pretends to be a fake gamer, how does it effect anyone other than them?

 

[bastardofmelbourne]

At the risk of being flamed, I don't really see this as a gender issue.

I think the thing that annoys people about fake gamer girls isn't the girl part, it's the fake part. It's the idea that this person may be expressing interest or appeal in the things that appeal or interest you, but is not doing so honestly (for whatever reason.) People are afraid of being tricked.

Think back to high school in the 90s, when most adult gamers today would have grown up. Stuff like video games and comic books and tabletop RPGs were niche interests that made their proponents vulnerable to bullying or mockery. In that kind of environment, when someone comes up and says "I love DnD!", there's this underlying fear that the person isn't being honest, that this is all a trick, and that this is going to end with someone giving you a wedgie and call you a hobbit-fucker. So those gamers, now adults, have this defensive, not-entirely-rational reaction to "fake" gamers where they question their gaming credentials.

All members of a niche subculture will do this in reaction to interest from mainstream culture. Homosexuals will question whether bisexuals are "really" interested in homosexual relationships, or if they're just experimenting. They might get defensive when confronted with the attitudes of metrosexuals, who "act gay" while being straight. Black hip-hop artists question whether their white fans are "really" interested in their music, or if they're just wiggers. In all cases the member of the subculture is not upset at the gender, race or sexual orientation of the mainstream member, but at whether their interest is honestly expressed. Their defensiveness may not be entirely rational, but it is understandable.

One of the reasons that the whole fake gamer girl pseudo-controversy thing in the media has failed to interest me is that it seems to skip over that key point and focus on the gender element. To me, the idea that I'm being lied to by a lady who's being paid to dress as Cortana and say she loves Halo as part of a marketing shindig is kinda of upsetting, and not because it's a lady. It's because I don't like the idea that I'm being lied to. I mean, shit - if a lady was honestly so into Halo that she'd dress up as Cortana, why wouldn't I like it? It's one more person I can play Halo with, and it's also a lady, which is a novel break from all the guys.

But all the discussion on this issue has focussed on a hypothetical misogynistic neckbeard who hates the idea of there being boobs in his hobby. Has anyone ever met a person like that? Do they represent gamers as a whole? They're as mythical as the fake gamer girl who pretends to like Warcraft in order to get into a male gamer's pants.

It's hardly controversial to state that members of a subculture become defensive when they perceive persons outside that subculture as appropriating the trappings or fashions of that subculture. That's the core issue. It's not a gender issue. It's only become a gender issue because gaming media - and the Escapist is guilty of this - finds it easier to condemn the hypothetical neckbeard based on the idea that he's a misogynist than actually engaging with the more complex question of how members of a previously niche subculture deal with that subculture becoming mainstream.

 

[lord.jeff]

If you're so bothered that someone may or may not be a real gamer that you feel a need to call them out on it you're not a nerd you are more of a hipster. A nerd is someone who expresses love for something to an almost obsessive degree, whether or not someone else enjoys it shouldn't effect his opinion of his passion but the moment you start to feel threatened by someone else being into games or whatever no matter what their reasons then you are you are the one into games for the wrong reasons not them.

 

[Zeldias]

When has the shit not been commodified? The whole reason gaming culture existed in the first place was because people were selling other people shit. From the beginning, there has been marketing and it's continuing to be marketed. This isn't like tattooing having had cultural and ritual significance then having the markers and rituals be stolen and repackaged for consumers with no imagination to pretend they're part of a different culture by paying a person 400 bucks to tattoo a koi fish on their ass. What people are really mad about is that it no longer feels niche. Which means we're dealing with sexist hipsters. And I like to think most folks understand how to deal with hipsters, if not sexists. And it is a sexist issue because motherfuckers typically only target women; what about fake gamer men who pretend to like Call of Duty but secretly just want to be liked by the bros? Never hear any motherfuckers out here breaking out the pitchforks on that hypothetical.

As others have also said, who cares if a person is pretending to enjoy something. It's not costing you anything or damaging your experience unless you're secretly some kind of empath who feels physical pain when in the presence of deceit. This whole "issue" is nothing more than the pointless histrionics of dudes who are anxious about another gender entering their space. Which is a pointless thing to hold anxiety about. A male-dominated space is less so.

In hindsight, I regret spending the time to type all this about such a stupid issue. I just get mad and rant.

 

[Frission]

This discussion is idiotic and the OP should be ashamed.

I have no idea how this affects you in any shape or form. It just sounds like winging.

 

[bastardofmelbourne]

I got into a fight with him on this very forum. I was told to "get off his cloud" because "females have their own cloud and it's so much higher than mine!". He then went on to snarkily add "To the so called gamer girls in this thread, how many of you beat Dark Souls? Wait, dont' answer, because none of you have" only to have Moonlight Butterfly show him her achievement listings, which got met with "Your boyfriend playing for you doesn't count."

So dont' call it a myth.

It sounds like you got trolled.

Serious mode: you could certainly find such a neckbeard as described, if you sought one out. I'm sure they exist; any universe in which the Westboro Baptist Church is a thing can support any extreme of idiocy or prejudice.

But they are a terribly, terribly small minority, and they don't represent gamers any more than the WBC represents the greater Christian religion. Even amongst the hundreds or thousands of posters on this forum, you've met one, and he might have been pulling your leg.

More importantly: the misogynistic neckbeard upset at girls invading his hobby is as fair a representation of the greater male gamer population as the manipulative fake gamer girl who pretends to be into Warcraft in order to trick hapless white male gamers into having sex with them is representative of greater female gaming population. They are extremist, unrealistic stereotypes, and it is equally lazy for either side of the debate to put them forward as representative of the core problem.

It also runs the real risk that proponents of either side of the argument would be categorised as one of those extremist stereotypes by virtue solely of their position in the debate. Male gamers who feel deceived by shallow attempts at marketing towards their demographic will be categorised as misogynistic neckbeards; female gamers who feel offended by the assertion that they aren't "real" gamers will be categorised as manipulative sexpots or overly sensitive feminazis. In this way, any chance of a valuable discussion is lost for both parties, and the entire public debate begins to resemble two cats fighting over who gets to shit in the litter box first.

 

[invadergir]

Yeah... This again? Are you really that afraid of girls in your club or why do you specify the gender? Do you want to imply that there is no fake behaviour from the other gender or do you just imply that you hold the female gender to such irrational standards that no one could qualify as geek or nerd in your book when they have a pair of tits. If including this, do you also hold overweight males to such standards because they also have a pair of tits?

Well. Eplain this to me with your own words and not with some stupid yt link I won't even bother to look at: Why the need to specify the gender?

Also, no, I don't feel particulary enraged by fake geeks / nerds. Because they have *shock* zero impact on my life.

And finally: You imply that being a nerd or geek had some kind of entry barrier. Well, it had only one in particular. Have a non-mainstream hobby which consumes a big chunk of your time. Tadaa, you are a geek / nerd.

Wow, this is lovely.
I heart this comment.

Stupid bullshit about fake girls is stupid bullshit and I really don't care for the frustrated tears of gamer hipsters who don't want ladies in their treehouse.

Gaming is not `your` thing. It's just a thing. And everyone can enjoy it.

Oh yeah, and, I'm a gamer girl.
Come at me bro.

I think the OP did a disservice to the video he posted. The video makes no distinction of gender.

The video even quoted Anita Sarkesian.

 

[Smeggs]

gamers used to be mocked and made fun of, anything dealing with video games immediately made you a loser, a nerd, an outsider, and a socially awkward kid that kept to a small group of other losers.
Culturally we didn't have any value and as a market we were a niche... Now people want to be us, they want to act like us, and pretend to enjoy the same things we do; and do you know why? Because now, we're cool! So stop complaining about being a purist and start enjoying the fact that; plain and simple, we won!

WEEEEE ARE THE CHAMPIOOOOOOONS...OF THE WOOOOOOOOOOORRRRRRRLD!

I don't care about "fake nerds/geeks" because I follow one simple mantra when dealing with them; fuck 'em.

That's right. I don't give a shit about them, they don't give a shit about me; fuck 'em. The world is a much more enjoyable place if you just look people you don't like right in the eye and let them know you give not even the barest of damns.

But you can also be classy about it.

 

[PhiMed]

That's the saddest, most small-minded video I've ever seen. Thank you for making my Christmas a little less merry.

I can't believe this guy compared exploitation of Native Americans to people wearing non-prescription horned rims. That guy should be really feel ashamed of himself.

 

[EvilRoy]

But all the discussion on this issue has focussed on a hypothetical misogynistic neckbeard who hates the idea of there being boobs in his hobby. Has anyone ever met a person like that? Do they represent gamers as a whole? They're as mythical as the fake gamer girl who pretends to like Warcraft in order to get into a male gamer's pants.

Oh they exist. Not only that, but they exist in fields and areas wholly unrelated to gaming, for both genders.Each of these has their own fantastic little quizmaster who will home in on a person and make sure they belong inside a club or at a lab or in a class. It doesn't necessarily need to be gender based, but there are definitely some people out there who like to make sure their space is clean and homogeneous.

A couple of the questions below, some I experienced first hand, others I happened to be in the nosebleeds for.

(At a cocktail function thing for science/engineers):
"So.. do you happen to know how to differentiate cos2(x)sin(2x)?" "What?" "Can you tell me the derivative..." "No, why would I keep that information on hand?" "Well it's fairly simple, I'm sure you can figure it out in your head." "Why am I doing this for you?" "Well to show you can." "Why am I showing you I can?"

It went on for a bit, I told him in polite terms to sod off eventually.

(Philosophy 103 or maybe 121 or something):
I happened to share a philosophy course with a 6th year male nurse, so basically a meter from the finish line, and I was privy to a first year female nursing student actually trying to quiz him on some of the topics she had no doubt learned earlier that day. I can't repeat most of the questions, I wasn't in medicine so it blew over my head, but the way the questions were framed, she wasn't asking for her own knowledge or to start a convo on a topic she wanted to learn about, she was asking to make sure he knew. The 6th year almost-a-proffesional nurse was being quizzed by a first year on bullshit first year topics.

(The cheapest of cheap golf clubs):
Broke down to a dude asking a girl at a golf club what specific strategies she would use on each hole, which clubs what balls out of the three regulation blah blah blah. It was painful for everyone, not because she didn't know all the answers, but because the quizmaster was on my level of golfing, somewhere between embarrassing and class four emotional abuse for onlookers, and he felt he was within his right to expect a woman to be a better golfer than him just to be allowed on the course.

The last one, and I swear to christ this is true, I started taking yoga classes. I took these because botched physio (my fault) and knee pain (my first bosses fault) left me with some joint trouble from the waste down I was hoping daily stretch exercises could alleviate.

First day, I'm the only dude in the class, girl (25ish so not like a dumbass teenager) walks up to me and says "Is it true that a lot of guys take yoga so that they can suck their own..."
Yeah, someone asked me that question, to my face, sharing the room with a number of people, and apparently expected either a positive answer, or a mumble and fast escape.

So I guess to answer your question, not only have I see this misogynist neckbeard, but I have seen him wearing tacky pants in a clubhouse, I have seen her in a philosophy class making herself look brick stupid, I have seen him trying to prove someone doesn't deserve a second glass of cheap hose-water orange juice and I have seen her trying to embarrass a person into not attending a yoga class. I don't think it's gamers that have a problem, I think it's the whole friggin human race that has one unpleasant personality type that manifests far too often, but disproportionately more in some environments.

 

[bastardofmelbourne]

snip

Based on this and GunsmithKitten's post I suspect people have misread that line. This is my fault; I will try to clarify.

When I said "They're as mythical as the fake gamer girl who pretends to like Warcraft in order to get into a male gamer's pants" I wasn't saying that misogynistic neckbeards don't exist. I was trying to draw a comparions between one offensive stereotype (misogynistic neckbeard raging at the presence of ovaries at a comic book convention) and another popular one (manipulative female trying to seduce innocent nerds through dishonest cosplay)

I was pointing out that they're as fair a represenation of the male gaming population (or, if you prefer, the subset of that population that gets upset at cultural appropriation) as the manipulative cosplayer is of the female gaming population. You can find examples of both, but they don't accurately represent the demographic in question.

Putting forward examples of misogynistic neckbeards doesn't really address the point. I totally agree with you in stating that elitism and its inbred hillbilly cousins sexism and racism permeate every aspect of modern culture to some degree. I also agree that all those neckbeards you list are, indeed, bearded in the neck region, and I wouldn't want to associate with them (I have met people like that myself.)

The point was that focussing the discussion on those extreme, nonindicative examples both a) overlooks the more relevant question of how a subculture should react to the trappings of their culture being appropriated by the mainstream and b) risks categorising one side of the argument into an offensive and inaccurate stereotype.

More importantly, it's lazy, because everyone can hate a misogynistic neckbeard like the examples you listed, but it's much harder to hate an otherwise reasonable person who is nevertheless upset at the possibility that marketing firms pay public relations people to pretend that they like video games in order to influence his purchasing attitudes with a false sense of camaraderie.

Anyway, I hope that was clearer.

 

[gwilym101]

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/the-big-picture/6552-Original-Geek-Girl

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/jimquisition/6535-Fake-Nerd-Girls

The escapists very own Bob Chipman and Jim Sterling giving their opinions on this subject.