March 08, 2004

The geek shall inherit the Earth ...but this writer isn't so sure that is a good thing. [via Arts and Letters Daily]

Though I have to agree with Starr, as another self-admitted huge geek, that perhaps not all SF fans are brilliant socialisers, I have to take exception to the idea that SF has ever been about simple escapism. About exagerration yes, just like the great epics such as Beowulf and The Odyssey. But can one honestly call most pulp non-SF fiction, the Harlequins, the spy thrillers, the impossibly neat mysteries, any more in touch with real life? Whereas the many of the greatest works of speculative fiction are all about putting us in touch with the stark realities of life, by recasting them just enough differently that we see them again new. I am thinking here of the long history of utopias and dystopias that put society under a microscope, the novels that explored "otherness" long before it became fashionable among academics, even the simple morality plays against letting our own hubris destroy us. Far from failing to "satisfy the human urge to find meaning in life and to aspire to a better world", my life's experience has been that speculative fiction is the genre that puts those questions most at its heart. All literature has special value to bring to our world - poetry is especially good for expressing ideas of the heart and emotion, novels for exploring personal interaction. I have always found the strength of speculative fiction to be an exploration of society itself (which is one of the major reasons I, as a social historian, am drawn to it). Maybe if people read more SF, "the society that lies outside of the cinema and the comic shop" would not stagnate, but begin to talk about what that society means.

posted by jb 20 years ago
  • Ouch. But, as Jackson's acceptance speech suggests, the fact that these films did prove successful represents a new degree of respectability for the fantasy genre, along with the science fiction and superhero genres. No. The reason RoTK got all those awards is because it grossed SO MUCH, is SO POPULAR. and the earlier parts were snubbed (I like the trilogy, BTW). Can someone define what 'geek' means, contemporarily? Depending on the answer, she might be almost completely off the mark (or maybe not).
  • I don't really know what geek means contemporarily, but I am sick to death of what I perceive in this article and elsewhere to be discrimination against the 'geek'. AFAIC, a 'geek' is anyone who wants to behave, dress, eat, play in ways different to the 'norm', whatever *that* is. And it pisses me off, has always pissed me off, that there is a line drawn in the sand between a geek and the 'normal' person. Because it seems to me that being 'part of the crowd' is what is wrong with this civilization. People are lead to do things that are stupid and destructive just because everyone else is doing them, so I'd much rather be a geek. Thus, in fact this article has only served to make me angry. Grrr. Plus it's my birthday, on which I'm always miserable, and I noticed the other day I have silver (not just grey) but silver hairs coming in my beard. AAARGH. so old. Soooo oold.
  • I think the writer's point is that while SF/F is not necessarily escapist, many fans of SF/F use their obsession with the genre to escape the real world. Hm. I have always used literature as a form of escape. Not from the problems and nastiness of reality, but out of my own skin (else I wouldn't have read Gravity's Rainbow or Heart of Darkness). Literature has broadened my mind and given me multiple insights on many aspects of life. So, is escapism necessarily bad? But I can see why the writer is concerned. The genre is being used as a tool for people to turn their backs on their regular lives and quibble about whether Worf can beat Riker's butt, or why Quenya gives elves a headache. And more people reading SF/F may just mean that more people see the genre as soma. Nostrildamus: Don't feel so bad. My dad has silver hairs coming out of his beard, and he's only 48. He doesn't feel really old. Just a smidgeon. Heck, *I* have silver hairs on my head. uh... I realise this sounds annoyingly upbeat. Don't kill me, please. Please?
  • Nostrildamus, Happy Birthday!!!! I thought a 'X' geek is someone who takes a higher-than-average interest in 'X'. And just 'geek' is someone who tends to find different topics and focus on them. Am I right?
  • Geek is a positive epithet in Silicon Valley, negative in NZ. In Cali I was happy to be a geek, because it implied intelligence, skill in a technical area (neither of which I had to any great degree) and had its own subculture which seemed to be gadget-oriented. Back here in NZ, it seems to mean, essentially, that you're too smart for your own good and probably paid far more than you're worth at the expense of someone who deserves more. And happy birthday, Nostrildamus! You don't have to be old to go grey - my husband has distinguished silver temples at the ripe old age of 27.
  • Yah!!! HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!!! Mine is on the NINTH. I want EVERYONE to know that!!
  • Thankyou those who wished me happy bday. I am only 34! But early silverness runs in the family. Luckily I haven't aged much in other ways. Nobody else wish me happy birthday please! I really hate it! heheh happy birthday Darshon for tomorrow (if that is what you meant ~ it's the 8th here) Pisceans rule.
  • Well that explains this little mix-up.
  • I always understood geekhood to be a positive thing. It always implied intelligence and focus. The only time it was a negative, and not overly so even then, was when I was in high school. As far as hikikomori, I would say Thank God that there is a world for these kids to go into that is keeping them from commiting suicide. As I understand this phenomenon, it is not about obsession with the fantasy world as much as being unable to perform as expected under a tremendous amount of pressure. And I would say that the computer world has sucked far and away more people into it's vortex than SF/F ever will. Oh, and one more thing, my favorite fantasy world that I would gladly escape to would be "Islandia" by Austin Tappan Wright.
  • Darshon: Try a Catholic girls' school. You are guaranteed to get loads of grief for being a geek. But that's all behind me now. Yes, it is. You might be right about the hikikomori, the isolation may serve as an escape valve. I guess it's like the difference between giving morphine to a chronic back-pain sufferer, and a morphine addict.
  • I'd like to know what she considers "normal". [society] to become more interested in whiling away its time dreaming, than in addressing the real problems that confront it. I would also argue that the only way to learn to appreciate society
  • niccolo: that's essentially what I thought as well (after I stopped seething and started thinking clearly :) Fantasy and speculative fiction of all kinds acts as a kind of laboratory in which to explore aspects of our world, in controlled circumstances. Not always a utopia - some of my favorite works are the classic distopias, as well as many books about worlds neither better or worse, but simply different. I think what the writer was trying to drive at - and would have been better off focussing on - were escapist tendancies in literature and media. The most escapist literature I have ever read (parts of - tried but could not finish) are romance novels; many mainstream movies and television shows also fit. But many of the apparently fantastical creations, such as Whedon's Buffy and Angel series are in fact less escapist than their mainstream brethren - they are about bringing the horrors that could threaten our world forth. Actually, both shows were most frightening when they brushed against the most real fears - whether that was cruel principals, a pathological child (who possessed the demon who tried to posses him), or death itself.
  • Horror and fantasy (whether in comics form or otherwise) are often seen simply as escapist literature. Sometimes they can be, offerring quick catharsis, a plastic dream, an easy out. But they don't have to be. When we are lucky they offer a road map - a guide to the territory of The Imagination, for it is the function of imaginative literature to show us the world we know, but from a different direction. Neil Gaiman, from an essay Writing and Werewolfing. Or: 'I love you sons of bitches. you're the only ones with guts enough to really care about the future, who really notice what machines do to us, what cities do to us, what tremendous misunderstandings, mistakes, accidents, and catastrophes do to us. You're the only ones zany enough to agonise over time and distances without limit, over mysteries that will never die, over the fact that we are right now determining whether the space voyage for the next billion years or so is going to be Heaven or Hell'. Kurt Vonnegut, from God Bless You, Mr Rosewater
  • I agree wholeheartedly with those quotes, dng. Taking a step back, and this has been said a hundred times before, some societies on Earth assign personalities into groups, such as 'geek' etc., however the same societies say that members of any one set cannot, by this definition, share characteristics with persons in other sets. Consiquently you end up with the paradox: "I am everything and nothing". Returning to fantasy, I think any problems we have with the genre are from people who do not analyze and think about what they are seeing. People who see violence as violence, joy as joy, and tears as tears. However, then you can say: 'as these people don't consider context to be relevant to their emotional response to art, it does not matter if they are viewing fantasy or real life. Thus, fantasy is not the problem.' Now I am going to contradict myself by agreeing with the writer and saying that I believe people should participate more in life: expecting things to simply be delivered (as continuous unpredictable TV is), will probably take you anywhere or lead to anything. I believe the internet is helping in this area, because it a medium where people make decisions rather than have those decisions made for them. However, is this really a contradiction? Is it true that people who like fantasy are completely unproductive individuals? Of course not - and as so many people have said in this thread - the opposite is true. Good fantasy leads us to make decisions, because it is abstract wisdom. It seems the writer is paying to much attention to what people tell her. However, that may be the tone of the magazine, it is trying to be on everyone's side in a battle that doesn't exist. It's a very interesting topic.
  • My main disagreement is that a geek doesn't have to like fantasy or sci-fi, this geek certainly doesn't.
  • According to my brother, an IT security consultant (!) a geek is a cool nurd. The truth is that most sci fi and fantasy fans are infantile, escapist people, as shallow as they are socially inept... Hilarious comment from Arts and Letters daily ... generalised and pompous ... because, of course, great works of literature such as Ulysses have so much more to offer our daily existence ...
  • Dunno, Ulysses offers me plenty, as does all of Joyce. /Joyce fan who is not currently bashing unbelievers any harder than this relatively tothless comment.
  • Go the toth. In fact, go to the dentist.
  • Is being a nurd worse than being a knurd?