Am I a Geek or an Addict?

I started writing this entry but mere minutes after watching the first teaser trailer for Star Trek: Into Darkness. The reason I was inspired to do so was because I noticed that not only was I giddy with excitement over the trailer but my body was physically shaking. This is the type of behavior you see from speed freaks and coke addicts (I’m assuming) and I am acting like this from just watching a little over a minute of film footage.

This is not the first moment I have noticed my geekiness taking over my physical body. Earlier that same day I was gleefully working on my latest writing project when I looked at the clock and realized that it was Wednesday and I had not yet been to the comic book shop yet. For those not in the know, Wednesday is new comic book day. I quickly dropped what I was doing, ran down stairs to my car and rushed to the comic book shop. Twenty minutes later I was walking out of my local comic shop with a stack of brand new comics. Walking to my car I briefly smelled the scent of new ink that was present in my bag of comics and a familiar sense of euphoria came over me. I realized that the same sort of ritual enjoyment I go through on a weekly basis is not dissimilar to the actions of a drug addict.

"KHAN!"

Now if I had continued to remain an introvert like I did throughout so much of my childhood, I could believe that my actions were unique to me and me alone. But thanks to the internet and college interest groups, I have learned that I am not alone in my actions. In fact, go to any comic book convention and I am on the low end of the geek spectrum. I don’t play D&D or other roleplaying games, I have never cosplayed, I know only a scant few words in Klingon, and I have absolutely no contingency plan for the Zombie Apocalypse. But I am no less enthusiastic in my excitement. In fact, just using the above example, I had the same amount of enthusiasm for the new Star Trek trailer as did my Crossover Appeal Co-stars (see that episode here).

There has been much debate among the fandom community over what qualifies one to be given the label “Geek” or “Nerd”. Not all fans seem to wish to refer to themselves by these monikers. Initially this was due to the negative stigma associated with them. The term geek originally referred to a type of circus freak famous for biting the heads off of live chickens. The term nerd was first coined by that brilliant wordsmith Dr. Seuss. His use of the word was to describe some mythical animal an explorer was searching for to put in his zoo. While being a true geek may not be the most glamorous of professions, and being a mythical creature has no other meaning than just that, it is hard to understand how these terms ever became synonymous with the passionately fan-oriented. Because to me, that is the true definition of a geek or nerd. Someone who is both passionate and knowledgeable on a given subject beyond the average citizen. While most geeks seem to be fans of sci-fi and/or fantasy, you can certainly use the term to describe fans of other things.

We all at one time in our life encountered someone who has a perfect recall of sports statistics. Originally fans of sports were solely labeled as jocks, but in our media soaked age there are multiple sports fans who have no athletic ability but the same rabid passion for the game as their jock brethren. That is right folks, there are sports geeks. As are their music geeks, car geeks, and even fashion geeks. Sports, music, cars, fashion sense, these used to be the things that made someone NOT be labeled a geek. But as the outsiders become more mainstream, the mainstream slowly becomes outside.

As I wrote in a previous entry (see here), I am a strong defender of geek culture. But the more and more popular culture is taken over by geek culture, the less I feel the need to defend it. The recent release of The Hobbit broke a December record for highest opening. Of the ten highest grossing films of all time, eight of them can be labeled as either science fiction or fantasy and two of them (The Dark Knight Rises and The Avengers) are based on comic books, which are the one medium that still seem to have the negative geek stigma attached to them. And even that stigma is slowly going away. Which just means soon my habit will be socially acceptable.