Is being now a nerd cool or not?
 

Official thread
Nerd is a term, often bearing a derogatory connotation or stereotype, that refers to a person who avidly pursues intellectual activities, technical or scientific endeavors, esoteric knowledge, or other obscure interests, rather than engaging in more social or conventional activities. The nerd may be awkward, shy and unattractive.[1] Therefore, a nerd is often excluded from physical activity and considered a loner by peers, or will tend to associate with like-minded people. However, the politically correct term that many people have yet to adopt in present day society is for one of high intellect to be referred to as "bad ass intellectual", which is a movement that has only recently been advocated for as of 2009. One of the many advocates for this mass movement is Michael D. Lam of the University of Washington; an active board member of the literature and higher learning committee.
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Lately i think Nerd no longer amounts to being a looser, a guy who lacks social experience or a totally uncool and boring guy. Now anime rivals comics and its in, they are seeing as intelligent and most often with some degree of jealousy to the knowledge and unique talent they hold. Pimping out cars is cool, but now pimping up your PC is ALSO cool.

I think this has a lot to do with Apple and Microsoft "techting" social stuffs like Iphones, consoles, no more videotapes or portable CD, hell having an mp3 player is so prehistoric now its Ipods, Ipads. People show their laptops as if they where showing they grand new luxurious cars.

The best games are in PC WoW, SC2, Bioware's game Final Fantasy, etc. RPG used to be nerdy and geeky now its cool. CoD's latest hit and FPS games attract non geeks to gaming and nerdy world.

If you say you are a nerd people look intimidated by your knowledge in computer and want you by your side for advices and stuffs. They hang out and now may wear fashionable clothes.

I think i am seeing Nerd as now the new model and image being promoted. And i was wondering if you guys agree with it. I still look with envy the nerds!

it depends on the person your calling a nerd. someone like the tenth doctor its cool someone like martin prince its not.

Sorry for quadra posting lol, i just pressed refresh and boom i got a bunch of topics! Sorry please discuss all here!

Only when it's legitimate and you don't try too hard.

Hold the phones... WHAT? :confused:

People call me a nerd all the time to the point i think of it as a compliment(hey your a tech nerd how do you due blah blah blah)

So there I guess i nerd is cool but then there's the "ha i know the stats of all the fire emblem characters nerd(aka my best friend:D)"

The traditional definition for nerd is fairly irrelevant now, today's nerd is not the same, they are LARPers, Warhammer players, Magic players, scientists, etc. Those who play games are not nerds any more, it's a quite widely accepted medium, look at almost any gaming forum online, these people aren't nerds, they are absolutely idiotic.

I take issue with this:
Neither of these is intrinsically cool, though they certainly are in particular circles of people. In fact nothing is intrinsically cool, it depends on the audience, the time period, even the location. Take Justin Bieber in certain demographics he is the pinnacle of cool, yet to another he is effectively the inverse of cool

People play CoD in similar ways to sport, it's a game, straight up. We live in a consumer based society, something should work out of the box: consoles, computers, phones. Why is something like CoD so popular, simple, it's easy to set up a game, which is the same reason laptops are so popular at the moment, you can use them here, you can use them there. Online gaming has become a lot easier in the past 5 years, more so than organising a local gaming event, where if you have enough people then you may as well play some football or something else.

WoW is not cool, at all.

People are lazy, they will do what is easy.

Just in case its a grammar error, i know it's activision :p

Tread carefully. The Internet is basically a giant Selection Bias device.

I don't think a nerd will ever be cool, just it's coverage will change over time, as in what you need to do to be classed as one.

I think gaming is considered more socially acceptable these days, however, I don't think it's fully out there yet. Although a lot of people game these days, the majority only do it casually, and only playing the popular games.

Honestly, if I was ever called a nerd I wouldn't take offence over it. I'd rather be a nerd than some other, more nasty word to describe a person.

I prefer the term "geek".

You like to be known as the person who bites the heads off of live chickens?

Better than being known as a tiny tangy crunchy candy.

It can be cool to be a geek now, but not a nerd. Nerds lack almost any social skills and live in the world of math and academia. Geeks have some grip on regular social interactions but they're not quite competent in it. They're just fascinated with scifi and video games. Now there are nerdy geeks and geeky nerds but in their purest forms there is a difference.

My thoughts exactly.

I was raised in the 90's and being picked on and stuff for playing video games constantly, and reading comic books and the such in highschool. I don't consider myself a nerd or a geek, I just enjoy what I do, and very supportive of what I enjoy.

I think technically, a nerd isn't supposed to be cool but nowadays a geek is (although originally they weren't either).
I tend to think of both as compliment. For me a geek means a fan of something, whether they have any skills or not, and a nerd means someone with very high skills in a very specific, usually obscure subject. Because being part of a fandom results in more social contact than working on your obscure speciality, being a geek comes with better social skills than nerds, but since a lot of people are both at the same time anyways, I'd say it doesn't make that much of a difference in the end.

I'm what some would call a nerd (hell I am a member of this forum after all).... however, I am also a nerd that can kick your ass (I have more than a bit of amateur wrestling training & have just started training in BJJ).

Why do I state this you may be asking? Do I just want to sound like a tough guy? Well no actually... I say this simply because it brings home the fact that you aren't cool just because you are a nerd.... what makes you cool is the things that you do in addition to those nerdy things. Be it something as simple as hanging out with your friends or something as complex as training to become skilled at something people enjoy... The point is that you get out there into the real world to socialise & do other activities than just play games. It is really more that cool people are bringing acceptance of nerdy things than Nerds themselves being cool... I mean nobody likes a dude who sits in front of a computer all day... that is the very definition of uncool.

I thought it was the other way around with the whole geek and nerd thing.

Also, does it really matter?

Apparently it does considering you took the time to click on this thread, read through it & post a comment.