Overthinking Memes: Idiot Nerd Girl

Today i'd like to begin a series where I needlessly overthink various internet memes.  I'm going to start things off with our dear friend Idiot Nerd girl and what it means for gender relations.  Trust me, you're going to love it.

Idiot Nerd Girl for reference.

Fundamentally, the concept is Anti-Poseur.  Nerds have a long history of being Anti-Poseur and we absolutely RAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGE when someone gets a niggling detail of our particular fandom wrong, misquotes our favorite heroes, or disagrees with us on which fandom is superior.  This is not a laudable trait, but it is demonstrably true-just spend time at any convention.  Despite the feminist interpretation of the subject that somehow translates into All Dudes Are Rapists, this meme isn't truly about gender so much as a lack of the encylopedic knowledge that nerds tend to accumulate in lieu of any information that could theoretically prove useful.  This is not misogynist rage; it is simply hipster rage.  Nerd culture is at a sociological peak and there is an unspoken, but very strong agreement still present in the culture that you have to suffer for it, which many many many of the people who were nerdy when it wasn't popular did.

I'm not trying to come off as Old Schoolier Than Thou.  I don't give a shit.  But being asked to prove your cred (and that is exactly what it is, the same instinct as gangster rappers, skateboarders and any other nominally outcast subculture-you have to prove your cred) is not participating in Rape Culture.  It is participating in Nerd Culture and you don't have to be a girl to deal with it.  Generally it is restricted to your favorite fandom and I feel what the culture is really lacking is some sort of Jeopardy themed geek-off to determine who is the bigger waste of good DNA and has memorized the most irrelevant facts.

There is real, serious misogyny within Nerd Culture-ask any girl that has been to convention and is cosplaying "out of body type" or maybe google the term "Cosplay is not consent."  I am not even saying that geeks are free of the bullying instinct-in fact if you read any fandom based forum or go to any fandom based convention, you'll find it is as viciously darwinian as anyone else's, if not more so.  But folks, firing up the Feminist Black Flag about this meme is much ado about nothing.  Nobody likes fake people.  It isn't restricted to your gender; you just haven't noticed it until now, because you didn't participate until it became popular.

Shamefully Yours,
Chris By-The-Throat