What Is A Fake Geek Girl? A Label That Doesn't Exist, Just Like the Word 'Geek Culture''

When I met Felicia Day at the Farpoint Convention in Maryland in 2011, I was excited to meet her because she was the writer of the Guild (the fact that she is a good actress is also cool, though I am slightly jealous of her multiple talents).  When I told her I liked the way she writes the show, she stood up from her table and started talking to me more.  We talked longer than I expected (over 5 minutes) and it was fun talking to her about writing.  However, I did also realize that the line was getting bigger and I was possibly getting looks from the staff.  It felt great meeting  a celebrity who also seemed interested in talking to me. 

I like Felicia Day because she is an excellent writer and the stuff she writes I enjoy.  That's it.  I just recently read about the attack on Felicia during Twitter (Ryan Perez asked if Felicia Day was a glorified booth babe--he was later fired).  I didn't understand how that question and similar ones for females could even arise.

Just today, I read an article where someone accused Olivia Munn as 'being hired as a model to get guys to watch TV when she is not a geek herself' (that is paraphrased).  I started watching G4's Attack Of The Show the same week Olivia Munn & Kevin Perera (?) started and thought they were amazing hosts.  Not once did I think she was a 'model hired host' because she had fun, she was excited about stuff on the show, and seemed to care about a lot of the stuff as equally as anyone else.  It never entered my mind to think of stuff like this.

The only time I wondered this was when I got my Playstation 3, as the Playstation Network's shows were Core & The Pulse; the hosts were 100% women.  I wondered if they were, in fact, models hired so people would watch their shows, but didn't give it much thought and just forgot about it.  It took making me the absolute minority to wonder about it  If they were just models, then they certainly were good actors in that they seemed happy to be talking about video games and actually enjoyed their jobs.

Once thing I think that people don't seem to realize, is that you can like something after being forced/hired into it (though I am not implying that for the Playstation Network women).   For instance, lets say you get hired by a company and don't really care.  However, as you learn what to do and what the company represents, you appreciate it more and even become a unofficial spokesperson for the positive message of the company when people ask you about it because you are proud to be a part of it.  Now, in the real world, you would never be called a Fake Employee for this after the fact, so why should you be labeled this in the 'Geek' Community.  If a booth babe likes her job, is she any less a geek for supporting a job she enjoys (it is the act of hiring booth babes that is negative, not the women themselves)?

This leads me to another word I think has loss all meaning:  'geek'.  Usually, people take the words that are detrimental and make it their own so it becomes something positive.  Now, I am not black or homosexual (being of the male, straight, white, blue-eyed, blond-haired label) so I don't know how successful attempts have been to turn bitterly hurtful words into something positive , but I know the negative words that are used on both have attempted to be turned around to mean something positive (yes, I know Geek is not a sexual orientation or a race of people, I am simply trying to expand on the history of taking words themselves and trying to turn them positive).  Geek has become a sort-of positive word now, to the point that the word now means nothing, but never did to begin with.

Picture this; 2 girls--1 goes to Scott Pilgram Vs The World (the movie) by choice, while the other is dragged by her boyfriend.  Later, they both really love the movie.  Are they both geeks or not?  Was it choice?  Is it not 'geek' because it's 'only a movie and movies aren't geek?'

Picture this; there are 2 girls, and both watch Scott Pilgrim Vs The World (the movie).  Afterwards, 1 likes the movie but wants nothing to do with the graphic novel, whereas the other loves the movie just as much as the other girl, but seeks out the comics.  Are we going to label the comic reader as 'geek' because comic books are traditionally thought of as geeky activities, whereas movies are not?  Are both 'geeks' but for different reasons due to the nature of the property?

Imagine now that both people in both examples above are males.  Does it make it any different?  Also, try both examples above with males and females, substituting the move and comic for "A History of Violence," a property that is both, but one that I doubt anyone considered 'geeky'.

The word 'geek' has no meaning.  It started out meaning "a fool, dupe, or simpleton" in the 1500's, and later in the 1900s was called toward circus freaks in movies and film.  Now, however, the current 2012 definition for Dictionary.com states:

1.a computer expert or enthusiast (a term of pride as self-reference, but often considered offensive when used by outsiders.)

2.a peculiar or otherwise dislikable person, especially one who is perceived to be overly intellectual.

3.a carnival performer who performs sensationally morbid or disgusting acts, as biting off the head of a live chicken.

4.  a boring and unattractive social misfit

5.a person, soldier, or civilian of an East Asian country, especially in wartime.

If you notice, we don't consider 'geek' dislikable persons anymore, Geek is no longer a carnival performer, if geeks culture matched the 'boring and unattractive' it wouldn't be so popular now, and we certainly don't use it to refer to the enemy we're combating in war. 

Also, why did the world take hold of the word 'Geek' for Geek Culture?  Why not Nerd or Dork--their definitions, though different in origin, are almost exactly the same?  When was the first word "Geek Culture" actually used, because I've only been hearing about this word the last 5 years?  It most likely was stated by someone in an article, and since we copy and paste other peoples ideas on the internet, it slowly became that word associated with the culture (No reference because this is only an opinion).

Geek, when used on the media, in blogs, on websites, TV, movies, books (and whatever media you own because you're a geek) DOES NOT REFER TO ANY OF THESE DEFINITIONS ABOVE OR ANY OFFICIAL DICTIONARY TERM!  The Word Geek is a new word now and has yet to be defined.  That is the problem with the Anime/Comic Book/Sci-Fi/Etc crowd is that everything is being considered 'Geek' culture without really thinking about the definition, so now people are trying to apply those definitions to the way they think it should be, only millions of people are trying to identify what they think it is.It's easy to find a Buffy community or Star Trek community, but Geek?

This classification of whether or not someone is a geek or not is not something that will ever now be defined.  In fact, it's harmful if you want to get people interested in what you consider to be 'geek' culture, because enforcing rules on how to be a geek, or what makes you a geek, is way to make sure no one comes to the party.  Geek won't be defined by people that want it defined their way because the 'Geek' culture we hear in the media has gone mainstream with the success of films like the Dark Night & Avengers, and TV show like Battlestar Galactica and Lost, before it had a chance to actually be identified.  Now, the media will make it what they want.  Everyone knows what Geek culture means to them, but there is no Geek Society making up the rules to say weather or not Twilight or My Little Pony or 3rd Rock From The Sun or Ninja Warrior is an "Officially Licensed Geek Product."  That will never exist.

By trying to label, we are being really, really naive in thinking that these define us as well.  I just heard Manic Pixie Dream Girl last week, and that is probably the stupidest label I have ever heard of.  It's as if we need a label so we can identify it later, but people are not labels.  

Lets hopefully get around to not being defined by what we like.  I could like Batman & Super Mario Brothers and be a total asshole toward everyone and steal money from people every chance I get.  Or, I could really like Spider-Man & Thief:  The Dark Project and save a kid from being run over in traffic while I was helping my friend carry packages to her car.  Now, replace any of those Geek properties with the term 'black', 'white', 'man', or 'woman'.  Which of those do you think really defined me, the label or my actions?

I'm tired of hearing about Fake Geek Girls & Geek Community; lets stop trying to pigeonhole people into labels and categories.

How Not To Make Money In Comic Books - My Self-Publishing Adventure Part 1: 2002 (DownTimeComics & Demon Heir)

How Not To Make Money In Comic Books – My Self-Publishing Adventure, Part 1:  2002 (DownTimeComics & Demon Heir)

     In this Blog series, I will be breaking down my comic book expenses and profits (ha, that’s a good one) by year.  My hope is that people will see that putting together a comic book requires a great deal of work and a lot of start-up capital; you will rarely see any return in profit.  If you get into comic books, it’s because you want to publish them for the love of it (though hoping it leads to being picked up by the major companies or get a movie deal is a nice dream, too)

     My friend at college, Rob Baden, had been doing a webcomic online called DownTimeComics (http://web.archive.org/web/20050430040909/http://www.downtimecomics.com/dtc/).  He had wanted to expand the website to include others.

     I had an idea about a Demon Hunter, called Demon Heir, that I got my friend RL Shawver to do some art for.  I had already written an entire universe along with 8 major storyline leadinging up to an epic conclusion for the entire series.  The comic strip lasted around 1 ½ months and 8 pages.  I was a junior at college at the time and only 21 years old; my ideas for that story were pretty ambitious and unrealistic since I we were both at college at the time with our own degrees to work on.

     The webpage no longer exists, though you can still see the main page on Wayback Machine.  Unfortunately, none of the comics are available online anymore.   I have now input the old Demon Heir comics on my website (http://www.shawnpmurphy.com) under Webcomics, where you may see the first comic  I ever did.

     That’s it for this year.  It doesn’t start to get more advanced until 2006.  I will be tracking everything, from my website fees, printing costs, artist payment; everything!   If you have an interest in making comics (and you are a writer with no artistic skills) then you will want to follow this.

2002

Total Cost:          N/A
Gross Profit:        N/A
Net Profit/Loss:  N/A

All Years (2002 – 2002)



Total Cost:           N/A
Gross Profit:         N/A
Net Profit/Loss:   N/A

You can follow the rest of my self-publishing adventures here: http://shawnpmurphy.com/?page_id=3473

Amazing Spider-Man: My First Midnight Showing Adventure

I went Tuesday to see Amazing Spider-Man at 12:01am.  I had never been to a midnight premiere before and thought I would relate my experience.

When I first heard the premise of Amazing Spider-Man, I thought, Proto-Goblin (who never shows up in the film) and Peter’s Parents would make a horrible idea for a story.  Then, I saw the theatrical trailer.  The idea of Peter searching for his parents actually made sense, as it would be something that 1) a real kid would do in high school now that they are older, and 2) tell a different story that hadn’t been told in the comics.

When the time came, I invited my friends (and 5 people showed up to a midnight showing; I was quite surprised at that).  I went to the theater 4 days early to buy the tickets so I wouldn’t have to pay any internet surcharge and not have to worry about it being sold out. 

The day of the showing, I arrived at 9:45, expecting there to be a big line; there were only 6 people.  Eventually, around 10, these people were let in to see Amazing Spider-Man in IMAX & Real3D to choose their seats 2 hours early, because nothing was playing in either theater.  Those of us with regular 2D movie tickets had to wait until 11:00pm to even get into the building (as their policy is you aren’t allowed into the building until 1 hour before your show starts).   We were able to loiter at the entrance until too many people for the IMAX appeared and the Theater kicked us outside, where luckily it wasn’t 100 degrees like it was  this late at night yesterday.

I asked at the counter, and found that IMAX was Sold Out; Real3RD was sold out, and 2D was Sold Out.  However, they had opened a 2^nd movie theater in 2D that still had 250 seats left.  I asked if I could go into the other theater instead, even though my ticket was for the other theater.  They said I could.  And, as I expected, none of my friends had bought tickets early, but luckily they had opened that 2^nd theater.

So, as we waited, a line eventually formed around 10:45, until they told the 2D theaters to enter.  We made it into the 2^nd theater, and there was no one there except the 2 people in front of us; we could pick any seat we wanted.  We chose the direct center. 

Then, Amazing Spider-Man started.  It was much, much better than Spider-Man 3 (and felt more realistic than the previous 3 films), and I thought the best thing was Gwen Stacy & Peter Parker’s characters’ and the way they interacted with each other, and their relationship was very cute when they started talking to each other the first time.  Peter really felt like an awkward kid who had no social skills.  That’s all I’ll say on the movie though, because I don’t want to give anything away.  Now I can’t wait for the Blu-Ray, and hopefully a sequel with Mysterio (yes, I can dream).

Why I Wanted To Play The Tomb Raider Reboot - And Now Why I May Not

Tomb Raider (the new game which was designed to remake Laura Croft with her origin story) is coming out soon.  I had wanted to try it out.  The reason:   this game looked like it had an interesting story.  That’s right.   I thought the idea of being stranded and alone on an island, trying to survive, and learning to fight and hunt would make an awesome game.  I’m not interested in the Tomb Raider franchise, nor have I played any of the games (except for some of Tomb Raider 2 on PC that I forget if I enjoyed or not).   I didn’t care this was a  Tomb Raider game, and could care less that is was remake, even less about the character, and even more less if the character was a man or a woman.

So, why should the gender matter at the end of that sentence?  Because of this:   (http://www.themarysue.com/lara-croft-misogyny/) People said Laura has become a victim.  I know all about the victim trap for female character development, but I didn’t think it was relevant here, because it was someone who has to survive on an island by themselves, wouldn’t they experience all kinds of hardships?  I think it’s because people will think Laura Croft didn’t chose to be an archeologist action-adventurer and she was forced into it.  In the first trailer, she’s already on her way to her first adventure.  She was going to be one anyway.  This just happens to be her first adventure; it doesn’t appear it will change her character (though I hope I’m wrong in terms of telling a good story), only develop her adventuring, climbing, and gun shooting skills.

However, the article says that video game players identify with a man, but want to protect a woman avatar.  This apparently makes males root for her more if they ‘save’ her.  This was so insanely stupid.  I played Uncharted 1 & 2 and Hydrophobia recently, (male and female leads) and guess what?  I found myself more into the game with the female lead because of how immersive the game was!  I enjoyed Uncharted’s story and characters + character development more, but Hydrophobia made me feel like I was actually there.   The gender was not an issue for me.

Later, this article (http://www.themarysue.com/tomb-raider-rape-press-release/) stated that the executive producer said, “they try to rape her.”  And people saw this implied from the first person that attacks her in the trailer. 

In the game, I’m sure you will have to fight 800 people before the game is done (all male, because god forbid you kill any females or people will think you are committing violence against women).  In real life, if you were a woman, and fighting against 800 people one at a time, I’m pretty sure a high percentage of them will try to rape you.  However, games are a fantasy.  We don’t need to worry about falling off a cliff into a massive vortex or getting eaten by dinosaurs in real life, but some woman do have to worry about being raped in the real world.  So, why would you put this realistic thing in the game to begin with when people play games to escape and have fun?

I could easily dismiss the victim angle until I actually play the game, but after the implied rape and the designer talking about it as if they wanted all this from the beginning, I’m now less interested to pick up the game.  Could it be because now I will think of Laura as a woman instead of my avatar into the video game world? I feel that using rape as any selling point or from putting it in their as normal will cause people not to check it out, or they will find it out in the game unexpectantly, feel uncomfortable,  and return it to the store.  I hope that Crystal Dynamics (having stated there is no rape subtext) are having a woman review as a game tester to double-check the game;  looking for instances of rape (no matter how unintentional)  and removing them.  I'm still going to play the game eventually, I just hope I'm not clouded by this when I do.

Read this article for a different picture of the game:   http://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=4282521818336541068#editor/target=post;postID=7089648919791698761

TV Trope - The Villianess Woman Always Reforms

I was checking out the Mortal Kombat Animated Series, when one episodes had a female assassin for Shao-Kan get close to Jax so they could kidnap him.  She eventually turns good (for unknown reasons, but I'll just say, because the script forced her to).

One thing I noticed early on when I was growing up, was the number of female characters that were, for whatever reason, evil, then decided to turn good (and god help you if you were a male character who was evil and became good; you will always die [the only time this didn't happen was when Vegeta from Dragonball and Xanatos from Gargoyles turned good, but they still remained morally ambiguous characters; males only died if they went 'true' good], but that's another post entirely)

The biggest example I have for this is The Incredibles.  In this film, Mirage is clearly working for the villain, but then decides to help the main heroes.  This woman killed other superheroes, and then turns good because Syndrome was willing to gamble that Mr. Incredible wouldn't kill her.  This happens again at the end of Voltron; the main female villain (and not even the main villain, like almost all the examples I will use) suddenly decides to become good because of something that happened to her heart or...I really don't remember or even care.

In Vampire Hunter D, the lone female not only ends up surviving, but also does the right thing in helping D.  In Digimon, the one villain to turn good is Gatomon, a female Digimon.  Episodes later, it's reveled that she was tortured and brainwashed to be the evil character that she is because woman can't possibly be evil on their own (let's see, main evil female Digimon in Season 1 are..., oh wait, all of them were male).  Also, if you watched G.I. Joe:  The Movie, the Baroness (the only female villain) was actually brainwashed into doing all those evil, evil things.

These are just examples from my memory at the moment, but it happened a lot in my 80's and 90's cartoons, enough that it was the first Trope that I remember realizing existed.  For some reason, the media believes that woman can never truly be evil, and they can always be forgiven, but, yeah, screw the males, they were born evil, and their punishment for being indecisive is death.

Does anyone have any examples from their Saturday morning cartoons growing up where they noticed this?

Feeling For Characters In A Video Game (Uncharted)

Usually when playing a video game, it's hard to really care about the characters.  I don't even remember when I really felt anything toward a character's death, or a male and female protagonists love for each other.  It wasn't until I played Uncharted 2 that I realized I wanted the characters to do something that wasn't go and shoot people.

In Uncharted:  Drake's Fortune, we are immediately introduced to Elena, a TV news reporter with her own show.  At first, I'm thinking she's going to be the annoying news reporter that no one will care about, but the main character (Drake) will for some reason, and at one point have to save her for doing something stupid.  I was completely wrong in my assumption.

The characters of Drake and Elena actually helped each other throughout the story.  You never had to protect Elena, she would be fighting with her gun and actually kill some people for you; she could handle herself.  You are the one that gets captured first, and it's Elena that breaks you out because she is smart enough to know how to save you, and she actually serves a purpose in the plot at various points.  Eventually she does get captured, but that's more for the story to get you alone and by yourself.  Plus the way she talked and acted made you actually care about her character (at one point I thought she might betray Drake for some reason when she wanted to say behind and 'film' while people were hunting for them, but this was necessary for another plot point for her to find.).

I recently played through Uncharted a 2nd time awhile back, and found myself enjoying the characters more this time around, and Elena more than I thought.  After beating the game on Hard, I wanted to try out Uncharted 2:  Among Thieves.

You immediately start out with 2 new characters helping you, and a new love interest (Chloe).  "Wait," I thought, "was Elena gone forever?  Was she just a Bond woman with only one appearance."  After I played through the game a bit, it dawned on me that this was the case, and I was actually pissed that they had created this cool character and then taken them away (but it helped that Chloe was played by Claudia Black).  I realized a video game hadn't actually made me angry that way in...well, forever.  I guess I wanted a continuing storyline and for the characters to end up happily ever after.

Eventually, you run into Elena in the middle of the war zone.  Who cared that it was complete coincidence, she was back and introduced a fun dynamic to the game the way she interacted with Drake and his new love interest.  You could tell the characters acted differently toward each other from this point on, and Drake slightly changed since meeting her this game (he stands up for her to his current girl, indicating he might still have feelings for her).  Their interactions are also pretty amusing.  Also, Uncharted 2 seemed to have 3 times as much interactions between the characters while you played the game because they were always following you around saying something their characters would normally say to make you feel as if you were traveling with 3 dimensional characters. 

So, I'm going to play Uncharted 2, figure out how to harness the power of the sun to awaken some giant status thing, but in the back of my mind I'll be hoping Drake leaves Chloe and gets back with Elena.

Adventures In Sales

I recently had been thinking about my old sales jobs, particularly a really bad one where I went door-to-door selling everyday items.

I had replied to a newspaper add (this was 2004) and went to a job interview.  I should have seen the signs early, for they didn't exactly tell you what you were supposed to do at this job.  After the interview, they wanted me to follow with someone for a day to see what they do, and if I liked it, I could come back the next day.  So, guess what we did that day?

The man that drove me and another recruit had a large inventory of items in the trunk of his car.  I still remember we were selling a glass Chess board, a small back massager, and a large Disney book (we would state that it had Pixar stories in it, and that it would never be reprinted because Pixar broke away from Disney (again, this was 2004). 

Basically, we would drive to a town, then spend the entire day walking from business to business, trying to sell the items.  The entire job was commission based, but I think you made an average (very minor) for the day amount.  You could not go door-to-door at a house, because it was illegal in West Virginia, but businesses were ok unless they told us to get out, which one person did mid-sale with two of his employees.

Having nothing to go on, I went back the next day, using my car for the entire day, and being teamed up with a partner.  I learned before I went out that this was 'the easiest business to start because it required no start up capital other than a warehouse you had to rent'.  All the items we sold were items that hadn't sold for 2-3 years so they just dumped them to us (apparently for free).  Essentially, we were a door-to-door Five Below.

This was definitely a pyramid scheme, as the guy in charge made a small commission from everyone's sales that day, and a portion of my sales went to my partner (he'd been there awhile) and then the higher ups.  I could eventually train someone and get a portion of their profits. 

So, the 1st day I sold with my partner (or 2nd if you count the training day), but I was really annoyed that my partner had to smoke in my car every hour or so.  The 2nd day (3rd) I remember the most; we chose folders with different towns on them, and made sure we didn't go to towns we already hit, however, upon going to those two towns, we found that our group from Ohio had already been here last week, everyone had already seen the items, and no one wanted to buy anything.  How is there no communication between themselves?

I drove home that night with $40.00 for a 12 hour period, and that's not counting my gas from driving all day; so essentially, I didn't make anything.  I wasn't going to fall for this bogus sales job.  I quit the next day.