Unlucky in love? Date a geek!
Jun. 21st, 2006 01:14 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
trinityvixenThis article is almost too painfully stupid to make fun of.
Not that I'd let a thing like that stop me, though.
Where do I even begin, though? Start to finish this is ridiculous. The first few paragraphs get the patriarchal "women are only looking for men who will make the money for them because they don't want to work and make their own" bullshit out of the way nicely by saying geeks are "great providers."
I love my geek friends, but do I know any who make huge monies? Not especially.![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
darkling1 (Happy Birthday again, btw) and bigscary, you guys probably make the most out of anyone I know (oh, hslayer, too. Does that mean you will provide for the ditz blonde looking for teh monies when she finds out you fit the rubric of "geek"? Or, as is the case with the two of you with girlfriends, do you prefer your women geek first, stupidity dead last?
And the examples they cite are hilarious. David Arquette is neither a geek nor a nerd. He's just weird. Tiger Woods classifies as a nerd because he plays golf? Doesn't that just mean that his family was affluent enough to afford greens fees as a kid and live in an area with easy access to a pro shop and a driving range? Why is golf nerdier than, say, football? It's lamer, I grant you, and much more boring to watch (not that football's a gas, but no one would argue for golf being the more exciting sport between the two). But nerdier? Isn't golf an embodiment everything we raise our kids to think they need to be these days? It enforces a strong sense of competition between what should be peers; embraces consumerism and selling your body to corporate logos; encourages people to think they have to do everything for themselves; and rewards people for essentially doing nothing (isn't that the new American Dream?). Football is just a bunch of guys touching each other. That's, like, gay.
I love how they also confuse the character one actor plays on TV versus the man himself. Clearly, if you are a nerd on TV, you must be one in real life. And it's not like TV or movies ever purposefully ugly up obviously pretty people because the thought of hiring actually nonattractive people makes them shudder and dive into their fortresses of solitude (big stacks of money) or anything.
But how to find a geek to be your sugar daddy, ladies? They helpfully provide some suggestions--what games to search by, key words relating to a geek's schooling or nerdly proclivities--and how to shrug off the low opinions of your snobby girlfriends who wouldn't be caught dead clubbing with you and Mr. Wizard Jr. It's a lucky thing that geeks never screw around, too, because then you'd have to worry that your geeky guy might go for one of said airhead gal-pals.
And if I say one word about what evidence I have to the contrary--that proves geeks are no more faithful or faithless to their partners than "non geeks" (a.k.a. Boring People), several people on my friendslist will murder me. Just consider it said.
The physical attraction bullshit doesn't even merit a mention. Suffice to say, my many lovely guy and girl geek friends are universally considered ugly. In fact, my geek girl friends? You don't actually exist according to this article. Apparently, the only competition bubbleheaded beauties face for the attention of homely geek boys? World of Warcraft, Star Trek, and Chess.
*****
This article, on the other hand, actually is so dumb and pointless, it's only worth shaking your head over. But hey, if all conservatives were this stupid, we wouldn't have to worry about the GOP, would we?
The one and only gripe I make about it is his stupid "Well, if you're a physicist, why do you get to sound off about global warming as if you know anything about it?" Excuse me, but the ID folks screamed to the heavens that they had some two hundred scientists signing up to support them instead of evolution, they didn't make any bones about the fact that not one of their scientific experts was actually an expert in the field of biology, evolutionary biology (okay, that one makes sense), genetics, cladistics, archaeology, etc etc etc.
(note: I don't put "scientists" in quotes the way some conservative folk do when they dislike the positions that scientists take--I may dislike their politics, but if you have a PhD in Chemistry, you're a scientist.)
*****
And one last rant from Miss McRanty Pants.
Today, the fire inspectors came. My boss and I have been told countless times that we do shit wrong by these people. Three inspections ago, we had left flammable materials in a freezer not built to protect flammable stuff; our bad, we started storing it in the flammable-material-okay freezer in another lab. Then it was that we hadn't put the dates of purchased chemicals on things in the fireproof cabinet. Okay, we'll do that. Then it was that we didn't have the date that said chemicals were opened on the bottles. ::MUCH TEETH GRINDING:: Okay, now we have.
They come today, and I'm expecting no problems. I mixed some 70% EtOH, but I put the pure stuff away in the cabinet under the hood. We hadn't fixed any slides in a week, so there was no MeOH-Acetone in the wrong freezer. Every bottle has been labelled a billion times over. I peek around my desk to watch them go through the other lab benches and then get to the hood.
Where they stop and start frowning. When the fire inspectors stall, they are looking for to make trouble with you. I jump up to forestall what whirlwind I can, and ask if there is a problem. They hold up a bottle of anhydrous isopropanol with no date on it. They tell me it needs one. I tell them a) I know that from being yelled at every six months by them, and b) there are initials on that bottle that do not belong to my PI, which means the bottle is not ours.
This guy starts pulling almost a mafioso type racket, telling me that "If it was opened only a year ago, okay, but if not," then he shrugs, letting ominous words linger. I tell him again that this hood is not ours exclusively; the chemicals in it not entirely ours. This does not seem to matter. If I can't find a date on when this bottle that has nothing to do with me and that isn't in any record I have was opened, our lab gets a citation.
I finally figure out whose are the initials on the bottle and point the inspectors in the direction of another lab's technician. This technician goes back there with them and they talk, I ignore it because it is now Not My Problem. Then there is laughter and an exchance in Russian. The accent I couldn't place with the lead inspector was apparently Russian, which the technician from the other lab is. There is none of the stern "This is your fault for having your lab space docketed around the hood that's not yours" lecturing or threats. Didn't see a single thing written down, no harsh language or severe frowns.
All because they are both Russian and I and my coworkers are not. That is so fucking unfair it hurts.
Not that I'd let a thing like that stop me, though.
Where do I even begin, though? Start to finish this is ridiculous. The first few paragraphs get the patriarchal "women are only looking for men who will make the money for them because they don't want to work and make their own" bullshit out of the way nicely by saying geeks are "great providers."
I love my geek friends, but do I know any who make huge monies? Not especially.
darkling1 (Happy Birthday again, btw) and bigscary, you guys probably make the most out of anyone I know (oh, hslayer, too. Does that mean you will provide for the ditz blonde looking for teh monies when she finds out you fit the rubric of "geek"? Or, as is the case with the two of you with girlfriends, do you prefer your women geek first, stupidity dead last?And the examples they cite are hilarious. David Arquette is neither a geek nor a nerd. He's just weird. Tiger Woods classifies as a nerd because he plays golf? Doesn't that just mean that his family was affluent enough to afford greens fees as a kid and live in an area with easy access to a pro shop and a driving range? Why is golf nerdier than, say, football? It's lamer, I grant you, and much more boring to watch (not that football's a gas, but no one would argue for golf being the more exciting sport between the two). But nerdier? Isn't golf an embodiment everything we raise our kids to think they need to be these days? It enforces a strong sense of competition between what should be peers; embraces consumerism and selling your body to corporate logos; encourages people to think they have to do everything for themselves; and rewards people for essentially doing nothing (isn't that the new American Dream?). Football is just a bunch of guys touching each other. That's, like, gay.
I love how they also confuse the character one actor plays on TV versus the man himself. Clearly, if you are a nerd on TV, you must be one in real life. And it's not like TV or movies ever purposefully ugly up obviously pretty people because the thought of hiring actually nonattractive people makes them shudder and dive into their fortresses of solitude (big stacks of money) or anything.
But how to find a geek to be your sugar daddy, ladies? They helpfully provide some suggestions--what games to search by, key words relating to a geek's schooling or nerdly proclivities--and how to shrug off the low opinions of your snobby girlfriends who wouldn't be caught dead clubbing with you and Mr. Wizard Jr. It's a lucky thing that geeks never screw around, too, because then you'd have to worry that your geeky guy might go for one of said airhead gal-pals.
And if I say one word about what evidence I have to the contrary--that proves geeks are no more faithful or faithless to their partners than "non geeks" (a.k.a. Boring People), several people on my friendslist will murder me. Just consider it said.
The physical attraction bullshit doesn't even merit a mention. Suffice to say, my many lovely guy and girl geek friends are universally considered ugly. In fact, my geek girl friends? You don't actually exist according to this article. Apparently, the only competition bubbleheaded beauties face for the attention of homely geek boys? World of Warcraft, Star Trek, and Chess.
This article, on the other hand, actually is so dumb and pointless, it's only worth shaking your head over. But hey, if all conservatives were this stupid, we wouldn't have to worry about the GOP, would we?
The one and only gripe I make about it is his stupid "Well, if you're a physicist, why do you get to sound off about global warming as if you know anything about it?" Excuse me, but the ID folks screamed to the heavens that they had some two hundred scientists signing up to support them instead of evolution, they didn't make any bones about the fact that not one of their scientific experts was actually an expert in the field of biology, evolutionary biology (okay, that one makes sense), genetics, cladistics, archaeology, etc etc etc.
(note: I don't put "scientists" in quotes the way some conservative folk do when they dislike the positions that scientists take--I may dislike their politics, but if you have a PhD in Chemistry, you're a scientist.)
And one last rant from Miss McRanty Pants.
Today, the fire inspectors came. My boss and I have been told countless times that we do shit wrong by these people. Three inspections ago, we had left flammable materials in a freezer not built to protect flammable stuff; our bad, we started storing it in the flammable-material-okay freezer in another lab. Then it was that we hadn't put the dates of purchased chemicals on things in the fireproof cabinet. Okay, we'll do that. Then it was that we didn't have the date that said chemicals were opened on the bottles. ::MUCH TEETH GRINDING:: Okay, now we have.
They come today, and I'm expecting no problems. I mixed some 70% EtOH, but I put the pure stuff away in the cabinet under the hood. We hadn't fixed any slides in a week, so there was no MeOH-Acetone in the wrong freezer. Every bottle has been labelled a billion times over. I peek around my desk to watch them go through the other lab benches and then get to the hood.
Where they stop and start frowning. When the fire inspectors stall, they are looking for to make trouble with you. I jump up to forestall what whirlwind I can, and ask if there is a problem. They hold up a bottle of anhydrous isopropanol with no date on it. They tell me it needs one. I tell them a) I know that from being yelled at every six months by them, and b) there are initials on that bottle that do not belong to my PI, which means the bottle is not ours.
This guy starts pulling almost a mafioso type racket, telling me that "If it was opened only a year ago, okay, but if not," then he shrugs, letting ominous words linger. I tell him again that this hood is not ours exclusively; the chemicals in it not entirely ours. This does not seem to matter. If I can't find a date on when this bottle that has nothing to do with me and that isn't in any record I have was opened, our lab gets a citation.
I finally figure out whose are the initials on the bottle and point the inspectors in the direction of another lab's technician. This technician goes back there with them and they talk, I ignore it because it is now Not My Problem. Then there is laughter and an exchance in Russian. The accent I couldn't place with the lead inspector was apparently Russian, which the technician from the other lab is. There is none of the stern "This is your fault for having your lab space docketed around the hood that's not yours" lecturing or threats. Didn't see a single thing written down, no harsh language or severe frowns.
All because they are both Russian and I and my coworkers are not. That is so fucking unfair it hurts.
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no subject
Date: 2006-06-21 07:36 pm (UTC)As for the inspectors--how could I prove it? I don't speak Russian and I can't be sure they weren't cited, only that the Russian guy was treated a helluva lot better. That's not really grounds for anything. Plus, the last thing any lab wants is to make enemies of an inspector of any stripe. Your lab will never be forgiven for it.
no subject
Date: 2006-06-21 07:51 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-06-21 07:52 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-06-21 07:59 pm (UTC)Feels good to be a geek.
no subject
Date: 2006-06-21 08:07 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-06-21 08:41 pm (UTC)I'll agree with you here - nothing wrong with liking Dan Brown (although I personally think he's terrible, others clearly disagree), but that doesn't make you a geek. That's still mainstream. If they said they liked reading Isaac Asimov or Orson Scott Card, that would be different. Or if they built their own computers. Or studied languages for fun. Or wrote Star Trek fan fiction or were engineers or did something, anything, actually geeky.
God - there are apparently geek wannabes. How's that for a lack of personality?
no subject
Date: 2006-06-21 08:52 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-06-21 09:11 pm (UTC)Hopefully not the Pit of Voles.
no subject
Date: 2006-06-21 09:26 pm (UTC)I think it should be a pre-req that you not like Harry Potter fanfic in specific. You can like Potter and wear Gryffindor scarves in the height of summer and be a fanatic. But once you're in that cult of HP fanfic, something twisted happens to your brain that people outside it just shouldn't be exposed to.
no subject
Date: 2006-06-21 08:54 pm (UTC)That's possibly the most wonderful thing you've ever said in the course of leaving LJ comments. It gives me hope for the male species. And conservatives, even :) I, too, would celebrate almost any innocent-but-obsessive pasttime in an SO if it meant that they would acknowledge that, just because it's popular doesn't make Da Vinci Code good.
no subject
Date: 2006-06-21 09:14 pm (UTC)Though I usually can tell more from board game and video game choices than from book choices on this site:
Board game:
Checkers, Life, Connect 4, etc: Bad
Monopoly, Spades, etc: Tolerable
Chess, Scrabble, etc: Good
Memoir '44, Ticket to Ride, etc., or Bridge, Go, etc.: Bonus points
Something so obscure I have to look it up on boardgamegeek.com: Huge bonus points. Has only happened once :)
Video game:
"mario", Pong, solitaire, etc., or none: Bad
Mainstream platformer (e.g. Donkey Kong), sports game or The Sims: Tolerable
Pretty much any real game: Good
WoW, DDO, CoH/CoV, or Guitar Hero: Awesome. Never seen one, though.
Bad doesn't mean disqualifying, just that there has to be something else there. Also that you can't then claim to be "into" board or video games.
no subject
Date: 2006-06-21 09:33 pm (UTC)