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Gamer Hierarchies and the Great Ordning

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03 Aug 2017 11:59 #252072 by Jexik
One thing I've found both on these forums and in person is gamers' (and other people's) desire to place themselves above others. Magic players will look down on the Yu Gi Oh community; board gamers will bag on Monopoly, Settlers, Munckhin, or whatever "I'm too cool/enlightened/smart for that now" sort of game. Some of us on the AT side will point out games without enough interaction, while the Feldians will dismiss our games as being too childish or luck-based. Matt Drake or Barnes will go to GenCon or somewhere else and get upset at the state of creeps, cosplayers, and overweight folks.

Sure, there are people who will pretty much play everything, but they're rare. There seems to be a lot of effort to justify "these games of ours" to friends, family, and society, and to somehow distance ourselves from those, "losers/children/neckbeards/stuffed shirts," over there. "That's not me, bro."

Why do you think we do this? Do you do it? Is it justified?

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03 Aug 2017 12:14 #252075 by charlest
This is in all facets of life, not just gaming. We're talking more about the human condition, wanting to feel special, and dealing with identity issues.
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03 Aug 2017 12:19 #252077 by Michael Barnes
There used to be a funny org chart out there that had this all laid out for you. I don't remember how it went down, but I do remember that Puffing Billy players were at the very bottom.
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03 Aug 2017 12:27 - 03 Aug 2017 12:30 #252078 by Da Bid Dabid
I'm always pretty self deprecating about the gaming hobby as a whole, only in close circles I would speak without reservation to avoid the sort of judgement in the OP. Holding on to an early childhood fear of getting "beaten up" or at least being the outcast nerd by my peers. I'm stunned how open others, especially younger folks, can be about what they do. Likely some of that is the internet not only allowing a connection to judge others but also find like minded folks where you wouldn't be shunned.

I don't think I'll ever be able to explain Blood Bowl as more than "Oh, I play fantasy football" unless that comfort zone has already been established.
Last edit: 03 Aug 2017 12:30 by Da Bid Dabid.

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03 Aug 2017 12:37 #252079 by bfkiller

charlest wrote: This is in all facets of life, not just gaming. We're talking more about the human condition, wanting to feel special, and dealing with identity issues.


Exactly. It's essentially the same reason racism exists at a psychological level (at least theoretically). Viewing differences as inferior is an ego-protection thing.

"Their nerd thing is worse than our nerd thing! We are the better nerds!"

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03 Aug 2017 12:59 #252081 by the_jake_1973
I can reasonably say that this site is better than 90% of the boardgames subreddit. That's just science right there.
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03 Aug 2017 14:02 #252088 by hotseatgames
Con-goers who have horrible hygiene deserve every bit of vilification they get.

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03 Aug 2017 14:09 #252091 by Legomancer
I only feel superior because, objectively, I am superior to someone who's got an encyclopedic knowledge of German WW2 field munitions.

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03 Aug 2017 14:09 #252092 by OldHippy
Personally I'm more embarrassed by they hobby than anything else. I don't really go around bragging about my taste in games publicly. If it comes up, fine... but I try to downplay it and present it as a childish thing I just can't let go of.

That said I do think humans are naturally attracted to the idea of making hierarchies in some way. We say don't judge and we try to mean it but we don't mean it. We all judge pretty much all the time. It's what humans do and figuring out what the hierarchy is fits in with a natural human instinct. It's something that all animals do to some degree, not just us, it's ingrained in the DNA somewhere. Sometimes the hierarchy is justified and the judgement is correct (even though we like to pretend we're all equal and everything is subjective... it isn't) and sometimes it's wildly inaccurate. A hierarchy of gaming preferences... that's very, very low on the hierarchy of hierarchies. Some of it is just jokes too, and jokes frequently have victims. If you find yourself the victim of a joke... try your best to laugh it off and remember the time you laughed at some other victim.
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03 Aug 2017 14:19 #252093 by Legomancer
Seriously, though, the chart I remember had furries at the bottom, which was funny because I'm not a furry and I don't think I know any furries but I've never had furries come and shit up something else I or someone else liked. Far as I can tell, they do their furry thing with each other and more power to them. I have, however, dealt with or been a part of nerd communities that are supposedly "above" furries and they regularly make shit miserable for other people. If we're not creating unhealthy sycophantic "fandoms" to weirdly organize around we're making elaborate purity tests to determine who even gets to be in the unhealthy sycophantic fandom.

You can always look around a nerd space and find someone worse than yourself because it only gets worse. It's a non-Einsteinian space in which every single point is somehow worse than every other point. In a single day you can hear nerds giving themselves three cheers for being so intellectually curious and open minded and then hear them upset because Domino being black now is "too different" despite absolutely no one giving a shit about black OR white Domino for 30 years.

Fighting about whether wargamers or CCG players are worse is a loser's game.
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03 Aug 2017 14:28 #252094 by RobertB
I've said it on here before: everybody's somebody's weirdo. To phase it a little more negatively, I'm getting too old to worry about what some jerkass thinks about what I do for fun.

However, if I want to weigh what society as a whole thinks of boardgaming, I think an argument can be made that video games are legitimizing boardgames above and beyond the old family standards (Monopoly, etc).

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03 Aug 2017 15:11 #252096 by Shellhead

Legomancer wrote: Seriously, though, the chart I remember had furries at the bottom, which was funny because I'm not a furry and I don't think I know any furries but I've never had furries come and shit up something else I or someone else liked. Far as I can tell, they do their furry thing with each other and more power to them. I have, however, dealt with or been a part of nerd communities that are supposedly "above" furries and they regularly make shit miserable for other people. If we're not creating unhealthy sycophantic "fandoms" to weirdly organize around we're making elaborate purity tests to determine who even gets to be in the unhealthy sycophantic fandom.

You can always look around a nerd space and find someone worse than yourself because it only gets worse. It's a non-Einsteinian space in which every single point is somehow worse than every other point. In a single day you can hear nerds giving themselves three cheers for being so intellectually curious and open minded and then hear them upset because Domino being black now is "too different" despite absolutely no one giving a shit about black OR white Domino for 30 years.

Fighting about whether wargamers or CCG players are worse is a loser's game.


I've seen that geek hierarchy chart. I couldn't find a legible-sized picture of it, but here's a link to a pdf of it:
www.smofbabe.net/geekchart.pdf
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03 Aug 2017 15:12 #252097 by SuperflyPete
Personally, I give not a single fuck where I lie in the gamer spectrum. I'm just me. I only know how to be me, and I excel at it. Everyone else is just a spectator in my existence.

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03 Aug 2017 15:44 #252098 by Msample

JonJacob wrote: Personally I'm more embarrassed by they hobby than anything else. I don't really go around bragging about my taste in games publicly. If it comes up, fine... but I try to downplay it and present it as a childish thing I just can't let go of.
.


When I go to conventions, I just tell coworkers " Went to visit some friends in ( insert convention city name ) . Saves a lot of explaining.

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03 Aug 2017 15:53 #252100 by Black Barney
Furries and erotic furries are the same thing, believe me.

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