nongamer reactions to your hobby

To be honest I really to try to be a non-conformist and when studying computer science, as I do, this is even encouraged as I try not to get associated with the computer nerd image. The fellow students who know me closer are aware of the fact that I play recockculously complex historical simulations.

Still, when some of them 'surprisingly' picked me up for a game basketball I let them in my room where I had two games set up, one of which being the a two-mapped scenario of LEUTHEN. I have about 50 games in a shelf facing away from the entrance, but they did see them and one asked why I don't study history instead. Well, because I like to eat.

Anyways, most war game boxes have Nazi imagery on them, which is really embarrassing. I hide away a few of the more offending game covers such as UP FRONT, PANZER COMMAND and VON MANSTEIN'S BACKHAND BLOW.

Yeah, being a wargamer in germany has to have a whole nother set of stigmas attached to it.

I have not had any bad reactions from non-gamers that I've met. Mostly because they all have non-mainstream hobbies themselves and don't judge. The bulk of people I know, family and friends, are casual gamers that play games availible in the big-box stores. (Walmart, Target, etc.) Their reaction is ususally "I didn't know there were so many games!" and "Where do you get all these games?", both of which were also my reaction when I found BGG. My great-grandfather began collecting games before the Great Depression, mostly poor mass-market ones, and my family just assumes that I take after him.

hancock.tom wrote:

Yeah, being a wargamer in germany has to have a whole nother set of stigmas attached to it.

Speaking of stigmas, has anyone in Dixie (or anywhere else) ever had someone react badly to a civil war game? Are there many civil war games with the "Stars and Bars" on their cover?

lots of people watch war movies and enjoy them. No problem there right? if they see you enjoying a war-game you could just explain its like a war movie. only its a game.

Schweig! wrote:

To be honest I really to try to be a non-conformist and when studying computer science, as I do, this is even encouraged as I try not to get associated with the computer nerd image. The fellow students who know me closer are aware of the fact that I play recockculously complex historical simulations.

Still, when some of them 'surprisingly' picked me up for a game basketball I let them in my room where I had two games set up, one of which being the a two-mapped scenario of LEUTHEN. I have about 50 games in a shelf facing away from the entrance, but they did see them and one asked why I don't study history instead. Well, because I like to eat.

Anyways, most war game boxes have Nazi imagery on them, which is really embarrassing. I hide away a few of the more offending game covers such as UP FRONT, PANZER COMMAND and VON MANSTEIN'S BACKHAND BLOW.

Just to show there are no hard feelings and that we are a happy & stable world, we need to get a game of Escape from Colditz going (and it has a swastika on the box) - with a Brit, German, Pole, Dutchman, & Frenchman (?) playing ... and even better still, draw the roles randomly and you have to speak in that team's accent.

Or we can just forget I said anything.

hancock.tom wrote:

Yeah, being a wargamer in germany has to have a whole nother set of stigmas attached to it.

Yes. But only the WWII war games are a problem. 7 Years War, Napoleonics and even WWI are all wars you aren't frowned upon by being interested in.

Southernman wrote:

Just to show there are no hard feelings and that we are a happy & stable world, we need to get a game of Escape from Colditz going (and it has a swastika on the box) - with a Brit, German, Pole, Dutchman, & Frenchman (?) playing ... and even better still, draw the roles randomly and you have to speak in that team's accent.

Or we can just forget I said anything.

See, I'm certainly not sore about WWII, that was way before my time. But the public opinion is slowly altered to a view that the Germans were just mere victims in the global struggle that was the Second World War. The devastating caused by the German army and the vast Nazi structures that remained after the war shall not be remembered. Antisemitism is en vogue again, neatly disguised as criticism of Israel. And that's what pisses me off, that a nation can apparently go through such shit as starting a world war and a genocide and not learn from it.

Sorry schweig - that wasn't meant as a poke at you, rather a poke at all of us.
And a bit sad about what you're saying about a prevailing attitude in your country - sounds like some people are slowly heading to where Japan has been for the past 60 years ... but let's NOT start that up in any form at all in this thread, else we end up in Thunderdome !

Death and Taxis wrote:

I tried explaining the whole Ameritrash/Euro/Wargaming/RPG/Everyotherfuckingthing to my wife and she gave me a look that was part pity and part "I'm gonna call the men in the white coats now". (insert appropriate emoticon here)

I tried to explain the AT/EuroGame distinction to my girlfriend a couple of years ago, and with her usual tact, she interrupted my third sentence by saying, "Okay, I'm bored now. Let's talk about something else."

Death and Taxis wrote:

Nerd is very much a derogatory term applied to the large-brained but socially inept among us while Geek is a mild and friendly term used to describe a fan of anything not considered mainstream.

I've encountered this distinction before, but it honestly sounds like something that that borderline nerds came up with to make themselves feel superior to the other nerds.

its funny (in a not so funny way) how present ultra-right groups/sentiment/politics play the victim-role so well.

back to games though, I enjoy wargames even though im decidedly anti-militarist. I see no problems here, as games to me are a safe way to experience and understand what i regard as "unsafe" subjects, stuff thats moral grey zone. wars. famine. murder. strife. etc. Just like movies give you a safe experience about something. I realize some people might frown upon seeing some war symbolism used but really i just say have you seen " apocalypse now" ? good movie eh? this game is good like that!

Nerds? NERDS?! NEEERRRRRRRRDDDDDDDDDDDSSSSSSS!!!!!

timeLESS wrote:

its funny (in a not so funny way) how present ultra-right groups/sentiment/politics play the victim-role so well.

?

Bringing politics into a discussion that's not about politics makes you a wanker. When you can flip the political group mentioned with its opposite and it reads the same, it makes you a double wanker with cheese.

After this past US election season, are people not sick to death of politics? Must we talk more about it? Will the madness never end? Won't somebody please think of the children?

Shellhead wrote:

Death and Taxis wrote:

Nerd is very much a derogatory term applied to the large-brained but socially inept among us while Geek is a mild and friendly term used to describe a fan of anything not considered mainstream.

I've encountered this distinction before, but it honestly sounds like something that that borderline nerds came up with to make themselves feel superior to the other nerds.

Every subculture arranges its own hierarchy. Even moreso if that subculture is itself considered less acceptable than others.

I'm sure we've all seen this before:

http://static.mmoabc.com/my/P/u/n/ch/2007/12/13//1197585855086.gif