I’m a computer geek guy. I’m a fat, ugly, opinionated, bushy bearded, long haired, Monty Python, Simpsons , Star Trek and comic book guy loving slob who thinks that only points of clothes is prevent nekidness and to be as cheep as possible, and thinks that proper spelling and grammer and writting style are pedantic skills better left to tech writters.
I’m also a manly many type. I believe that knowing how to fix a car, recognize a pitch, identify a hockey player, shoot and skin an animal, chop up a tree, build a fence or a house, sew up your own wounds with fishing line, and start a fire with sticks and twine are important skills to practice, and that you should never bitch about pain, protect women even to the point of looking like an ass, cook your damn steak rare, say fuck-all to wusses afraid of food contamination, and appreciate a well crafted beer, whiskey or whisky.
I’m the Asian girl dressed up as a Japanese anime or video game character at the sci-fi convention.
I’m the girly girl who cries at the end of the predictable chick flick when the girl realizes that the down-to-earth guy is the one she really loves.
I’m the shopping-is-a-competitive-sport woman who can spend six hours at the mall trying on clothes, not buy anything, and consider it a successful shopping trip.
Defy:
I’m the fashionably dressed 30-year-old woman at the comic shop coming through boxes of old What If comics looking for a #16 to complete my Shang Chi collection.
I’m the girl in the mini-skirt who gets in line an two hours before the amusement park opes so that I can go running to the best roller coaster in the amusement park line and ride it 10 times in a row before the line starts to back up.
I’m a leftist vegetarian nerd student who despises basically everybody. I like computers and have a small circle of friends who are also nerds. We get together and do nerdy things. I have opinions about everything, especially gay rights, women’s rights, saving the whales and racism.
[sub]Well, I’m not a vegetarian as such. Close, though. Closer than most, anyway.[/sub]
As a gay man, I am frighteningly good with plants. In fact, I’m even better with plants than other gay men who are into plants. I scare them. When they try to match plant knowledge with me I make them run away like little girls.
Even if you’re a professional, or a biologist or something I’ll still sneer at you if you tell me such and such plant is difficult to grow when I’ve not only grown it, it bloomed and went to seed and I grew more from the seed.
Up until recently, I was a collector of comic books and action figures who was unemployed and lived with my parents. I’m not in the greatest shape of my life, my hair is starting to thin in my mid-20s, and I have a beard. I was a real late bloomer and still have never dated much.
HOWEVER, I am very aware of the negative “Comic Book Guy”/“Cat Piss Man” stereotype of comic collectors as antisocial nerds and pathetic losers, so I do my best to fight it: I played in several bands in college, I have a couple degrees, I finally have a decent job and I wear a suit and tie to work, I have wonderful friends, I dress well when I go out, and my personal hygiene is pretty darn good. Also, to further confound the stereotypes, I would wear my faded Green Lantern and Flash T-shirts to my law school classes, and my nicer vintage-retro-looking shirts and two-tone wingtips to comic conventions (with plenty of deodorant to counteract everyone else!).
I am the dyke with a ponytail hanging out the hole in my ball cap, driving my Nissan X-Terra to Home Depot to buy blades for my table and skill saw. I’m the butch late-30s neighbor walking her three dogs, painting the outside of her house, trimming the trees and hauling things to the dump. I’m the big girl sitting across the aisle from you in McDonald’s wearing all men’s Old Navy clothes, white gym socks and LL Bean mocs. This “mode of casual me” renders me all but invisible to many straight men (except those that ask me at Home Depot “Do you work here?”) and all snotty Nordstrom saleswomen.
~and~
I’m a very well-dressed English professor wearing a Ralph Lauren suit with a tasteful scarf and expensive loafers. I’m the woman who can be depended on to see both sides of heated political/pesonal issues and offer diplomatic resolutions (another form of trimming trees and transporting unwanted things to the landfill.) When in professional mode: men “see” me, suddenly notice I’m blonde and well-bosomed, hold doors for me and make small talk. I get quick service in tony department stores and bars. Hah! If they only knew that I was wearing Hanes Grandma Underwear for Dykes underneath it all!
I’m a gamer who will debate the pros and cons of different role-playing systems and will say, “Missed your dex check!” if someone drops something. I also have no dating life.
As a weightlifter, I will take WAY TOO LONG describing my workout routine in excrutiating detail to anyone who asks.
As a doper, I am really bothered by poor typing, grammar, or spelling. I am VERY embarrassed if it’s my own mistake.
I’m a nerd: overweight, awkward, with bad skin who runs linux, reads comic books, wears glasses and revels in many traditional icons of geekhood. (but I do have a gorgeous girlfriend, and no longer live with my parents)
I’m a hipster wannabe: shaved head, goatee, Buddy Holly-style glasses, occasional attendance at shows featuring obscure/local bands, movie snob tendencies. (but I actually enjoy said music, and don’t feel superior about it)
I’m a country boy: I like to shoot, drive pickups, make and eat BBQ, listen to country music and drink inexpensive beer. (but I’m ultra-tolerant and my girlfriend is adorably ethnic)
I’m an Italian-American: I cook lots of pasta, I make my own sauce, I listen to my mother, I talk with my hands, I’m olive-toned and hairy, and I’ve been known to wear a wifebeater, at least one of which is stained with tomato sauce. (but I’m not Catholic or involvled with any family that’s not genetic)
Reinforces: I am a soccer (baseball, football, basketball, swimming, water polo) mom, who drives a mini van.
Defies: A Texan without boots or a 10 gallon western style hat and don’t wear jeans. Hubby and son have jeans but don’t have western boots or hats either.
The hat of choice around our house has always been a bucket hat. Everyone at our house screams like a little girl at the sight of a snake and we haven’t had a gun or rifle under the bed in 18 years.
I think I perpetuate a lot of stereotypes about my generation by trying my best not to perpetuate stereotypes, if that makes sense.
If this isn’t a stereotype yet, it will be…I am in my early 20’s, very intelligent, good at a little of everything, but I haven’t been to college, didn’t graduate high school mostly because it was boring, and I am regretting it now.
Hmm, I have three tattoos, 9 earrings, too much jewelry and black clothing. I listen to a wide range of music, but mostly hard rock. I have just managed to find my natural hair color again, but am already considering going back to black-ish. I have a tattoo that includes a pentacle, and no, dammit, for the last time, I am NOT a Wiccan! My political views are centrist bordering on anarchistic, I am cynical minded and trust no one until they prove themselves worthy. This seems to be rather typical of folks my age.
On the other hand, I’m a young woman in the Deep SouthTM, a Daddy’s Girl who can talk him into or out of almost anything, an expert in behaving myself in polite society (even though I never do!), and I can charm the pants off just about anyone. Typical Southern Belle, when I need to be. I look durn professional in a suit, with my glasses on and my hair swept back, only one earring per ear.
Basically, I am walking contradiction. A pile of stereotypes and abnormalities. I am completely normal.
I’m a redhead and I can get so instantly, blindingly angry that I scare people. And then an hour later I am sooo over being mad and totally embarassed about perpetuating the stereotype.
I’m a single gal with cats (who I’m secretly convinced are going to eat me one day when I crushed by stacks of falling newspapers).
I’m the whitest white girl ever and I really, really can’t dance (unless I’m drunk and then yous till wouldn’t call it dancing).
But, I’m also an engineer with multiple tattoos who’s a liberal (very rare in the civil engineering world). I’m the only rower I know who can row with long, fake fingernails. And I’m a Southerner, born and bred, but I can talk faster than anyone you’ve ever met…