I recently attended a pinball convention in a large northeastern city, thousands of people attended, everybody was white, i didn’t see one single black person…does anyone know why pinball is such a white hobby? i figured it’s because as kids growing up, white kids in the suburbs had extra money to waste on pinball while black kids in the inner city did not…does this make sense?
Pretty sure this falls into the opinion realm. Perhaps you should ask for a forum change, as you’re not going to get a factual (or possibly even coherent) answer.
NM
I would say that pinball is just another nerdy male hobby as well as a hipster diversion (no offense intended). It isn’t anything special about pinball in particular. Almost all such hobbies are heavily white especially when you get to the level of interest of traveling to go to a convention to participate in it. The same would be true if it were a Renaissance Fair, fly fishing or Star Trek convention or dozens of other esoteric hobbies.
It isn’t a dumb question but I think it is too specific.
Moved to the Game Room.
Colibri
General Questions Moderator
The paleness of their skin makes outdoor activities unattractive.
I’ve never noticed. But then, I’m deaf, dumb and blind.
But I bet you sure play a mean pinball.
I’m sure I saw I saw him tilt.
Like Shagnasty says, a lot of these geeky hobbies are white male-oriented. I try to join in sometimes. The level of welcoming is very varied.
The local SCA has black people but exactly zero Asian people. Try going hiking sometimes, you don’t find many Asian people there either.
I’ve never been to a pinball convention (they have those?). What do you do there? Just play pinball all weekend?
Anyway cons are a lot of money, and if you aren’t that into it and/or don’t feel that welcome you may not want to spend the money, especially if you have a partner that’s not very into it.
I joined meetup and attended several different meetups in my interest group and they were all 100% white. (Except for the natural hair convention…which was 100% black, ironically!) You get used to it…but at the same time you do wonder, do other Asians not like fantasy/sci-fi/geek culture? I know they do! So where are they?
A lot of white kids grew up in the suburbs. They had lots of friends, they’re kind of pampered, have an easy life - they’re told they’re special all the time and can be whatever they want when they grow up. Then they grow up, and really, they kind of suck at adult life, they have some dull job or no real job - and a lot of the friends they had growing up have gone on to do better things, make lots of money, have prestige social status what have you. Now, they are no longer equals with these people who were once just like them, their peers, their friends. So, they gravitate to anything that reminds them of when they were young and could be anything they wanted and were just as good and important as everyone else.
Or most pinball machines are in primarily-white neighborhoods for some unknown reason. Didn’t see one until I went to college, though, and we had black people and everything there. :rolleyes:
But…were said black people ever observed playing pinball?
Or else, you know, they just find the wide array of boards interesting and enjoy playing it and it takes a measure of skill and physical finesse to do it right and stuff.
But it’s a game, so let’s go with the lost youth and feelings of inferiority thing.
Now that I think about it, the only people I’ve known who actually owned their own machines and were into them were rather wealthy. One was the owner of the company I used to work for, the other was an attorney friend of the family. Losers 
I don’t know if what I have been to exactly qualify as “pinball conventions” (Pin-A-Go-Go and Pacific Pinball Expo), but the two main things seem to be, (a) people bring their pinball machines, and other people play them, and (b) companies that sell pinball parts (yes, they do exist) set up shop, and people buy stuff from them. Occasionally, there are pinball contests and seminars.
As for why it’s predominantly white (and, from what I have seen, predominantly male), it’s hard to say. My best guess is, back in the days before video games, white kids were more likely to have spare money for things like pinball than black kids. You don’t see many people born after, say, 1975 involved in pinball as they grew up at the start of the video game era (true, things like Pong existed in the early 1970s, but I consider the first appearance of Space Invaders as the tipping point).
As for why it’s predominantly male, it was “a boy’s thing to do” in the pre-video game days.
I wouldn’t mind going to a pinball convention-it would be nice to play some machines where the legs weren’t adjusted for maximum droppage(back legs high, front legs low). That’s the first thing I check when I check out a machine at a bar.
I think a lot of those things tend to cultural as much as economic. Someone who can find the money for expensive athletic shoes or team-branded clothing* can find loose change for video games or pinball. For whatever reason it’s less accepted by their peers to a degree that keeps them from getting into it. For all I know, that reason is “That’s a white dude’s hobby”.
*Not to imply that all black kids spend their money on such. Point being that you can find examples of targeted “luxury” spending in a lot of groups who don’t generally participate in other hobbies.
Pinball is what I consider a ‘retro’ hobby and I would consider it fairly obscure today. Lately the only pinball machines I see as a white adult are in movie theaters. Why it is such a white hobby is due to many factors, explained with a healthy dose of stereotype and over-generalization 
:
-White people just seem more likely to latch on to something obscure/niche in general. Perhaps because a white person is more likely to have the means/lifestyle/background that allows them to kill time, yet still wants to feel ‘unique’ in what they spend time doing.
-There is a running joke among some people of color which basically goes along the lines of the fact that while many hobbies (bicycling, skiing, hiking, etc) are enjoyed by people other than white people, its white people that are often spending a lot of money on it or take it to hilarious extremes. My mother-in-law loves telenovelas and watches her favorites religiously, but doesn’t go to telenovela conventions, blog about them, have telenovela parties, etc. Conversely, my friend’s wife is obsessed with Dr. Who, and actually goes to some Dr. Who convention in Cardiff Wales because she’s so into it.
-Things that get more popular with one particular group start to get lumped as that group’s “thing”. I notice that table tennis and badmiton skew very heavily asian, for example. There’s no reason someone outside that group can’t be into it, but since they might not necessarily be from the same culture dominant in the hobby, there might be a bit of a gulf in mutual understanding. Part of why my wife isn’t into some ‘white’ hobbies is that she doesn’t want to be the token minority in the group and feels she won’t be as fully accepted with it as other white people. While this isn’t always true or a rational feeling many people don’t want to necessarily ‘stick out’ in a group and it can cause certain hobbies/fields to get pretty homogenized.
-Adding on to that: Nerds can be depressingly racist (and sexist) at times. While many like to come off as intellectual and inclusive, often times they still carry their own prejudices and while they and others in their culture might be blind to it, people of color might really be aware. This stems from many reasons; one of which I believe is when a person feels like kind of an outcast but finds comradere in other similar outcasts, they get weirdly possesive and tribal when it comes to other groups stepping into their ‘thing’. Sexism is the same problem, some guys can’t wrap their head around the idea that a woman could be as into their hobby as they are.
I don’t know. I’ve been to a few video game conventions and I found them fairly diverse both racially and gender-wise.
I wonder where pinball machines tended to be set up in the old days. I wouldn’t be surprised if they were more common in white neighborhoods than black ones and that might explain part of the appeal, assuming the OP is right about the demographics of players on a large scale (I don’t know that he is and there are local factors that could answer his question). You probably won’t feel an item has nostalgia or kitsch value if it’s not part of your cultural background, so to speak. And romanticizing the past of a few generations ago is more of a white hobby for reasons that don’t need to be explained. But let’s not act like all hipsters are white, and Mr. Nylock’s post doesn’t deserve more than :rolleyes:.