Ugh. It reads like a long rationalization of why the author was unpopular growing up.
Leading with the Einstein quote sets it all up nicely for him. “I am unpopular, therefore I am smart and the people who don’t like me are dumb.” As has been mentioned above, there are plenty of nerds who are not smart, there are at least as many smart people who are popular as there are smart nerds, and there are plenty of people who have all the characteristics of nerds, but are still popular.
The following is just bizarre:
Besides characterizing everyone who isn’t a nerd as a superficial airhead, it is an entirely unsupported supposition that falls apart with the barest of examination. One characteristic of nerds is their lack of breadth. The popular kids are generally the ones who are multi-tasking - clubs, sports, activities, etc.
I think nerds are the way they are for one basic reason - lack of social skills. Look at all the heads of tech companies - they are all powerful and charismatic people, while at the same time share with nerds interests in math and computers and probably science fiction too, but no one would ever call them a nerd. These people have hired thousands of employees, almost all of lower intelligence than themselves, but don’t show the disdain for them that the author of the article exhibits.
Exactly – that “OR” is very important. The article’s author himself acknowleges at one point that what makes for a “nerd” is the lack of either interest (“focusing on something else”) or skill (“lacked the talent”) to play the social hierarchy game.
Because “people skills” are skills. They have to be learned and practiced. However, many people do not realize that. They figure that if it “came naturally”() to them, then anyone to whom it does not has “something wrong with them”. ( but of course, all that means is they they more readily learned, from example rather than deliberate teaching) .
The thesis of the article IS very interesting – with school as a make-do holding pattern until the young people can make it to something productive, a segment of the population will seek to impose dominance over others just to have some order in their universe. And for another segment that is going to mean total misery because they do not yet have the mental and emotional tools to understand that it doesn’t matter if the jocks or the class queens won’t give you the time of day, there’s a life to live.
One thing however that I don’t seem to see acknowleged is that in large measure this is because the entire environment ever since preschool makes such things as “plays well with other children” criteria for developmental evaluation. The schools actually tells the kids from an early age that the “right” thing is for everyone to be together one-big-happy get-along. And of course, there’s the hammering of the concept of the “well-rounded student”, which gives great weight to non-academic extracurriculars. So they get the seed planted in their psyche that “there’s something wrong with” someone who does not take easily to enjoying the same things that others do – this being a problem for humans, for whom “different does not necessarily equal bad” is one of the hardest lessons to learn at any age.
As with others who have posted, there were no real “castes” in my school – never mind that it was a private school, that phenomenon DOES happen in private as well as public schools. But at that particular time, the size and social composition of the class (less than 60 in the whole graduating class) was such that it would have made no sense to create a caste structure.
…however, I must say that it would be better to say “were focusing all their talents on something that was NOT conducive to popularity”. That mitigates the “justificational” tone that Lamar Mundane denounces. After all, some of them may have been indeed focusing their attention on something completely and utterly pointless.
I can accept that. After all, I knew smart kids that focused a great deal of pointless attention on Star Trek trivia. To them, it was more important. I guess a big factor is how much importance an individual places on popularity.
To me, I had a chip on my shoulder because I lived on a farm, which was an hour bus ride home every night. Not only did that carry a stigma with it, but it made participation in social activities nearly impossible. Especially without a driver’s license or a car.
While I don’t agree with all of his generalizations about nerds and non-nerds he does make some interesting points about general happiness among young people.
When I was going through puberty I put holes in walls and whatnot and was continiously told by my parents that is was just chemistry. This usually only served to frustrate me more. In the article he talks about how today teenagers are basically useless, and it seems clear to me that this is at least as important as any hormonal changes a person may be going through. Most teenagers don’t feel useless because of phsyiological changes, they feel useless because they are useless, generally speaking.
For the most part what a person learns in school is unimportant beyond tests, as the article points out. So what this leads to upon graduation is a group of people who have been mostly useless for 18 years with very few really useful skills. Generally I think nerds probably realize this more than the rest, which only leads further down unpleasent roads.
Popularity is a game in public school. Nerds generally realize that the whole thing is pointless and don’t play and are then preyed upon by others. The article spends most of its time talking about Nerds vs. The Rest obviously, but I think that the overally idea of frustration/uselessness felt by teenagers is more important.
In general, they are physically unattractive - Sex is a huge biological driver. If you aren’t getting enough sex, I think that it can create a lot of self-doubt, resentment and other emotional problems.
They lack social skills - Shyness or awkwardness can lead to “nerdism”. If you are physically unattractive or even just average or plain looking, and you aren’t outgoing, there’s not much left to attract other people to you. The result is that you get “lost in the crowd”.
They are physically weak - If you are small and scrawny, you make a much easier target for bullies. Our validictorian was also capt of the basketball and baseball teams. I don’t he think got picked on all that much.
They are lame - Lets face it, work and school suck. People like other people who are fun or amusing or witty or attract the opposite sex. If that’s all you have to talk about in your life, the only people who will want to hang out with you will be other people who only want to talk about work or school.
They are not involved in anything mainstream - It’s fine to be part of the D&D squad or AV club, but these are activities that tend to involve a tiny, self-selecting homogenius group of fringe people.
They have a “seige mentality” - Partially a reponse to feeling picked on and persecuted, partially resentment, and partially due to their timid nature, nerds tend to be wary of outsiders. Especially those who are more popular than they are. It makes it very dificult to make friends outside of your circle if you afraid to take social risks.
I don’t know where this notion appeared that “coolness” “nerds” and other social hierarchies disappears with high school. I found my college to be very cliquish. And from what I’ve seen, it doesn’t disappear in the work place as you get older. The only diference (as the article points out) is that the pool of people gets larger so that it’s easier to find a group of people to hang with. Pretty much anytime you have a closed social system ( school, summer camp, prison, an episode of Average Joe) you are going to have a social hierarchy. Every hierarchy has it’s A, B,C,and D players.
I think they would just be straight-out “Geeks.” While Nerds are often Geeky, you don’t have to be a Nerd to be a Geek. And you don’t have to be smart to be a Geek.
FINALLY somehow who speaks the truth! Look, all this psychological introspective debate is nothing but a load of self-justificational whooey! Nerds are nerds because they are physically unattractive! Period!
I’m sure there are a few exceptions, but face it folks - its all about looks.
I’ve found just the opposite - the only people still playing the popularity games in college or the workplace are the people who are still stuck in their high-school mentality, and it becomes glaringly obvious who these people are as you get older. From my experience, the people who get stuck in the high school mentality seem to be people who haven’t had very broad life experiences - they grew up, went to school, married and worked in the same place all their lives. In other words, they are frightened by change and challenged by anyone who’s done more with their lives.
Glad someone agrees with me. But it’s not just “looks”. It’s sexual attractiveness. Basically physical looks for girls (prettiness, big boobs, etc). For guys, it’s looks but also things like athletic ability, confidence, and whatever the heck else it is that women find attractive. But in the end, it all pretty much boils down to sex.
Hell, if you are getting laid all the time, why would you
featherlou - That’s a pretty simplistic response. I don’t care how much a person “travels” or “experiences”. It is a natural inclination for people to bond with people with similar interests and personalities and exclude those who they find abbrasive. The drivers in the work environment might be diferent than in high school, but the same politics are still there. If you think you can just come and go at work and chalk up office politics as “high school mentality” you are doing yourself a disservice. Its not always the best worker that gets promoted.
Many primary and secondary school students aren’t having sex often, or at all. And that’s as it should be. They’re kids. I’d be much more worried about the middle schooler (and “nerdhood” usually manifests itself by middle school) who was having sex than one who wasn’t.
Regardless of their physical attractiveness, most teenaged girls can get plenty of sex if they’re willing to put out for any guy that wants it. This is a sure-fire way to gain a certain kind of “popularity”. Yet despite getting laid all the time I don’t think many of these girls are any happier or better off than the lowest of the nerds. Most suffer from their share of, that’s right, self-doubt, resentment, and emotional problems.
I was quite interested in the article and also the comments here. I’m glad to see that many did not have the typical American high school experience so popularised in TV and film. Not being from the US, attending junior high or high school looked torturous unless you were a jock or cheerleader.
My experience was totally different as I went to a private single sex school, we wore uniforms, playing sport did not necessarily make one popular and there was no competition vying for the interest of the opposite sex. Academic excellence was encouraged. AFAICT everyone got along well, nerds were not ostracized and there was no specific popular crowd.
I know it sounds rather unbelievable but we are talking back in the late 60’s here and it really was like that at my school at least.
Both my kids went to regular high schools and after checking with them they said yes there is a cool crowd and nerd crowd but there is no bullying or animosity toward the nerdy kids. It certainly is nothing like what is portrayed in American schools.
I waded through most of page one of that article and then gave up. Yadda yadda yadda.
I went to a large-ish school in S. Calif. Several thousand students. Funny, a lot of the popular kids in my school were not particularly attractive. They might have had more money or a popular sibling or something like that, but some of them were downright odd-looking. (I remember the girl with the unibrow. Hung out with the popular crowd.) We had flat-chested homely popular girls stuffed into trendy clothes who thought they were all that and more. They were “popular,” after all. I could not recognize one single outstanding feature about them (looks, intelligence, personality) that explained their popularity—they just were.
There were also some people that were very attractive, dressed okay, but were not popular for whatever reason. Some, I think, were simply not interested in jumping through the particular hoops required to remain popular. Or perhaps there was something about them that didn’t allow them to be accepted by the popular crowd. Whatever.
There were also some people who were popular because they were truly nice to everyone. These people were usually very confident, “leader” types of kids, and were accomplished in some way. I remember one guy (who has since gone on to be an actor—I’ve seen him in a few bit parts on TV) who had a big nose and a very “nebish” kind of look. Not handsome. But he was one of the most loved guys in school because he was so nice to everyone.
I didn’t have a chance in hell of being popular in school, but if I had to choose which category that I fit into (as cited in the article), I probably would have been table C. Barely. I had a decent circle of friends and as long as I stayed away from the asshole popular bully types, it wasn’t too bad at times. I got a lot of positive attention for being the “class artist.” Other times, it was worse, as there were definitely those popular types who fed their egos by picking on the nerds. (And even though I was a C table type—marginally—I was definitely a nerd!)
Some of the asshole popular types, I daresay, experienced a rude awakening when they got out of high school. Because their mediocre looks, arrogant personality and sense of entitlement did not serve them in the real world. They were just another shmuck who wouldn’t automatically get respect dished out to them. They’d have to earn it, just like the rest of us had learned to do back in school. But many of these kids had never learned how to earn people’s good opinion of them. Being a shallow, snotty bully hadn’t given them the necessary skills required to interact with people in a positive way.
I’d say the author is on target in some respects. That’s how I felt about popularity in high school, anyway: it would have been nice if fewer people picked on me, but I had enough friends and didn’t care enough about the rest to change my behavior. He’s perhaps being overcharitable in saying this is why ALL nerds are unpopular. I think a lot of it has to do with a lack of social graces. The writer asks why smart people can’t just figure out how to be popular - it’s because in addition to the looks issue, the ability to get along with people isn’t related to how smart you are. Some people just have a better sense of how to behave in social situations.
Geeks? I don’t know. Frankly I’m amazed at how specific the terminology is getting these days. Interestingly, though I’m friends with some people like this (people who are very into Tolkien, role-playing, Star Trek, etc.) And I always have had some friends like that, which should tell you how popular I was. But I feel uncomfortable around them at times, and in my opinion that’s for the reason described above. For one thing, some of them just don’t know when to stop talking about their particular obsession. A myopic fixation on one topic just gets unnerving sometimes.
I agree. I was with the hippie/wild bunch, but I had nerd, jock, greaser friends and lots of people interacted in all groups. Nerds are pretty hard to define. It has more to do with social graces than with intelligence.
Yeah, I’d say that the way the words are used today, it is the exact opposite of the view previously posited in this thread.
Namely, you can be a nerd without being smart…it has to do with social intelligence. Whereas you might call the CIO of a tech company a “geek” if he’s interested in technological minutia, but you wouldn’t call him a “nerd” (well, if he comes across as more Ellison than Gates.)
Personally, even though I am into gaming, I don’t consider myself a gaming nerd, because I have the social intelligence to only talk about it with people who are interested in it. Whereas, while I like better music than anyone else ;), I am a music nerd because I talk about it so much it bores people to death.
Ha Ha! That was me in the overlap. All-State band geek by day and then my freaky nerdy Hermann Hesse-reading friends and I would smoke cheap giggly pot and lay around listening to music after school.
Amen to that. The girls were at least on their way in terms of puberty and a lot of the boys hadn’t even started. Prepubescent boys with high voices trying to make it with girls with boobs and periods. Bullying was at it’s zenith. What a mess.
I think my HS - a large middle - upper middle class suburban affair did a pretty good job rewarding academic excellence officially and amongst the student body. Being on the honor roll garnered a certain amount of grudging respect from the “popular” crowd which (as always) was largely made up of the quarterback - sports captains - cheerleaders types. So generally being a nerd - even in the social misfit sense - wasn’t always met with put-downs.
I thought the article had some interesting, insightful points, but I think that’s not really hitting the nail on the head. As others here have said, it’s about more than intelligence, more than appearance. Some of my unpopular friends were as dumb as rocks. In all honesty, I was probably the smartest out of my circle of friends, but I was not the least popular. Oh, I was down there, but I wasn’t the worst. Social skills have a lot more to do with it. Remaining popular can also involve a certain amount of cutthroat ruthlessness, too, in my experience. That I had, in spades, but I didn’t have the rest of the skill set, so I wasn’t popular.
What’s interesting about the popularity question is its chicken-or-the-egg nature - are nerdy kids unpopular because they are nerdy, or nerdy because they are unpopular? I think it’s a little bit of both, and the article failed to touch on the cyclical nature of the popularity process. I was unpopular, and so I developed more intellectual habits to keep myself occupied. As a result, I became more of a nerd and more unpopular, and so on.
I have to say that I was VERY disappointed with the second half of the article. The author was spouting a lot of pseudo-historical “fact” about the Renaissance and Middle Ages that greatly reduce his credibility to someone who knows even a little bit of social history about the period - such as his assertion that people who train until about 30 for their careers these days are approaching the average life expectancy for the time. This is simply wrong - infant and child mortality was very high, but once out of childhood, a person had a high probability of surviving at least into their 40s or later (particularly in the Renaissance). Little will reduce someone’s credibility in my eyes more than basing their arguments on incorrect information that they are trying to pass off as fact.
Actually it was a lion rampant.