Being Pushed Aside for Greater Things

A few years ago, I was told to go to a new grocery store, and take advantage of the sales from it. The area was making new shopping centers all over, and you could see all sorts of potential growth. It was an odd sight, because I had to get their through a very bumpy and difficult road, and know the correct turns or I would be very lost.

The grocery store was trying to have an old west feel to it, with dust covered wagons, and old buckets or items from yesteryear on display. The ground was cracked a bit, and had some other problems, but you could see they were ready to change that quickly.

As I walked around, I noticed something really interesting. The first part was that the younger staff assigned to work in the aisles was mostly attractive girls. They were quick to help us find the items we needed, and then get back to their work. I noticed another part though, many of the customers seemed pretty ragged. There was poor, and then there was the sort of messed up. One guy seemed to be talking to the milk section. Another one had holes all over his clothes.

When I walked up to the cash register, the guy working had the tell tale signs of burn marks all over his face. He was polite, and did his work well, but you could tell there was nerve damage with his fingers as he tried to add our various items together.

When I walked out of the store, I sort of didn’t want to return. The entire atmosphere had this sadness, and sort of desperation to it. I knew that an airforce base was nearby, and found out later that many of the people living in this town were rejected from their service, and just stayed in the town. There are some really nice people in this town, but it always feels like it has been rejected, and not quite up to par.

Driving home, I pictured the expansion of the shopping centers, giving jobs to everyone. Then the housing market would provide better, and better places to stay, so the area would go from the sad place to a booming area. It is a common thing, and even today you see how the city planners are changing things around. My mind could create the new town perfectly, and how all of the new people don’t even think about the old members of the town.

Then I remembered the man with the burn marks, and the guy talking to the milk. What would happen to them? Would they be pushed out to some other town? Would people mistreat them?

What also hit me was how much this was happening everywhere. In the town of Union Gap in the Yakima area people are being crowded out by nice shopping areas. Those same people are the most likely to break into your car. The same is happening in parts of the Seattle area. The creepiest sight I saw was the police rounding up homeless people so the national Democratic party could meet there. We were told they would be put into better homes and stuff, but I never found out if it actually happened.

I don’t know what to call that feeling, it’s ambivalence, but also realization and a bit of horror. The recipe for such an emotion is happening with a few things right now, and people are starting to notice it. South Park talked about it for an entire season. Other sources have been pointing out how it deals with games. Then I realized my sister was talking about it when I brought up nerds. The term is getting changed, so the original nerds are no longer allowed into their own group.

South Park has been covering this idea for all of Season 18. I don’t claim to watch the show, but apparently it has been about how people feel they are helping, while pushing away the very people they say they are helping. It’s about how the town of South Park decides to upgrade the town’s image. The first thing they do is hire a principal who demands that everyone be Politically Correct or be beaten and mistreated. The reality is that the principal is a frat house party guy that is only doing the PC thing to pick up girls. He is just as callous and horrible as you can imagine, but covers it up with public displays of sensitivity.

The town also feels the same way. The slums of the town soon get new shopping centers, and a Whole Foods store all around them. Whole Foods offers congratulations to anyone offering to donate a dollar or a small amount to help starving people in a far off country. The poor right next to the store are carted off and treated horribly by the people who congratulate themselves for helping the poor. The advertisements and way of thinking goes really deep into the modern political psyche and how it is used within advertising. We go on crusades for a subject we couldn’t care less about because it makes us feel good.

We don’t have a PC principal in the town I went to, but the rest is very accurate. The feeling is over how the area is improved by the stores, and shopping. The people who live their, and many of them are not someone you would normally want to talk to, are treated as in the way or directly against this new form of growth. A guy talking to milk is not a great way to sell a grocery store.

Imagine someone who has next to zero self consciousness about himself. He dresses in old, stained clothes that can smell from misuse. His hair is uncombed, and he has not shaved in about a week. That not only describes someone you don’t really want to meet, but also half the people at the comics shop for Free Comic Book Day. I could also be describing some of the pioneers in Computer Science, or at the local gamer area in the nearby college.

The reason for the similar description is because geeks and nerds were people willing to give up social status for things they loved. At the MIT model railroad club, they actually had terms for unwashed body particulate getting clogged in keyboards, and other things. They were also the forefront of computer science creating things like computer languages, compilers, operating systems, videogames, even more videogames, and text adventures. We seriously owe these guys a lot, but would have a hard time being in the same room as them at their prime.

In fact, Academia has been creating this image of the disheveled genius for years. A man who knows how the world works, but forgets to wear pants. Just about every mad scientist stereotype you can think of was actually a description of an average scientist. The weird laugh, and way of speaking is because many of them were German.

There were good looking members of academia, but they chose to look weird instead. I have spent quite a bit of time trying to find a fairly attractive looking polymath. If you check pictures of Nobel prize winners, you will notice that the male winners will look average at best. The women will vary much more greatly, because the stereotype isn’t expected for them.

The reason why I bring this up is because of something mentioned by Archimedes123 on youtube. In his video, he describes how videogame companies seem to be pushing all sorts of gimmicks, and then dropping them quickly. The reason why is because they are looking for the next big thing. This next big thing involves all of the gamers who are not playing consoles right now for whatever reason. This is basically an attempt to attract the gamers that do not identify as gamers.

Virtual Reality, Motion Control, Online Flash Games, Farmville, and so many smartphone games get power because companies believe this will be the next big thing. This will be the thing that lets the major game companies into the market of 100 million Wii players. They are not aiming at the person who identifies themselves as gamer, but to those that play games, and spends money on what is commonly called casual games.

He further submits that when these games become popular, the gamers now will be called casual or unneeded. Those people who pushed themselves for days on end, and couldn’t stop playing Halo or Final Fantasy will be the outsiders looking in, not the insiders allowing others to play with them.

Although Archimedes does not take it much further I can add some thoughts to that theory. Not only have the major game companies been working to replace the current gamers, they have been waiting for it to happen. If you follow the games of Naughty Dog from the major breakthrough of Crash Bandicoot, to Jak and Daxter and then to Uncharted and the Last of Us, you would notice how much their style changes over the years. The games start off as cartoonish, with simple controls to someone climbing mountains while sneaking up to kill enemies. The style evolves at what the company believes the average player would find interesting. The change in Jak and Daxter to a darker more emotional story was a bit jarring. Then when you compare the controls, you see how Uncharted feels like a more adult version of Jak’s climbing and fighting style. The reason why I bring Naughty Dog up is because Sony owns it. The ideas and pushes from the publisher were in this direction.

As gamers get older they tend to leave gaming, or stop spending as much on it as the younger players. Because of this, entire genres were ignored for years. There wasn’t a Side Scrolling Super Mario Bros on two Nintendo Consoles. In fact by the time we hit the PS2, there is no major conversation on the big new side scrolling game coming out. Why? Because the new gamers have not played one. The same can be said for Arcade games or top down style games.

It all came crashing down into me when I had a conversation with my sister. She loves videogames and all things nerdy. It would be difficult for her since my Mom’s side of the family is engineers, chemists, accountants, and various academics. I felt like I was letting down the family when I became a history and anthropology major. She was raised to love videogames, and will talk about them for hours. Her favorite game has been the Legend of Zelda, and she actually has all of them on the Wii. Her favorites are Wind Waker and Skyward Sword because of the art style.

The reason why I bring this up is because I overheard her talking with friends about dating. The one that was simply a no was a gamer that goes to the local gamer lounge in the local university. He has unclean clothes, a bit of a problem socializing, and can be described as nerd.

She has friends that forget to take baths, and don’t dress up for things. They hang out and go to big things. Where she lives, everyone is a geek or nerd of some kind. However they also work hard to have a nice appearance. Then she pointed out that she loves Marvel movies, but is likely not going to read a comic book. She loves videogames, but likely won’t play the shoot shoot bang bang games.

Without me bringing it up she talked about how she viewed arcades as smelly dungeons with guys that never bathed. When she saw a modern arcade she really enjoyed it, but had no intention to try out a classic one. That sense of nostalgia others might feel for it bring thoughts of dread with her instead.

“If you showed Chris Pratt or Chris Evans playing a nice clean happy arcade game,” says my sister, “I would suddenly want to play them.”

To her, the image needs to be, and is, being changed. She accepts the nerdy things more, as do many more people who do not claim themselves as geeks or nerds. They feel proud of themselves at dressing up as Captain America or Samus Aran on Halloween. It becomes popular to call yourself a nerd, or to do a geeky thing. Chris Pratt is funny, good looking, and is the only reason to see Jurassic World. In fact, Finn in Star Wars should have been played by Chris Pratt.

The image and use of geeky images means that everyone becomes a geek, but the geek himself remains unpopular. The push of the gaming companies, and thus many of the nationalisms is that this new thing may be what replaces the old. This may be what brings in the 100 million Wii players or smart phone gamers. As the companies pretend to be on the side of gamers, they also intend to replace them.

This leaves the question of what happens to the Geek or Nerd? Very likely the term will become popular but the people it is actually about are marginalized or treated as if they were never gamers before. A new term will be made to describe the geeks of the world, Fedora for example, and this will be used with disparaging remarks. Like the guy talking to the milk, these are people that have difficulties being social -even with the milk- and are considered not someone you want to hang out with.

Society views these people as something in the way, and enjoy pretending to help to feel good. At the same time companies move into areas, and make it look different while pushing away the original inhabitants. Oddly enough this is happening to gamers. As my sister grows up, and lives among geeks the notion of what a geek is changes. Thus, the lowly unsocial super fan is being pushed to the side.

If this pattern sounds familiar, I sort of had to stop and reread it myself. Without thinking about I somehow covered many of the same feelings Native Hawaiians and Native Tribes in the US feel. They are pushed to the side for a better thing, and then sort of treated poorly as their own traditions and ideas are used to promote a sensationalized advertisement of these old traditions.

The thing is, it also describes people that need help in a completely different way. I don’t have answers to this at all. I have actually never returned to that grocery store because the other customers scared me off. On the other hand, they deserve to be helped, and taken care of somehow. This strange marginalization is a difficult thing, and gives off several emotions at once. As they are pushed away, their problems will only get worse, and likely the new people will push them to some other town.