when did nerds become fashionable?

[jefhatfield]

when i grew up, i was a nerd..i admit it..the highwater pants, a briefcase, and a tremendous fear of the opposite sex

what has made society change so much that kids are now regularly going to school with briefcases holding computers, and nerds are actually dating and living a more balanced and happy life:p

i have a strange theory but i think because someone like bill gates, with his strange appearance and his occupation got successful, it made nerds empowered to feel that they could somehow have some control...now it's ok for kids to have gates and people like steve wozniak (also a nerd) as heroes, not just britney spears (based on looks) or michael jordan (based on physical ability)

[Mr. Anderson]

Unfortunately, its just matter of money. Bill Gates is the best example..

Once 'nerds' started making the mega bucks with the start ups in 90s, the idea of the nerd changed.....

D

[eyelikeart]

Good call Mr. A. I think it's much more important for people to embrace others based on achievements such as Bill Gates, rather than just for beauty, etc.

While I wouldn't have considered myself a geek or nerd as a kid, I certainly wasn't popular either. I was one of those kids who kinds stuck around in the background, watching. I try to figure out what was the defining moment in my life when I started becoming one to be noticed more, and I think it's somewhere around the time I started school to get my design degree. :D

[Daveman Deluxe]

Originally posted by Mr. Anderson
Unfortunately, its just matter of money. Bill Gates is the best example..

Once 'nerds' started making the mega bucks with the start ups in 90s, the idea of the nerd changed.....

D

It's all about the Benjamins. Women started to realize that the men who can care and provide for them are the nerds, not the ex jocks.

Yes, that's an unfair generalization, but I've known enough people who can corroborate it to make me say it.

[jefhatfield]

Originally posted by Daveman Deluxe
It's all about the Benjamins. Women started to realize that the men who can care and provide for them are the nerds, not the ex jocks.

Yes, that's an unfair generalization, but I've known enough people who can corroborate it to make me say it.

in my high school in the 70s, the jocks got all the girls, and if the jock could beat up a lot of people at the same time for no reason at all, it made them more popular...twenty years later, if they have not seriously changed their ways, they are either dead or in jail and if they are walking the streets, they resemble the father from "married with children" ;)

and the nerds who didn't get the girls are doing quite ok and some have to chase them off...that story of the popular jock turned criminal and the gawky nerd turned successful businessman with a supermodel looking wife is a story i have seen played over and over again with uncanny regularity

what your generation saw, and mine before you, has been on the human script for many years

[etoiles]

...there is also a lot of pop/alternative bands which cultivate the 'nerd' look (think Weezer etc.). But I am sure that successful nerds (in reallife as in movies) have paved the road.

There is hope :p

[Durandal7]

It has been a trend through society to try and emulate those in power. In the middle ages there was a time in Britain when it was fashionable to be missing teeth and to use makeup to look pale and jaundiced because that was how the king looked.

Bill Gates' heaps of money helped. It helped even more when nerds started making wildly popular movies that glorified hackers such as The Matrix.

[Dros]

Originally posted by Daveman Deluxe
It's all about the Benjamins. Women started to realize that the men who can care and provide for them are the nerds, not the ex jocks.

Yes, that's an unfair generalization, but I've known enough people who can corroborate it to make me say it.

Is that an unfair generalization to nerds and jocks, or women?

[AhmedFaisal]

Originally posted by jefhatfield
in my high school in the 70s, the jocks got all the girls, and if the jock could beat up a lot of people at the same time for no reason at all, it made them more popular...twenty years later, if they have not seriously changed their ways, they are either dead or in jail and if they are walking the streets, they resemble the father from "married with children" ;)

and the nerds who didn't get the girls are doing quite ok and some have to chase them off...that story of the popular jock turned criminal and the gawky nerd turned successful businessman with a supermodel looking wife is a story i have seen played over and over again with uncanny regularity

what your generation saw, and mine before you, has been on the human script for many years

Well, I would qualify for the nerd category as well back then and now (unpopular in school, mainly because I actually tried to learn something there and not play cards during class, and now getting a PhD in Cell-Biology). Thing is, the girls that went for the jocks even if they would come to me now I wouldn`t want them, they are damaged goods. My g/f never was into that type of guys but into geeks. I mean what do I do with a supermodel wife who's intellectual horizon is Fonda tapes and beauty mags. I am a geek and I like geeky women.
Cheers,

Ahmed

[Daveman Deluxe]

Ahmed: Girls would come to me to talk, but go to the jocks for sex. I'll stick with geeks myself. :D

[shadowfax]

hmmm... i'm a nerd, and not really popular. i don't think that they are fashionable per se so much as more prevalent. i think that real nerds... the ones that fit the 1980s stereotype of socially maladjusted... aren't really fashionable. so if you mean, by the topic, that "nerds" have as a group changed themselves to become more fashionable, sure. i mean, nerds of old are still not popular. what we might call nerdy people now, though--intellectuals who listen to nonmainstream music, go to coffee shops all the time, and drive small, economical cars, or things along those lines--don't seem to be too similar to the nerds of the 1980s. still, those activities have certainly become more popular, and terming people who do them "nerds" has become much more of a neutral term than a derogatory one.

[jefhatfield]

Originally posted by shadowfax
hmmm... i'm a nerd, and not really popular. i don't think that they are fashionable per se so much as more prevalent. i think that real nerds... the ones that fit the 1980s stereotype of socially maladjusted... aren't really fashionable. so if you mean, by the topic, that "nerds" have as a group changed themselves to become more fashionable, sure. i mean, nerds of old are still not popular. what we might call nerdy people now, though--intellectuals who listen to nonmainstream music, go to coffee shops all the time, and drive small, economical cars, or things along those lines--don't seem to be too similar to the nerds of the 1980s. still, those activities have certainly become more popular, and terming people who do them "nerds" has become much more of a neutral term than a derogatory one.

i think now there are very commonly two types of nerds these days, nerd and nerd-light

the nerd is the one who spends the day at the library double checking figures from the united states statistical abract instead of going to the beach on a sunny saturday...they read engineering manuals in the tub until the water gets cold

nerd-lite is an intellectual who knows you can still be fashionable, live a balanced life, and realize that there is more to life than being smart or pursing intellectual pursuits every waking moment of the day

sexually though, jocks and nerds are alike and it is a misnomer that all nerds have no sex drive...that is a biological function and not related more to someone who dunks a basketball or reads shakespeare...remember iGav's post on that male handjob machine? he he...my guess is that nerds would use that thing as much as jocks :p :p

and remember "revenge of the nerds"...the two stars hooked up with girls in the end

[jelloshotsrule]

Originally posted by jefhatfield
iremember iGav's post on that male handjob machine? he he...my guess is that nerds would use that thing as much as jocks :p :p


uhh, wouldn't it be more since they're not getting any arse for real?

i know that's how my life goes... oh. i mean

[jefhatfield]

Originally posted by jelloshotsrule
uhh, wouldn't it be more since they're not getting any arse for real?

i know that's how my life goes... oh. i mean

i never thought about that, but prolly so:p

[Phil Of Mac]

Originally posted by jefhatfield
i think now there are very commonly two types of nerds these days, nerd and nerd-light

the nerd is the one who spends the day at the library double checking figures from the united states statistical abract instead of going to the beach on a sunny saturday...they read engineering manuals in the tub until the water gets cold

nerd-lite is an intellectual who knows you can still be fashionable, live a balanced life, and realize that there is more to life than being smart or pursing intellectual pursuits every waking moment of the day

sexually though, jocks and nerds are alike and it is a misnomer that all nerds have no sex drive...that is a biological function and not related more to someone who dunks a basketball or reads shakespeare...remember iGav's post on that male handjob machine? he he...my guess is that nerds would use that thing as much as jocks :p :p

and remember "revenge of the nerds"...the two stars hooked up with girls in the end

Who do you think bought all that internet porn in the mid-90's? Regular people, or nerds?

Nah. Nerds are great and I'm proud to be one, but popular? Not popular enough.

[question fear]

well, i for one think that the movie "the revenge of the nerds" was what caused the change in the tides...
--carly

[jefhatfield]

Originally posted by question fear
well, i for one think that the movie "the revenge of the nerds" was what caused the change in the tides...
--carly

that really was our rallying cry and we were so proud of that movie

i was in college at the time and the movie seemed to accurately portray the two sides most often easily identifiable at school

its funny how the nerds ended up getting the girls and winning the fraternity contest

[Fukui]

Originally posted by jefhatfield
nerd-lite is an intellectual who knows you can still be fashionable, live a balanced life, and realize that there is more to life than being smart or pursing intellectual pursuits every waking moment of the day
Wouldn't that be considered normal (moderate) person??

[scem0]

when did nerds become fashionable?

when people figured out that I was one.

scem0

[shadowfax]

Originally posted by scem0
when people figured out that I was one.

scem0 no, that's when i started binge drinking 'cos i realized i might be categorized with you... :p

[jelloshotsrule]

Originally posted by shadowfax
no, that's when i started binge drinking 'cos i realized i might be categorized with you... :p

oh snap!

please. late night trashing. please

[jelloshotsrule]

Originally posted by jelloshotsrule
oh snap!

please. late night trashing. please

guess not

this place used to be fun at night.

[shadowfax]

Originally posted by jelloshotsrule
guess not

this place used to be fun at night. oh, snap! now i get what you meant!


i have a real problem with people that try to act like they're nerds because they think nerds are cool. take your emo glasses off and spit you coffee out on your retro shoes, losers!

[jelloshotsrule]

Originally posted by shadowfax
oh, snap! now i get what you meant!


i have a real problem with people that try to act like they're nerds because they think nerds are cool. take your emo glasses off and spit you coffee out on your retro shoes, losers!

this is not nearly personal enough. you must attack someone on here directly

thusly, i resign to sleeping

where's tazo when you need him........

[lmalave]

It depends on your definition of nerd. If nerd is synonymous with social misfit (my definition), then nerds are by definition not cool and can never be cool.

If nerds are just a style of dress, then I guess it was inevitable that "nerd chic" style would become popular. I mean, jeez, you have "white trash chic" with the trucker hats and all, so I guess anything's possible.

[mac15]

I don't think nerds are at all fasionable, it all depends on how you define nerds. If by nerd you mean a guy who carries a laptop? thats not nerdy. But the guy in the glass' , pants that don't reach there shoes . Well thats nerdy to me anyways :)

[scem0]

Originally posted by shadowfax
oh, snap! now i get what you meant!


i have a real problem with people that try to act like they're nerds because they think nerds are cool. take your emo glasses off and spit you coffee out on your retro shoes, losers!

Once again I am in a category with you shadow! :D

I also hate it when people get the emo glasses and try to look nerdy. I hate it even more when they struggle to turn on the computers at school...

I guess, being a true nerd myself, that I am more adept to pressing large, obvious buttons on the front of obvious computer cases. I could only imagine how hard it would be for someone who isnt as versed in the actions regading geekdom.

scem0

[Giaguara]

yea, it has changed .. i was nerdish. now im just a geek. i wonder where all the nerd guys when i studied are now... :)