Popularity Contest
I'm going to do something my friend Phil hates: take a subject raised on the group email list we have and discuss it on my own page, rather than among friends. But, since it's relevant to more than just my friends on that list, I thought I'd spread the love around a little. Sarz, Phil. :-)
Paul Graham (whom I don't know from Adam, but isn't that the beauty of the internet?) wrote an interesting little essay on why nerds are unpopular. Summed up ever so poorly, the essay's argument is that nerds are unpopular because they don't take the time or have the desire to handle popularity's upkeep.
I definitely tried to be popular, in a short-lived run that ended in 5th grade. I invited the "cool" girls (plus two of my "nerd"-friends) to a slumber party/birthday party. Since I invited them, I would automatically join the ranks of the priviliged invitees to their next soirees. Yeah, whatever. Needless to say, my little scheme never worked. And that was even the 80s. I hate to think what I'd have to do now.
I wanted to be popular, but as Graham mentions, I wouldn't trade my intelligence for popularity. I secretly envied my best friend, Arwen, because she was smarter than me. But I think in late jr. high and high school, she kind of became tokenly popular, perhaps because some of the valedictorians were actually in the popular crowd as well.
I think, though, that being smart didn't turn me into a nerd. At least if I had been a nerd, I would have been noticed. No, I think intelligence (and/or common sense) made me invisible. I wasn't nerdy enough to even receive the negative attention of the popular crowd. To them, I was simply another person in the school. That was the worst part of secondary education.
Comments
I am off to my 40th high school reunion this weekend. I am looking forward to it and dreading it. What do you say to people you didn't know that well 40 years ago? I begged and pleaded two good friends to join me (the third died from smoking 5 or 6 years ago now) because I didn't want to be in a room full of people I didn't know. I think the problem I had in high school, similar to Danielle's, was that I was not popular, nor was I nerdy, therefore, I am a nonentity. Danielle had her music, I had debate.
Posted by: Jan | August 9, 2004 8:50 PM
It would just happen that the two comments so far are both from Johns, so I can't just single you out. OK, here's the deal: John T = computer geek, John K = music/audio geek, Jon D (if he ever reads and/or comments) = band geek. 'Nuf said.
Computer geek: You say you weren't unpopular--but were you actually popular? Maybe I'm confusing my eras and it was harder to be popular in the 80s than now (after all, that hair is hard to compete with, if yours doesn't feather properly).
Music/audio geek: Come now, that isn't a very nice thing to say. :-) I thought once we hit our 30s we are above and beyond such juvenile name calling (geek, however, will probably never go out of style...)
And yes, I had a friend named Arwen, yes, from LoTR, but not because of the movies. They also called their pickup Strider. I haven't talked to her for a while, but I wonder what comments she gets on her name these days.
Posted by: Danielle | August 4, 2004 3:21 PM
Wow, you had a childhood friend named Arwen?! Most impressive...
As for the nerd thing, good points, but as for you being a nerd...well I hate to break it to you, but ya kinda are! Perhaps different from we nerds in the tech camp, but nonetheless... ;-)
Posted by: Doc Dregs | August 4, 2004 3:07 PM
Paul Graham is a god among programmers, even if he is a little on the conservative side for my political tastes. That probably doesn't help much by way of describing him, so let's just say he's one of the few people who can write AND code, which means he can write books about coding that are actually *helpful*. Imagine that.
Anyway, I also disagreed somewhat with what he had to say regarding the reasons for unpopularity. I am a nerd. I was not unpopular.
I guess popularity has a great deal to do with how many people know *of* you. My friends and I independently wrote, edited, published and distributed our own underground school newspaper (mostly a kind of satire of the actual school newspaper, which nobody liked for a variety of reasons). Therefore, everyone kind of knew who we were. Therefore, we were, somehow, against all odds, popular nerds.
Posted by: John Tietze | August 4, 2004 2:48 PM