Elitist Geeks

[IamEmancipated]

There's a local gaming store (well, 45 minutes away) that I dislike entering as well because it feels like I don't belong there. It's nothing against the store---hell, the cashier the last few times we went was awesome in helping to explain some things about the book we bought (Mutants and Masterminds) as well as being extremely patient while I sorted through the big box of dice for a mostly-matching set.

But sometimes when you get in there, the stares and the general feeling of animosity makes me just want to walk away. We don't buy something from them every time, sure, but we did have an idea of wanting to buy when we walked in, you know. Mostly that comes down to not having the right amount of funds at the time (for something we found cheaper online).

Sure, we aren't hardcore gamers, but I've been playing tabletop D&D and Vampire/Hunter/Werewolf for close to 6 years now, and I think I can describe how to bull rush an opponent just as well as any other D&D nerd. (I stat monsters for fun, too!) It just feels like somehow you aren't welcome. :\

[XCashier]

Back in the nineties my parents painted a whole load of the figures for the local GW displays. They stopped very abruptly due to starting to find the figures were getting chipped and looking bad - which was soon explained by seeing an employee resetting a display by sweeping the whole shelf into a box haphazardly and practically chucking it across the room away from him rather than taking care of them.

Hand-painted figurines, tossed around like Legos?! Shameful! I hope that employee got reamed out for his carelessness.

I've gotten dissed at comic stores and conventions too. Don't know if it's due to my gender or if they just didn't like me. (I'm one of those awkward weirdos that people either instantly love or hate, very little in-between. ) But when you're considering buying merchandise and the merchant talks down to you and shoos you away like you're an annoying child, yeah, that's really going to sell a lot of comics, asshole.

[PepperElf]

Thank goodness I've never gotten that reaction (yet)

Same here. Or rather if I did I probably didn't even notice it. Most of the geek guys I know just seemed glad to talk to fellow geeks.

Although I did have one kling-on who... didn't treat me like a slut, but talked to me so much I actually avoided the store a couple of times lest I be roped into another will-it-ever-end conversation with him. And.. coming from me that's something - cos I'm good at talking too much myself.

[pzychobitch]

Jerking off while Fem-Shepherd has lesbian sex with an Asari does not count as a lay.

Hey, we can dream can't we?!

Kudos for the Mass Effect reference too

[Argabarga]

When I first started playing M:tG my brother and I would go to this one store to buy cards, almost every time the owner would sigh, stand up from his game and grudgingly sell us our stuff. Needless to say that store closed a LONG time ago.

For some (hilarious) reason, that scene played out in my head with Comic Book Guy from the Simpsons in the starring role:

"*SIGH* Fine, I will do it for you this ONE time... but I'll have you know... you have ruined my chances of getting a free tractor on Farmville, I HOPE you are happy!"




I've never been into comic collecting, tabletop games, card games or other hobbies that tend to coalesce around "hobby" stores like these, but I HAVE noticed that a very large portion of the people in them, especially younger males, go bonkers when a woman shows up. Closest analogue I can draw is when you're gaming, and one of your party lets on she's female, suddenly, there's a very vocal minority that starts negatively critiquing her playing style, choice of equipment, tactics, basically everything.... for what reason, I don't know, but a psychologist could have a field day. And then there's those immature types, who, free behind the "anonymity" of the internet are free to just be jerks with their gob-smackingly funny "Hey, showz us urrr tits!" comments. Maybe it's hormones? I dunno.

[raudf]

Closest analogue I can draw is when you're gaming, and one of your party lets on she's female, suddenly, there's a very vocal minority that starts negatively critiquing her playing style, choice of equipment, tactics, basically everything.... for what reason, I don't know, but a psychologist could have a field day. And then there's those immature types, who, free behind the "anonymity" of the internet are free to just be jerks with their gob-smackingly funny "Hey, showz us urrr tits!" comments. Maybe it's hormones? I dunno.

My husband had two players that behaved kinda like this both in character and out. He got tired of it and would either kill their characters off using a high charisma/appearance girl in character OR turn them into girls in character and watch them sulk the rest of the game. They never learned any better in character (any character they played) but out of character, my *ahem* commentary about how genitals were measured in my family shut them up pretty quickly.

[HYHYBT]

...my *ahem* commentary about how genitals were measured in my family...

You're just begging for someone to ask about that, aren't you?

[dragon_wings]

You're just begging for someone to ask about that, aren't you?

Yeah, I want to know too. :P

[Amanita]

I remember going into a gaming/comic shop with a friend of mine once- after the way the staff acted, I avoided the place for a LONG time.

Now, I used to be into Games Workshop, as a painter/collector and sometimes gamer. I had to give it up when I moved to Toronto in 2001, as I couldn't take them all with me, and would have had no space to work on them anyhow.

Sometime after I returned home, I was giving thought to getting back into it. A friend and I went into a store downtown which sold that stuff. While I was in there, I noticed one of the GW books sitting out, tossed haphazardly on top of a stack of boxes. I picked it up to have a look, and was leafing through it admiring the crapload of photos of painted miniatures, when somebody came up behind me and yanked the book out of my hand. WTF? Some fanboy who couldn't wait his turn, or ask to see it when I was done? No, it was a member of the staff, who began to lecture me about how the book wasn't supposed to be out, and on and on like that.
Well, if the book wasn't supposed to be where people could pick it up, how was that my fault exactly? And how was coming up from behind and grabbing the thing out of my hands supposed to protect it? Sounds like a recipe for damage to me, what if I had been holding a little tighter, or resisted? I bet the guy would have tried to blame me in that case. And just what was so hard about asking me for it, if it wasn't supposed to be out in the open and needed to be put back in its place?

I avoided that place for over a year, and told a lot of my geek friends why. However, I did eventually go back- I figured that with the high turnover in retail, the guy who was so rude to me might not even be there, and I was right- he was nowhere to be seen, and the staffers there were much nicer. I ended up buying some stuff from there, before they went out of business.

[Ryooshi]

I very much sympathize with the OP. when my husband and I moved to a new city 5 years ago we did a lot of searching for a new comic book store. I am very picky, as I don't like to be stared at (somewhat attractive and often stop in after work still in combats), and I don't like the place to smell bad. We found one close to home and I was ecstatic! Then they had to shut that store down due to a leasing dispute; a sad, sad day.
I now drive a 1/2 hr through downtown traffic to get to their main store just so I can be comfortable shopping. They make it worth it though, and I will still shop there when we move out of the city and it turns into a 45 min drive every 2 weeks.

[raudf]

You're just begging for someone to ask about that, aren't you?

Well, there was two versions, one involved seeing how much weight said "body part" could lift w/o falling off and the other was "the winner was the one that didn't bend when ran into a brick wall." And now commence the wincing, but keep in mind this isn't as graphic as I got with the guys.

Mind, we didn't ACTUALLY do that, unless said family member was doing a "hold ma beer!" Darwin tried his best in evolving my family...

[AnaKhouri]

My husband's friend has a bad geek shop owner story. I just remembered it.

In the town where we went to college there is a small gaming shop. It's one of only two in town so it does OK I guess. One of the employees (I don't think he was the owner) was nicknamed Jabba behind his back, and not just because of his physical size and personal hygeine(though I'm sure that had something to do with it as some people can be pretty cruel about that stuff) but his general attitude. He was ...unpleasant and often played games on the clock when the store never had more than one employee working at a time- Jabba expected customers to come get him if they wanted something. Luckily I don't game much so I never really interacted with him.

Anyway, Friend went in one day to purchase some Warhammer 40K stuff (about $60 worth, he said). Jabba was 'working' (playing a miniatures game with some regulars). Friend called out that he was ready to check out. He says Jabba didn't even look up, just grunted something. He repeated himself. Jabba ignored him. So Friend walked out, still holding the miniatures. Yup, he stole $60 of stuff out from under the empoyee's nose because Jabba was too lazy/careless to help him buy it legally.

Husband told Friend that stealing is wrong etc but I don't know if Friend ever took the stuff back; this was all related to me secondhand by Husband years after the fact.