Proving ourselves, over and over again.

You are safe here. No matter what kind of geek you are, or whether or not I understand your passions.

This ground is yours.

Yes. Thank you. And you are awesome.

Exactly. The first response to feeling threatened is to become defensive - to respond in kind to the challenger. But in a lot of ways that is just as problematic because you've just allowed them to choose the ground on which you fight.

Now, it has been a looooong time since anyone geek-checked me, but my stock response is now more likely to be a look of exaggerated pity and "Wow, your life must be very small and sad."

"you've just allowed them to choose the ground on which you fight." Exactly. And letting your opponent choose the ground rarely works in your favor.

The whole "fake girl geek" thing is bizarre. Fortunately, nobody has ever asked me to defend my cred - or maybe they have, and I just thought they were making conversation. Either way, I don't care what they think of me. When someone asks me what my fandoms are, I say, "Indie comics; in fact I draw an indie comic. Check out my table in room X! I also like science." Then the conversation usually turns to how awesome science comic books are, or they lose interest and wander away, which is fine too.

Maybe I'm just (not) meeting the wrong people. Although I give myself points for just plain obliviousness.

Plain obliviousness is often a good strategy for not only evading said credential checking, but also deflating it - if they don't get a rise out of you, they might be more likely to stop. I'm convinced a lot of the "credential-checkers" do it to get people defensive and therefore give them examples to point at of women being irrational and defensive and invalidate female emotions. *eyeroll* My inability to read social cues sometimes comes in handy that way - it's hard to get a rise out of someone who doesn't realize or care that you're trying to piss them off.

It already is driving away the next generation of geeks. My sister and her friends are all into fantasy and really geek out about it, but few would describe themselves as geeks - there's this perception that if girls like it, it's not geeky, and it's really visible when I see them hanging out, discussing urban fantasy or Welcome to Night Vale or Supernatural or the Hunger Games. Why is Lord of the Rings acceptably geeky and Supernatural isn't? It's unfair and driving people away, and it's misogynist. We need to storm the gatekeepers and remind them that women have been driving forces in fandoms since the beginning. If they push us, we need to tackle them back. These are our spaces, too.

Yay Night Vale! Seanan has been tweeting about it too!

I wrote a little blog post about how I'm kindof a fake geek girl because I don't have that passionate investment in any one fandom I enjoy and am rather more passionately invested in geekdom as a culture, but decided I couldn't publish it because I couldn't bear to remove the laundry list of credentials I'd included to prove how I was a valid geek anyway. If I couldn't even take me seriously as a geek without listing those off, how could I expect anyone else to do so?

It's awesome that you provide a safe space for us :) Thank you.

This has nothing to do with cred-checking and the faux fake girl-geek movement but it came up today - a woman artist responding to an article in the Daily Mail that was supposed to be a review of her concert and instead was an expose of her wardrobe malfunction. I thought you might enjoy it.

http://amandapalmer.net/blog/20130713/

Here is your internetz. I wrapped it up pretty for you.

word.

Have you read this? Michelle Rodriguez Made Me Cry at Comic-Con

Because I love it so much.

That was a pretty awesome article!

(And then I committed the cardinal sin of reading the comments. Ugh.I never learn.)

I am lately coming to terms with how I go straight into active checklist demonstration mode in certain situations, and how many of the "shut up, Wesley" looks and little hand waves and looking-straight-past-me things have been more entrenched sexism than my not measuring up, ever. Like I never had a chance in those situations, and never will.

Stopped myself from commenting, yesterday, even, because I found myself cred-checking my own right to discuss the cred-checking experience. To myself. As I wrote.

WHAT IS EVEN THE HELL.

Word. It's like a perpetual gaslighting machine. Not an easy thing to short-circuit, either inside our own brains or when we see it happening to others.

Anywhere, with anything, humans will look for more reasons to exclude than include. I don't know why this is. I play the Elder Scrolls games, yet I get bashed by the Loredinators (people with an obsessively dogmatic attachment to THE LORE, which even the devs can't be assed to stick to most of the time) and told I am not a 'real TES fan' for not caring how Nerevar wore his mohawk and for changing stuff in my own stories etc to make things work better. I play World of Warcraft, but I get called 'noob' and 'casual' (like it's a terrible thing) because I'm not raiding every day and decked out in Tier Whatever The Hell It's Up To Now gear. I think people have decided "Unless you're on the extreme fringe end of this fandom/game/etc, you are no geek. Begone!"


I'm tired of it.

I've been a geek long enough that I don't think I count as a girl geek any more ( maybe I can be a lady geek?) and I've always been put off big geek gatherings by that sort of credential checking. I really appreciate safe spaces, so thanks for providing one. Relatedly, I was just looking at my kickstarter account and realizing that of the last four things I backed, three were recommended by you, most recently that Salt and Burn game ( which I am super excited about). Please keep up with the kickstarter recs, they are fab!

If you're at a con, you're a geek. Period, end of story. Hardcore, lifelong fan, casual interest fan, it doesn't matter, the people attending like what the con is aimed at enough to invest the time and money. To me, if you're there, you're a [fandom] geek, so let's have fun geeking out and talking about our shared interest in a place where everyone around us is going to understand why we're rolling our eyes over Peter Jackson's decision to have elves at Helm's Deep and we can take comfort in knowing we're not the only one who can quote large sections of the Lord of the Rings trilogy from memory, not to mention sections of the commentary tracts off the extended editions.

I've only been to one con, The Gathering of the Fellowship in Toronto in '03, and no one ever gave me any crap about geek cred or my costume. I had no idea women were being called on the carpet to prove themselves until I started hearing about the Fake Geek Girl thing recently, and it pisses me off. If anyone attempts to cred check me in the future, they'll get an unequivocal "Piss off!".

"You are safe here. No matter what kind of geek you are, or whether or not I understand your passions."

Thank you. A major reason Sarah and I are as devoted fans of yours as we are is that you have been extremely welcoming to us, and our fellow fans at your events have been similarly welcoming. As we've been slowly getting into attending cons and other large geek gatherings, I'm dismayed to learn that not all of fandom is like this. Thank you very much for the space you provide for us, and I hope we can all make such spaces more common.

I think that people always have the opportunity to refrain from responding, whether outwardly or to their own selves, with negative emotion. That's the reflex response, the instinct - but it makes you a weak geek.

I had a discussion about this with my husband on my way home from work today, brought on by your blog entry yesterday.

I said: "I really feel like these days to be taken at all serious as a geek, I have to be ALL KNOWING! ABOUT ALL THINGS GEEK! EVEN THINGS I LOOK AT SIDEWAYS AND GO WHATEVER FLOATS YOUR BOAT MAN BUT I DON'T GET IT! Whereas a guy can be deep in one thing, or shallow in a bunch of things, and still be taken seriously and not looked at like he's a pretender who's degrading the entire medium by daring to exist."

He said: "That's because cred checking is impossible. The minute someone tries to cred check you they've already decided you don't belong and will adjust the bar however high it takes to keep you out, even and especially if they couldn't clear it themselves.* It's not intended to set a bar. It's intended to bar everyone that doesn't have a penis and doesn't conform and it's stupid ass bullshit, and I think those men should go home and think very hard about who they expect to date if they exclude all the girls, because I'm willing to bet they're not all being happily gay together, particularly since most of them also seem to be homophobic."

Me: "Apparently they don't want to date geek girls. They want to date NON geek girls, which would probably work as well as me trying to date an investment banker." (note: after I said this I thought of several geeky investment bankers I know and felt bad.)

Him: "Apparently they want to date sitcom wives who will spend the rest of their lives rolling their eyes about what a loser their immature lout of a husband with his 'games' and his 'comic books' is. I hope they get it. They deserve that hell."

This is why I married this one. :)


--

*Note: I have been cred checked by people who were wrong. As in, the cred check question answer they had in mind was incorrect. Fortunately or unfortunately, my memory for things I've played or read is frighteningly good (can't remember my own phone number or how to find my way home off the Garden State, but I can quote passages from books I read fifteen years ago verbatim--I would be deadly at Geek Jeopardy). I don't find this as satisfying as other people seem to, particularly since it either gets countered with a "NU UH!!" style refusal to believe me, or a "WELL I BET YOU DON'T KNOW THE ANSWER TO THIS EVEN MORE OBSCURE QUESTION THEN!!!!" bar raising, and that just further reinforces that there's no way I'll ever be accepted by this person, or at least viewed as something other than a hostile interloper who wants to destroy his precious precious with my evil vagina power.

Yes, you married a good one. So did I—they're not rare. However, they're comparatively quiet (not a hard thing.)

There are many people, of every gender, orientation, and expression that are bigger fans of just about anything you can name than I am. And that's cool as fuck. My girlfriend (cassandrasimplx) is a *huge* Whovian and manga/anime/etc aficionado[2], and about six times the Trekkie I am. It's awesome. :-)

I have the benefit of being a straight, white, physically-fit dude in a kilt; nobody checks my cred (and if anyone checks my regimentality, they had best be *very* good friends of mine, or they get dressed the fuck down). I wish I could share my privilege as widely as possible, like an AoE buff, but I'll do what I can - IF ANYONE HAS SUGGESTIONS FOR HOW TO DO THIS WELL, PLEASE LET ME KNOW.

I like hanging out with fans, even if I don't know anything about their fandom of choice. I might learn something cool, but, even if it doesn't do anything for me, it makes them happy, and that's what being a fan and passionately enjoying something is all about.

As a con staffer[1], my job is to make sure people have a good time, and I will definitely be on the lookout for the kind of cred-check harassment that happens as I'm able (though, admittedly, my attention to more predatory harassment, a'la the need for Backup Ribbons, takes precedence... hopefully, there will be little enough of the latter that I can curtail the former).


[1] DragonCon's MMORPG track, if anyone wants to check it out; I am also a line wrangler and official minion for the Kilt Blowing this year
[2] After going toe-to-toe with Joe Peacock about manga and Kurosawa's influence on George Lucas last year, she said, "So, am I a fake geek girl?" and he said, "Of course not! You're wearing jeans and a hoodie." (Part of the conversation had spun off from his essay on fake geek girls, and a fetish model who had done a Jessica Rabbit cosplay to win a costume contest at some previous convention, and both CS and I took him to task for that essay, resulting in, I think, a bit of backpedaling on his part.

I suppose I am lucky not to have noticed the 'cred check' phenomenon for myself, perhaps I don't go to enough cons. Strong female participation has always been a part of any fandom or geeky activity that I have been involved with, be it media, comics, gaming, historical recreation, LARP, filk, cosplay or just good old SF. I would think it a loss for there not to be women in my fandoms or for them not to be considered on an equal footing with the males.

My oldest daughter and her group of friends are all into the Marvel Cineverse, manga and anime - to the point that they took extra curricular Japanese lessons. She reads prolifically and writes fanfic and will chat half the night to like minded girls across the world (if she can get away with it). Friends have her down as a possible future SMOF.

My youngest daughter is expanding her reading from child and teen fantasy into manga. She also shows a fondness for weaponry and some basic costuming. I hope to be able to take her LARPing some tome soon, in the meanwhile I've got the first season of Xena for her to watch.

My son, youngest of the three, has only recently discovered the joy of reading, but managed to do the summer library challenge in record time. He's also just discovered Star Wars.

I would hope that should any of them wish to enter fandom in their own right (rather than being dragged along by mum and dad), they would find a welcome and not discouragement from a selfish minority.

"I suppose I am lucky not to have noticed the 'cred check' phenomenon for myself"

I think that it is easy for guys to not notice it, because it's not directed at them. And frequently, it doesn't happen to women who are in the companionship of men (or anybody male-appearing, such as my partner). I've run into it more when I'm alone, or with other women, and usually either in very crowded areas, where nobody else is paying attention, or in areas where there are very few other people. I know women who bring their otherwise-not-all-that-interested male friends or partners along because they get less crap (and frequently, less harassment). The guys that do this are, IMO, very aware they are doing something wrong.

I also do want to share an experience since you mention your kids and cons. I don't know how old they are, so this may not be relevant.

My mom is a huge geek, and especially a Trekkie. I started going to cons with her around age 8. I went to a LOT between 8-14. Mom was pretty laid back, and most of the time, would save our seats for the presentations and panels while I went out through the vendor rooms. I was supposed to be back by a certain time, but Mom generally considered that a con with a significant amount of attending women, including most of the vendor room being women, that it was safe enough she wasn't going to worry. So, I actually ended up talking a lot with various people. (Also: holy crap, the amount of free stuff a kid dressed up in a Starfleet uniform gets...)

I noticed a marked difference in how people behaved towards me when I was young, and considered a child. By the time I was 14 or 15, when the cons started to trail off... well, people treated me different. I was starting to notice the "invading on mah space" attitude from the male fans. I had always felt comfortable and safe, and... I no longer felt that way. And it hurt, though it's taken me years to realize exactly what happened. Because being a kid still, I had no idea.

So, I don't know if your kids are young enough to possibly run into that kind of issue, but feeling pushed out of your childhood fandom because you're now grown up and no longer a kid but are instead a WOMAN is... a special kind of heartbreak.

I wrote this a bit back and need to rewrite it on my blog instead of my Plurk.

"The heart of true fandom is not built from belittling for ignorance, or discrimination, or anything that separates us. It is built by sharing things, and standing together and accepting that sharing allows us have in our hearts a voice that looks at things and screams: "THAT IS SO AWESOME!!!!"

*clappityclappityclappity*

It's the part where I'm seeing younger fans who've never been to cons afraid to go to them that has me worried. They're getting a nightmare image from the stories they're reading, but I don't know how to avoid that without not telling the stories. And the stories need to be told. They need to know that these things can and do happen, but I'm trying to figure out how to do a better job of telling them it's not all-run-the-mocking-dudebro-gauntlet-all-the-time, that in all probability they will be made welcome by the majority of people they meet.

Is a puzzlement.

You are safe here. No matter what kind of geek you are, or whether or not I understand your passions.

This ground is yours.

Thank you for making a safe space for us. :) I dunno if this is in response to my comment or not, but I do understand the tendency to start listing creds as a preemptive strike. I've done it myself, but every time I tend to get this lurking fear that eventually I'll run out of geek things and then they'll have me. Fortunately, in my case, this hasn't happened, because the people I've met at cons locally are all very chill and awesome. But the fear is always there.

I posted a few more thoughts on my journal, if you don't mind me linking here. I got a little bit into the idea of "girly" interests--getting involved in a fandom on account of thinking the actor in the movie adaptation was hot--not being an inherently bad thing. One of my commenters theorized that, since Twilight is such an acceptable target for everyone, in a weird way, that makes Twihards the "real" geeks now, since they fight hard for their right to geek out on something that everyone so clearly and loudly hates. It's acceptable to be into X-Men, Doctor Who, Lord of the Rings, Batman, etc. But admit you're into those sparkly vampires? You're practically guaranteed to be shat on by somebody.

I'm taking an alternate route. Whenever I find someone questioning cred, I point out that they are a poser. Geeks have always been inclusive. Anyone who wants to exclude someone isn't a geek.

That's not paradox, it's recursive. Suckers will never break out.

"That's a poser attitude; geeks have always been inclusive" seems like a good phrase to memorize.

Thank you for posting this! I said for years that I was a mini-geek because I wasn't as cool or knowledgeable as the people I hung out with. Then I started working with people who were not in any way geeks and realized that mini/uber/whatever geek didn't matter. I was a geek because I enjoyed hanging out with my geek friends and listening in on their conversations even when I didn't really understand what they were talking about. I was a geek because I liked going to cons even when I didn't necessarily follow all the fandoms at those cons. I was a geek because I was the most comfortable when hanging out with other geeks. I was a geek because I wanted to be.