My sister and I took our cat to the vet yesterday, and while waiting for a sick kitten to be admitted for care (awwww) I picked up the current issue of Time Out New York, which was sitting in the lobby. The cover story is New Dork City, about how geekiness is becoming mainstream and can be spotted all through the city.
It was interesting, even if it didn’t match my own ideas of what being a nerd/dork/geek/generally socially awkward, smart misfit is. It struck me more as hipsters who’d decided to even disdain of hipster culture and declared themselves to be nerds instead, but still had the hipster attitude and approach, rather than a nerdy one.
But what got me about the article was a sidebar, Nerd Watching. It was five different kinds of nerds, what they do and where to find them, and a celebrity spokesnerd to be identified with each. And while again, their definition of nerds was a lot different than mine, it was at least interesting. And also somewhere between irritating and infuriating.
Why? Because the only female nerd in the bunch was, “The NILF.” I assume you already know what it stands for, but since this place does nothing but attract spam anyway, I might as well target it — Nerd I’d Like to Fuck. And though I agree, Tina Fey does indeed epitomize the sexy nerd girl, I object to the fact that a) the only other mention of women was that some kinds of nerds, the ones who make it cool, get to have “surprisingly attractive significant others” (no ugs! They aren’t worth dating! Especially not for a nerd, who values things like intelligence! …oh, wait); and b) that clearly, no men can be fuckable nerds — it’s just a girl thing, and apparently, girls don’t get to be any other kinds of nerd.
Furthermore, the emphasis was on the female nerd’s body, not her brain: the NILF can be spotted at, “strip clubs, where women take their clothes off to put themselves through law school,” and their key attributes listed “rockin’ body” before “rocket-scientist brain”. In other words, female nerds are nothing but male fantasies. She’s sexy — but she might be almost as smart as you, and close to worthwhile in a conversation! Gasp!
Well, speaking as a female who’s a nerd and a feminist, I’m a lot prouder of my smarts than my body, and pretty glad that I didn’t waste money to read the article. Shame, Time Out New York. Shaaaaaame.
