My good friend, Star Wars Fan, favorite barista, and all around social media hound Alyssa alerted me to this link about an upcoming TV show via Facebook:

http://www.nerdking.net/

It’s… get this… a TV show…. ala reality way (from the producers of none other than Survivor and Amazing Race mind you) about… nerds. More specifically… the search for the “King Of The Nerds” if the title of the show has anything to say about it. You know the pitch. A hip group of well put together kids (because you can’t be too old now can you?)most likely with blocky glasses and sweater vests to rival Kanye West will compete for the title by way of various trials and challenges made to test their “nerd” mettle. Whatever that means.

How do you know it’s legit? Why they say “nerd” 16 times in this press release and “geek” 3 times for good measure, so you know they mean business. They tell you that if you are passionate in things like sci fi or gaming, or even things like learning or books, you should probably hurry up and apply. No worries about your image kids, like the pocket protector graphic says in the website “Geek is the new cool”.

Tell me Mr. Big Shot producers… why is it that if I like Star Wars or Star Trek…. If I like D&D or Comic Books…. or even if I’ve been to Burning Man ( You lost me on that one there Richie Rich) tell me why if I like or am passionate about something other than the typical top 40 music listening, get-all my-news- from- TMZ,  go- see- a- movie- forget- about- the- book sheep of America I am a nerd and should be classified as different, and then not only be classified, I should hurry up to compete with the other people you exploit for your cash prizes?

Oh wait… I forgot… Your contest promises not to poke fun right? It promises to celebrate the nerd. Why you even have washed up movie stars from the 80s judging the show so I should take your hip credentials even more serious.

Yeah dude… you just don’t get it.

I guess it’s hard to explain. I keep taking you guys back in this blog. Back to when I was a kid. Back to when I was learning about the way things are “supposed to be” and how I was told to just “do what you’re told”. I sometimes look at our moniker and see the words “nerd culture” and sometimes when I talk to publicists and interview subjects and we pitch the cast, the word “nerd culture” pops up alot. I’ve written about it before. It’s confusing because when I was growing up, there was no such thing. It was simply a kid liking what he liked. There was no tumblr or pintrest. No facebook or flickr, or even blogs back then. So liking something different was really a labor of love. Playing a tabletop game like D&D meant no girlfriends could be around. If they saw, you’d likely be dateless for awhile, Star Wars was like practicing religion in a communist state, and comic books were the icing on the cake. Being a “nerd wasn’t cool. You weren’t getting invited to parties. But you liked what you liked, you lived what you loved, and if you were lucky, you made friends.

That was and is a lifestyle for me. Going out and sticking to our guns trying new music, having courage to tell dead celebrity jokes and going against the norm especially when it is tasteless and bad form is what we do. I know it’s hard for some to understand. And maybe that makes me crotchety or not with it. Maybe that’s why people over 30 can’t audition. But let me just say, that this website isn’t fooling this dinosaur. Please don’t act like you are trying to celebrate a genre that is “ascending” and “misunderstood” It doesn’t take a Mensa member to see the numbers of superhero movies and CNN updates from comic con to know what you’re up to. The only thing you want to celebrate is your future pay day off this show, and you don’t care who you step on to get it.