HoP Idol II: The Term "Gamer" a Pet Peeve

It's that time again boys and ghouls- time for today's HoP Idol challenge.  Today's entry comes from Wyrd of " ."  If you like what you see here, make sure you go to his blog and also vote him up this weekend. I'd pretty well guarantee a lively discussion after this one.

The term "Gamer" - A Pet Peeve 

When I was growing up the term "Gamer" had a very different meaning. It meant someone who played tabletop role-playing games or miniature games. It belonged exclusively to this often elitist subculture like a badge or title of secret unity. You'd be out with a couple of buddies, overhear another group talking, you'd walk up, and ask "Hey you guys game?" If the answer was no there was a moment of confusion followed by an apology, but if the answer was yes it was an instant ice breaker and all the normal social dividers (race, gender, class, age, etc) would go out the window giving way to a sense of camaraderie among people who would otherwise be strangers.


     Today it means to most people someone who plays video games. If you ask a person who doesn't even play video games if they are a gamer they recognize it enough to say, "Oh no. I don't do that.", but if they say yes it usually followed by "Why? What do you play?" Each sub-type of game player (fps, driving, flying, rpg, puzzles, etc) carrying elitism towards/against the others and often quickly taking the conversation into a form of cock fight. The "camaraderie" being a social cover in this case for finding another opponent to beat in their choice of virtual world.

     When I hear the term gamer used in the latter context it irritates the hell out of me. Not because I'm necessarily an elitist, but because if nothing else that most of the people that now call themselves gamers don't have clue one about the former. If you mention it to them they usually gawk at you with this look of, "Why the fuck would you want to use paper? and books? Dude I don't want to read." I won't lie. My response is akin to that of a parent trying to deal with a petulant child. I want to smack them. Plain and simple. They snub the table-top players for doing something that requires thought and creativity not just a few packs of rechargeable batteries and agile thumbs. Their camaraderie starting and ending with their team in deathmatch, and their creativity limited only to how well they can use leetspeak to make a cool user id. The whelps giving us "old timers" a bad name.

-Wyrd