Subject:
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Re: The AFOL mind
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.general
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Date:
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Sat, 3 Apr 2004 21:09:30 GMT
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Viewed:
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799 times
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In lugnet.general, Felix Greco wrote:
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I’ve found a conversation seems to come up a lot in reference to AFOLs. Are
we a bunch of dorks? Is what we do just nerdy? I have had this conversation
with AFOLs and nonAFOLs alike.
I think I’m a cool guy. I can relate to other guys- I workout, play
guitar, scratch my head about female behavior, I work hard. Yet, the people
I interact with in these other areas have said they just “don’t get” what I
do with lego. They appreciate that I enjoy it, and usually get a laugh out of
the stuff I make. These are the same people who kept telling me “Hey, they
did a room in legos on While You Were Out!”- Yah, I KNOW... Jeeesh. But, I
digress.
My wife was over at Toys-r-Us and told me she saw a bunch of kids trading
Yu-Gi-Oh cards. She said they fit every stereotype of a dork you could
imagine. Knowing I was once one of those kids, she started asking me
questions; Does the interest in those things make those kids that way? Or
are those kids already that way, so they’re attracted to those things? You
know- the old chicken or the egg question. I think the same arguments were
had about violence in cartoons.
I don’t know what to think of it. It makes me happy, and thats all that
matters. But I do ponder it. I think Eric Sophie put it best when we were
driving down to Texas for the SciBrick Houston gala. He was sitting there
thinking for a while and then he asked “Hey, do you think they’ll take us
seriously down there? Or do you think they’ll just pass us off?” It became a
legitimate concern for us because we were showing our stuff to a lot of VIP
AFOLs and we were representing SciBrick for the first time. In the end, they
seemed delighted with us and our display.
I think this argument is the basis of a lot of the motivation around here. I
recognize it every time someone at lugnet says something like “Why doesn’t
TLC take us more seriously?”. I recognize it when we get together for
meetings and listen to stories about nonAFOLs and their reactions. I
recognized it when news crews were out at Brickfest and we all cheered when
we hit CNN.
I have no point to make or anything. I have a lot of opinions, certainly.
I’m very interested to hear what you all have to say about this.
Felix
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I think you’re a cool guy Felix. After all, you ARE Jack Stone! ;)
I don’t know if this adds to the discussion, but I’ll talk about it anyway,
though I’m sure Lugnet is tired of me talking about it. This last weekend,
TexLUG held it’s semi-annual meeting, this time falling in San Antonio.
http://news.lugnet.com/org/us/texlug/?n=447
The college that hosted us seemed very thrilled at our coming, and sent out a
press release talking about it. We got a little article in the San Antonio
Express, seen here:
http://news.lugnet.com/org/us/texlug/?n=449
We didn’t know what to expect, but come Saturday afternoon when the public was
invited, we didn’t just get kids, we got adults to show up to. And I don’t mean
adults bringing their kids along. I mean adults who came on their own, by
themselves or with friends of equal age. And when the news guys came, what was
going to be a quick little five minute in-and-out visit turned into an hour long
stay.
With the exception to one man who scoffed at the display, the other 500+ people
who showed up during the course of the weekend seemed genuinely impressed with
what we had done. It really does make you feel good when people literally pull
you over and ask you to explain your creation, how you did it, how long it took
you.
So the public, I would say, took us very seriously. Northwest Vista College
took us very seriously. The police guys who showed up to lock the building down
at night took us very seriously. The news people took us relatively seriously,
at least they interviewed us :)
The guy from the San Antonio Express asked us if it took one type of person to
become an AFOL. Our answer was no, that the LEGO hobby attracted every type of
person, because LEGO has so much to offer. To the truly mathematical, technic
and mindstorms provides a great challenge. To the only artistic, mosaics and
sculptures fits the bill. For everyone else in between, LEGO offers system,
bionicle, duplo, and everything else. To me, I think it’s both ways, that some
kids get drawn in, and others are naturally leaned to it. It just takes all
kinds.
But to the question of “Are we dorks, are we being nerdy?”, depends on your
definition I suppose. I mean, nerds are typically described, IMO, as left
brained people, characterised by logical thinking and math skills. And in that
sense, yes, what we do is engineering in a sense, building structures, some more
sound than others. Then there are the other nerds, described possibly better as
dorks, dweebs, and geeks, those who are either right or left and right brained,
who use their imagination more often then others, who tend to become obsessed
with whatever they’re into. And in that respect I’d have to say we’re that too.
We’re not only engineering structures, but we also create beautiful (if not
functional like the Technic guys) things. And we’re pretty gall dern obsessed,
I freely admit it myself.
So to me, yes, we’re all dorks and nerds, doing geeky things. But my question
is ‘Is this a bad thing?’
After overhearing my fiancee’ watching TV, listening to two women on the show
that was on, hearing that they love Micheal Jackson no matter what he did (I’m
not saying that Mr. Jackson is guilty nor innocent, I’m just saying that I’m
glad I’m not obsessed over one man like that), that he was the most beautiful
person on earth, and would gladly give him their children, and have his, I feel
pretty secure in my hobby.
My name is Anthony, and I’m a dork, I’m a nerd, I play with LEGO, and I think
that’s pretty cool.
--Anthony
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Message has 1 Reply:
 | | Re: The AFOL mind
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| (...) I'd never analysed the difference between nerd, dork, geek etc..., not wanting to identify myself as any of them. I think that others' opinion of a Lego fan being any of those things depends on how you put it across. OK, so there's a range of (...) (20 years ago, 3-Apr-04, to lugnet.general, FTX)
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Message is in Reply To:
| | The AFOL mind
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| I've found a conversation seems to come up a lot in reference to AFOLs. Are we a bunch of dorks? Is what we do just nerdy? I have had this conversation with AFOLs and nonAFOLs alike. I think I'm a cool guy. I can relate to other guys- I workout, (...) (20 years ago, 3-Apr-04, to lugnet.general, FTX)
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