I feel that nerdy stuff became trendy with Big Bang Theory and MCU movies. I remember thinking that was a good thing but now I know better. What is weird is that once nerd culture became mainstream and it became fashionable to say you read comic books or played video games that is when the attacks on nerds (especially white males) started in full force.
Why do you think that it happened that way. Partly due to the large number of feminists who weren’t real fans getting involved in the hobbies. But I’m still surprised to this day how it all went down and definitely miss the days when you were made fun of for liking these things.
To think I used to tthibk gatekeeping was a bad thing.
Don't get me wrong, I'm all for letting people in to try new things, but we, as the stewards of fandoms, need to get over our "OMG OTHER PEOPLE ARE INTERESTED IN THE SAME THING I AM!!!" reaction to the Thing We Like when someone shows the least bit of interest. Let them try it, see if they enjoy it, but as soon as they start suggesting any sort of change to it that erodes the base of what makes the Thing a Thing (like inclusivity, et al) we need to be willing to tell them to go fuck off and make their own thing. That was our problem to begin with - we kept making it easier for the normies to get interested in our geek stuff, and we threw the doors too wide.
the guests got too uppity.
Yea I agree. What always annoys me with the diversity thing is that with pretty much any fandom there were already women and minorities who were enjoying them. We should’ve done some gatekeeping once we saw people who had no interest