What is Nerd?

There is an episode of the Simpsons where Homer goes back to college. It turns out that he never graduated, even though is a a safety supervisor at a nuclear plant. In the episode Homer gets help from a group of National Lampoon-esque nerds. They have glasses, they do not shower much, they make math jokes and they are totally unaccustomed to the outside world. One scene, Snake (the "bad boy" criminal recurring character) identified himself as the "wallet inspector" and stole the nerds' wallets. Homer, who has an impulse to pick on the nerds, finds compassion for their situation and they, in turn, help him graduate.

That is a nerd.

But...not so much anymore.

If you have an OKCupid profile, or are one Jdate or have some other weird online dating account, you will often see in the "Description," "Essay" and/or "Tell Us About Yourself" section that the person puts "I am such a nerd." This usually follows some statement about playing a video game, owning a video game console or mentioning the words "science fiction."

Nerds wear thick rimmed glasses.

In their profiles, they have a picture of them wearing glasses. While the nerd wears them because they have bad eyesight, some of these people wear the glasses to conform to some "nerd-chic" and not out of necessity.

"Oh my god...I'm such a nerd."

What does that even mean, anymore? There is a philosophy that I follow - if a concept is applied universally (or near-universally), it loses its meaning.

While the "nerd" is non universally applied, it is being stretched beyond its original meaning - a clique, looked down upon by the popular group and beat up by the jocks (this is a generalization that keeps out fringe/fluidly integrated groups - IE stoners, metalheads, goths, etc who can move from one group to another).

Dare I say that nerd has been co-opted by hipsters? They wear big glasses, have clothes that don't fit, have longer hair, don't groom....oh dear god...

...

So...here is my call to action - take it back, nerds. Take back your identity. Take it back before it is taken from you by the flannel-wearing, pencil-mustached, tight jeaned, PBR drinking, ironic-for-ironic sake, obscure band listening, feminine, Silverlake hipster crowd. If not...all is doomed.