geek love
I have a relatively new coworker who I haven't talked to a ton but I liked from the moment I first met her. She seemed like she had some spunk and I always like that.
Today a group of us were discussing some things (like you do) and Wicca came up. The person who mentioned it didn't really know what it was and said something vaguely about Paganism and I said, "Yeah, Wiccans are Pagan. I was Wiccan."
He asked if they were good witches or bad witches and I said, "Good witches. Always. It's not really possible to be a bad witch if you're Wiccan unless you're a complete moron or you don't know what the hell you're doing and aren't actually Wiccan."
I tried to explain the three fold law after that but there were all sorts of conversations occurring at once. Of course one person had to ask about ritual knives and be a bit condescending about it and I said, "Well, it's like-- Christians eat 'Jesus' body' and drink 'his blood'-- you're not actually eating flesh and drinking blood, it's ceremonial. It's symbolic." At which point he immediately nodded and laid off.
But the biggest surprise was discovering that New Coworker, who was sitting right next to me, was at the same time saying the things I was. We both said how a person would have to be an idiot to do evil as a Wiccan and then when I looked over at her in surprise (because Wicca is one of the most misunderstood religions, I swear) I found out she'd been Wiccan too.
Later she came by my desk and we started talking, and then I followed her to her desk to tell her some other things. It was cute because she started out being a bit hesitant and we just talked about sci fi/fantasy. Then when I stopped by her desk she said, "I think we're both into similar things and a bit nerdy so I'm just going to feel you out.... did you ever watch Buffy the Vampire Slayer?"
She winced a bit as she asked, as if she expected me to harass her for being immature or something, but of course my answer was, "I did! Buffy! JOSS WHEDON IS SO EFFING EVIL OMG."
And then we super geeked out on, like, everything. I found out she's into archaeology and anthropology like me so I recommended Ancient Aliens to her (with my usual disclaimer of "You will think they're crackpots when you first start it but actually it's really interesting") and then we went on a wheel of nerdiness.
Firefly? Check. Dr Horrible's Singalong? Check + I learned there will be a new one coming up wtf! Mists of Avalon? Check. She brought up Battlestar Galactica and Game of Thrones and I had to admit I hadn't seen/read either yet but I planned to watch GoT. (I tried starting the books one time and couldn't get into it at all but I want to give it another chance) Sandman comics and other Neil Gaiman assorted sundries? Check.
I can't even remember everything we went through. She said in an 'ok I'll admit to this' tone of voice that she even played a board game for Battlestar Galactica and I said, "Hey, I roleplayed Vampire: The Masquerade for years." We kept getting sidetracked on particular topics so we didn't cycle through everything. I didn't ask if she watches anime/manga but I don't think she's that type of geek although I could be wrong.
But the thing is, I'm used to being the sole geek voice where I work. Normally no one else is anywhere NEAR the nerd I am. When the IT people come through and they actually get terms like 'dubbed' or 'subbed' in context of anime I'm always a bit excited-- because I always feel a bit like I've found my brethren.
It was also cute because once she knew I had been Wiccan she said, "Now I can show you my Pagan tattoo!" and showed me her tat of a stylized version of the goddess symbol.
It's kind of exciting to know there's another total nerd working with me now.
I no longer have to be the only one who gets things like ritualistic knives for Wicca or why Joss Whedon is equally awesome and evil for his ability to pull me in and rip my freaking heart out with the things he does to his characters. (We had to have a moment over Spike, the two of us lol). Now if I wanted to mention roleplaying in passing the likelihood of the person getting what it is and not thinking I'm talking about some sort of sex game has increased exponentially.
I've always felt most comfortable around fellow geeks, to be honest. Anime conventions are one of the places I usually feel most at home.
Everyone likes the things I like and when they get in nerdy ass discussions about what series is the best; whether Luffy could kick Natsu and Naruto's asses or whether Ichigo would win over all of them; whether subbed or dubbed is better and whether a person can even truly call themselves an otaku if they're not reading/watching raws; whether fanservice is a good or bad thing; whether yaoi is obnoxious or whether it's awesome... these are things I actually have opinions about. These are things I actually know wtf I'm talking about. And these are things I actually enjoy discussing.
I've always sort of been the person on the outside looking in when it comes to my peer group. For many reasons, not the least of which being I don't drink, smoke, never used drugs, never was interested in any of that. I've never been into parties, either. I like people for who they are and what we can talk about, not the shit they can do for me or how stupid we can be together tonight versus the last. Plus, of course, I eventually figured out I was gay so there was also the whole 'Yeah I'm not exactly as interested in boys as the rest of you' thing my whole life.
It's basically always been a lot of feeling alienated by everyone else in my peer group, not because they mean to but because when you aren't into what everyone else is it ends up feeling like a clique when you're the one on the outside.
But geeks? Oh, geeks. You are into things I'm into. You don't necessarily care about whether I drink, smoke, use, party, anything-- what you care about is whether I know what a d20 is, or whether I cosplay at cons. You care about whether I've seen Neon Genesis Evangelion or whether I think Kirk or Picard is better (Picard all the way btw NOT EVEN A QUESTION).
Geeks of the world, I would like to say this to you:
I love you.
That is all.
[edited to add]
In closing, if you haven't seen this, you must:
http://youtu.be/N9qYF9DZPdw
Today a group of us were discussing some things (like you do) and Wicca came up. The person who mentioned it didn't really know what it was and said something vaguely about Paganism and I said, "Yeah, Wiccans are Pagan. I was Wiccan."
He asked if they were good witches or bad witches and I said, "Good witches. Always. It's not really possible to be a bad witch if you're Wiccan unless you're a complete moron or you don't know what the hell you're doing and aren't actually Wiccan."
I tried to explain the three fold law after that but there were all sorts of conversations occurring at once. Of course one person had to ask about ritual knives and be a bit condescending about it and I said, "Well, it's like-- Christians eat 'Jesus' body' and drink 'his blood'-- you're not actually eating flesh and drinking blood, it's ceremonial. It's symbolic." At which point he immediately nodded and laid off.
But the biggest surprise was discovering that New Coworker, who was sitting right next to me, was at the same time saying the things I was. We both said how a person would have to be an idiot to do evil as a Wiccan and then when I looked over at her in surprise (because Wicca is one of the most misunderstood religions, I swear) I found out she'd been Wiccan too.
Later she came by my desk and we started talking, and then I followed her to her desk to tell her some other things. It was cute because she started out being a bit hesitant and we just talked about sci fi/fantasy. Then when I stopped by her desk she said, "I think we're both into similar things and a bit nerdy so I'm just going to feel you out.... did you ever watch Buffy the Vampire Slayer?"
She winced a bit as she asked, as if she expected me to harass her for being immature or something, but of course my answer was, "I did! Buffy! JOSS WHEDON IS SO EFFING EVIL OMG."
And then we super geeked out on, like, everything. I found out she's into archaeology and anthropology like me so I recommended Ancient Aliens to her (with my usual disclaimer of "You will think they're crackpots when you first start it but actually it's really interesting") and then we went on a wheel of nerdiness.
Firefly? Check. Dr Horrible's Singalong? Check + I learned there will be a new one coming up wtf! Mists of Avalon? Check. She brought up Battlestar Galactica and Game of Thrones and I had to admit I hadn't seen/read either yet but I planned to watch GoT. (I tried starting the books one time and couldn't get into it at all but I want to give it another chance) Sandman comics and other Neil Gaiman assorted sundries? Check.
I can't even remember everything we went through. She said in an 'ok I'll admit to this' tone of voice that she even played a board game for Battlestar Galactica and I said, "Hey, I roleplayed Vampire: The Masquerade for years." We kept getting sidetracked on particular topics so we didn't cycle through everything. I didn't ask if she watches anime/manga but I don't think she's that type of geek although I could be wrong.
But the thing is, I'm used to being the sole geek voice where I work. Normally no one else is anywhere NEAR the nerd I am. When the IT people come through and they actually get terms like 'dubbed' or 'subbed' in context of anime I'm always a bit excited-- because I always feel a bit like I've found my brethren.
It was also cute because once she knew I had been Wiccan she said, "Now I can show you my Pagan tattoo!" and showed me her tat of a stylized version of the goddess symbol.
It's kind of exciting to know there's another total nerd working with me now.
I no longer have to be the only one who gets things like ritualistic knives for Wicca or why Joss Whedon is equally awesome and evil for his ability to pull me in and rip my freaking heart out with the things he does to his characters. (We had to have a moment over Spike, the two of us lol). Now if I wanted to mention roleplaying in passing the likelihood of the person getting what it is and not thinking I'm talking about some sort of sex game has increased exponentially.
I've always felt most comfortable around fellow geeks, to be honest. Anime conventions are one of the places I usually feel most at home.
Everyone likes the things I like and when they get in nerdy ass discussions about what series is the best; whether Luffy could kick Natsu and Naruto's asses or whether Ichigo would win over all of them; whether subbed or dubbed is better and whether a person can even truly call themselves an otaku if they're not reading/watching raws; whether fanservice is a good or bad thing; whether yaoi is obnoxious or whether it's awesome... these are things I actually have opinions about. These are things I actually know wtf I'm talking about. And these are things I actually enjoy discussing.
I've always sort of been the person on the outside looking in when it comes to my peer group. For many reasons, not the least of which being I don't drink, smoke, never used drugs, never was interested in any of that. I've never been into parties, either. I like people for who they are and what we can talk about, not the shit they can do for me or how stupid we can be together tonight versus the last. Plus, of course, I eventually figured out I was gay so there was also the whole 'Yeah I'm not exactly as interested in boys as the rest of you' thing my whole life.
It's basically always been a lot of feeling alienated by everyone else in my peer group, not because they mean to but because when you aren't into what everyone else is it ends up feeling like a clique when you're the one on the outside.
But geeks? Oh, geeks. You are into things I'm into. You don't necessarily care about whether I drink, smoke, use, party, anything-- what you care about is whether I know what a d20 is, or whether I cosplay at cons. You care about whether I've seen Neon Genesis Evangelion or whether I think Kirk or Picard is better (Picard all the way btw NOT EVEN A QUESTION).
Geeks of the world, I would like to say this to you:
I love you.
That is all.
[edited to add]
In closing, if you haven't seen this, you must:
http://youtu.be/N9qYF9DZPdw
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message 1:
by
LenaLena
(new)
Aug 22, 2012 08:24PM
Oh please. Subbed over dubbed any day.
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+1 on both your comments!(Also wow that would be so sad, thinking you're getting to see Patrick Stewart and then being told you can't ;_;)
ahaha I want to sing the Reading Rainbow song with him XD Goddd I love Levar Burton.
WeaselBox wrote: "Dubbing causes me pain. Plus it's disrespectful, both to the original actors and the material."I kind of feel that way too sometimes... mostly because at one anime con I was at, there was a dub producer type person there. And he had people go on stage pretending they were trying out for dub voice actor parts. He had it all set up where the people had the lines to read with the anime visual only/sound muted.
The first people who went up on stage to try were decent and one was even pretty good, but then the producer guy started urging them to do these really stupid accents and be over the top and it wasn't until they were doing an awful job that he said it was good.
I guess his view of 'good' is diametrically opposed to my view of 'good.'
That being said, I was at a con where the person who chose the English dub voices for the Cowboy Bebop movie (I want to say it was the voice actress for Nuriko in FY but I could be wrong). And she was really nice and really interested in making sure she did the best job getting good voices. I haven't seen the movie but I've heard they did a pretty good job on it in the English, even by people who hate dubs.
So I think a large part of it is the direction that these companies for some bizarre reason want the voice actors to take.
And then of course there are the 4Kidz of the world who butcher the series itself by editing and chopping up the original story and then add grating voices on top of it (One Piece is the best example imo). That's when dubbing really does seem like more of a disservice than anything to the original series, at least to me.
Gwen wrote: "He's awesome! And so nice! You could always sneak into one of his Star Trek panels next weekend. I'm sure the singing will happen again, what with a bunch of nerds congregating. =)"
I am so nerdy too because I used to LOVE Reading Rainbow XD I was always a dorky reader so it was like this amazing tv show to me, plus Lavar Burton just rocks all around.
Does anyone remember an old show probably in the 80s or early 90s that was about some woman who may or may not have been a witch, and she had this machine that she would drop things into (like, say, a hat, a feather, and a horseshoe) and the machine would chug, chug, chug, then spit out a book that she would read? She was one of those Sound of Music/Mary Poppins type ladies who was pretty and young and nice. I can't remember the name of this show....
My friend and I were really surprised by that director person too. I thought it had to be a joke at first, like maybe they were poking fun at themselves, but he seemed like he was serious. I have no idea if he was representative of the industry at large but it seems like he must be based on the commonly used (and, I think, obnoxious) ploys of things like totally random and inappropriate accents, really bad voice acting, etc. I don't think it's necessarily that the voice actors themselves suck, I think they're just told to do stupid things.Also yeah I wanted to throw a pillow at the dude's head XD A very densely packed pillow...
I can usually make it through Miyazaki-type films dubbed because they're usually done a little bit better than the norm. But what drives me nuts is that normal actors like, say, Brad Pitt in Sinbad, do a better job than voice actors in, say, Sailor Moon. (Brooklyn accent for Molly? Really?) It's just weird because normal actors would have a legitimate reason to suck compared to voice actors since they might rely on a lot of visual cues in their performances to show the audience how they feel, but voice actors are all about the voice. And yet it seems the opposite is how it ends up.
I suppose the biggest issue(?) is that a lot of times I feel like the American (at least, I don't know about other countries) companies that focus on anime and manga don't seem to have that awesome of a grasp of what the fans actually want and consider valuable.
Ok babe, add Josh the awesome (and Spike) and Eva (ngelion), and GoT, to the "things we have in common" list, and I'm sure there's much more...
Growing up in Holland we had Dutch, Belgian, English, French and German channels on tv. The Germans were the only ones who consistently dubbed. You haven't seen dubbing until you've heard Marilyn Monroe and John Wayne speak German. It's unwatchable. "Hey John! Fahren wir ins Las Vegas!"
Marleen wrote: "You haven't seen dubbing until you've heard Marilyn Monroe and John Wayne speak German. It's unwatchable."Even though I find dubbing utterly horrendous, it was fun hearing actors (and especially Robert de Niro and Al Pacino) say things like "puta madre!" instead of "motherfucker!" when I lived in Spain.
Man. I wrote a whole comment and then gr lost it... I'll try to remember what I said.Marleen and Lenore-- lol that is amusing me to think about. It always throws me off a bit to see Hollywood films dubbed because it's also usually voices that are SO off from the original actor it's sometimes hilarious and sometimes creepy-distracting XD
Sara -- does that mean you also couldn't get into GoT? By the way I emailed you, finally.
Silver Iris -- oh awesome you're also Wiccan? We should talk about that sometime! I had started rambling about it in the comment that I lost and now I don't remember what I said. By the way I haven't been to lj much this week yet but I hope to be able to focus on it a bit more coming up :)
