Making this post to gauge how many people are on the same wavelength as me in this regard because I’m toying with the idea of making a community. It’s also just a conversation to be had, I think.
Is anyone else kinda disappointed in the mainstream fandoms of nerdy things and alternative / punk / metal music these days? Honestly the nerd scene always harboured incel types but it’s been quite depressing to see that the alternative scene (at least online, where people are more honest and less polite) has swung conservative. The alternative spaces on mainstream social media are largely people who think there’s been no good music since Metallica, or a game of punk or Joe Rogan fan, goth or Harry Potter fan. And sadly even here on Lemmy, it seems to be on the instance that half of Lemmy is defederated from for right wing shit. And honestly the old guard of artists has been pretty disappointing too. Either apathetic with nothing to say after decades of preaching punching nazis, or making the news for signing bombs or misunderstanding Bruce Springsteen or calling for Charlize Theron to be arrested.
As far as nerd shit goes, the discussion for comic book media and games are an absolute dumpster fire, now more than ever. One that has escalated ever since Gamergate or the Captain Marvel movie. I’m not going to pretend that Supergirl didn’t have any issues. But I’m also not going to pretend that it was bad enough to warrant the extreme reaction, or that I didn’t predict that reaction the moment it was announced based on the pattern, or that the majority of the ‘criticism’ I saw wasn’t basically just men complaining about not finding Millie Alcock personally attractive.
In short, the alternative scene is getting fucked by honorary boomers that would’ve been looking the devil in heavy metal records alongside the republicans and christians in the '80s. And the nerd scene is long overdue for a grrrl riot.
Alt people and nerds have always been kinda overlapped in circles that I’ve been in. And Lemmy is really too small to have a seperate community for every little thing. So I’m thinking of a Blåhaj friendly space for fans of nerdy shit and rebel to post a mix of: music they want others to hear / sci-fi or fantasy or romantacy books they’re reading / comic book related media discussion / gaming discussion without the COD enthusiasts. A safe space for: women, LGBTQIA+ people, non-conformists, metalheads that are more likely to say “we’re not gonna take it” than “don’t tread on me”, punks that prefer Joe Strummer to Johnny Rotten. And an unsafe space for: manosphere dick bags, terfs, conservatives, 'phobes, pearl clutchers, bootlickers, church people, nerds that are terrified of cooties.
Does this interest anyone? I’ve even thought of a cool comic book related name for it. “Danny the Street” is a character from Doom Patrol, a sentient genderqueer street that teleports from place to place, picking up people along the way. The Dannyzens that live on Danny are largely drag queens and trans people and gender non-conformists but also misfit metahumans or anyone that feels like they belong there more than anywhere else. Their enemy is the Bureau of Normalcy, a government agency that seeks to stamp out and eradicate anything that doesn’t conform to white christian cisgender neurotypical standards.
Only problem is that I’ve never made a community or moderated before. And I can’t promise I’ll be around to punch nazis 100% of the time, easpecially if I find a job. So I’ll be both learning as I go along and possibly looking for help if it ever gets busy. It’s a niche of a niche though, so it’ll probably be quiet. I would love a space like this personally, if there are any others like me.
Is nerd an alt culture now though. Like im old. In grade school I was the uncool kid. It was a small school so there was at times another kid maybe even two like me but im the only one who was there through all the grades. When I went to high school it was larger and there was an actual uncool group. nerds, geeks, whatever. That was amazing. No on in high school outside our group would admit to watching cartoons or even a lot of fantasy and sci fi or read it. Same with comics and even though star wars was popular enough to watch no one would admit to likeing or playing with the toys at that age. DnD was definately a no no for the kids (everyone) who did not want to seem uncool. I was pretty happy to have some friends and in college I found others but like some neighbors of mine in the dorms were on the football team and they liked comics but did not talk about it with teammates. Kept it on the DL as they say. After college I found the cons and that was heaven.
Thing is that in the new millenium this stuff became mainstream. Not right away but harry potter was actually popular with teens and lotr and HP movies really broke through. Then of course there is the xmen ones. Batman, spiderman, the rest of marvel. So hughy lewis was a bit to early as by the 20teens to was truly hip to be square.
So when I used to go to anime clubs or conventions I would see stuff no one ever heard of. I see conventions now and they seem to mostly be corpo run and powered by cosplay. They don’t seem to have the subculture in (well maybe out) crowd feel of what I think of as alt. Its just kinda mainstream. Granted Im sorta off on like all things pop culture now (see that is the thing way back when no one would think about comics as pop culture). It could be old man days were better back when or my own personal depression or maybe things just are enshitified but I don’t have excitement for these things now. I think the last one I had was wheel of time and. well. I mean if I had not read the books it would have been a neat enough fantasy looking series.