Levels of Geekery

Now, I've been a geek since birth. Or at least since I was 3 or 4 years old and my dad started reading 'Lord of the Rings' to me. It really shaped who I've become.

As I grew up, being a geek or nerd was not cool and not something most people wanted to be. I was completely out in my geekery in high school though as I had a picture of the crew of Enterprise from Star Trek: The Next Generation in my locker. I was also going to small Star Trek cons at this time with my dad.

I continued deeper into hardcore geekery in college as I started going to anime cons and gaming a lot - both table top and live action. Even at that time, it wasn't really very accepted to be a geek.

Now, being a geek is much more accepted than in my youthful days of high school and college, and some people associate themselves with that title that perhaps wouldn't have in the 'old days'.

So, it got me thinking about the levels of geekery. Here are how I could classify the types of geeks out there:

A aspiring geek is someone who watches a few sci-fi tv shows, thinks they are cool but doesn't involve themselves with the geek culture at all.

A casual geek is someone who may do some gaming, mostly video games, and watches the popular sci-fi shows.

A prevalent geek is someone who attends conventions, but doesn't cosplay. They also do the things a casual and aspiring geek does. - This is the type of geek my husband is.

A hardcore geek is someone who attends cons, who cosplays, who LARPs, who is involved in one or several geeky organizations (like a Browncoat group of a Starfleet chapter), among all the other stuff the other types of geeks do as well. This is the height of geeky-ness, and this is the type that I am.