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I thing I decided late in life is that being really into things is cool. Something I'm rather sad about is that highschool kinda beat that attitude out of me.

I thing I decided late in life is that being really into things is cool. Something I'm rather sad about is that highschool kinda beat that attitude out of me. I was a classic nerd, including all the bad attributes that label comes with, but also one really good one: I was really into a number of things. But I learned from hard experience that being super into stuff was lame - being disinterested and too cool for stuff was hip. I internalized that attitude. Even into adulthood, I occasionally find myself making fun of people for being into specific things. I eventually made myself a rule: if someone really enjoys something that's not hurting anyone, that's an admirable trait. It's easy to obey this rule for things I like: science fiction, fancy beer, programming. It's not too hard to obey this rule for things that I'm not personally into, but are culturally adjacent to me: classical music, literature, skiing, fancy coffee. It's harder for things that are not as cool among my social group. I sometimes have to remind myself that being super into football, nascar, or the bachelorette is just as admirable as being into my things. Un-ironic enthusiasm is one of our best traits as humans, even when directed towards things I don't personally get that excited about. And so I'll always appreciate that coffee friend. They're lucky enough to have maintained the ability to nerd out about something and I'm glad of it.

abrookewood 4y ago
The other thing that's great about having friends like this, is that they've done all the hard work for you! You can just adopt their setup/approach (within reason) and can be fairly certain that you are going to get a good result without needing to put in months of research.
- switchbak 4y ago
  That's most of the benefit of putting "Reddit" at the end of a Google search for an esoteric subject. I love when someone has outrageously strong opinions on things I know very little about.
  - RF_Savage 4y ago
    And it works fine as long as they are not just parroting some strong opinnions to feel part of the group. But those reddit threads often do include some research and references, so one has a jumping off point for one's own search with some keywords.
    - switchbak 4y ago
      Absolutely, it's easy to think you're dealing with knowledge only to find out it was an uninformed yet strong opinion. It's also incredibly easy to game, so there's no way that'll last forever.
sublinear 4y ago
At the risk of sounding immature and causing offense (none intended), I think it's important to remember why your initial instinct in youth was to dislike unironic enthusiasm. I can only speak for myself, but was trying to avoid being labeled. I wanted to people to actually get to know me and not just use me as a means to an end. I am not merely my hobbies. I do enjoy helping people out from time to time, but I strongly dislike being someone's "_____ guy". Very easy to be taken advantage of. The world isn't always nice.
- stephen_g 4y ago
  I mean, if it works for you, then cool. For me, not getting into hobbies and things for that kind of reason would have been the source of massive regret about my life in hindsight. I have always loved getting really interested in all sorts of things, but it's true that it's important to not have a hobby that consumes you to the extent that it's basically the basis of your whole identity, or having only one thing you talk about so you're "that guy". But most people can be enthusiastic about various things and avoid that.
- agileAlligator 4y ago
  Irony/insincerity is a malaise of modern times. Being sincere about something leaves us vulnerable, open to attack. So we hide under successive layers of irony, until we ourselves aren't sure where our true beliefs lie.
bliteben 4y ago
I was recently struck by this tidbit about Cormac McCarthy: > As a child, McCarthy saw no value in school, preferring to pursue his own interests. He described a moment when his teacher asked the class about their hobbies. McCarthy answered eagerly, as he later said, "I was the only one with any hobbies and I had every hobby there was ... name anything, no matter how esoteric. I could have given everyone a hobby and still had 40 or 50 to take home."[15]
- rootveg 4y ago
  Not to mock but that sounds like a classic ADHD trait... coming from someone who in the last few month bought a e-piano, started painting and sailing
  - rocketbop 4y ago
    Cormac McCarthy does not have ADHD.
  - renewiltord 4y ago
    Everything a pathology, innit mate? ADHD is only ADHD if it impairs your functioning. If you're interested in a lot and can complete things then it's clearly not a disorder. And the man has written many books so clearly does not have an attention disorder.
    - noduerme 4y ago
      I swear, I did not read this before writing my response about pathologizing to the same post. I guess it's a type of thinking that presents a pretty narrow target. Easy to recognize as a crutch once you're aware of it.
  - derefr 4y ago
    You're thinking of having 50 attempted hobbies that you pretend you'll get back to one day. (I know; I have ADHD too.) But McCarthy meant that he had 50+ concurrent consistently-actively-pursued hobbies/passions. Which is something that's possible... if you have a lot of time on your hands, and you never allow anything into your life that drains you mentally so much that doing it kills your motivation to do anything else for the rest of the day. (Which IMHO is really only an option for people who are either retired, "independently wealthy", or being homeschooled.)
leidenfrost 4y ago
I thought of that, but later in life I saw how most kids were ok with other kind of "nerds" as long as they were sociable and not ugky. I remember of a kid who was nerdier than me, but he didn't fit into the usual nerdy social anxiety and he also did boxing as a hobby so he was ok. I concluded that it was not really about interest.
- mixmastamyk 4y ago
  Yep, we had a few geeks on the football team, no one was bothered.
  - kqr 4y ago
    I think the governing principle is that people want to belong to a social group, and to achieve that belonging, they need to be as un-like other social groups as possible, to make their affiliation clear. In other words, cool kids are fine with hanging out with un-cool kids, if it can be done in a way that does not involve un-coolness at all, so they don't become un-cool by association.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
BluSyn 4y ago
This resonates, as I've had bad experiences with being "too into" things when I was younger. Eg, being called a "fanboy" in a derogatory way, just because I'm really passionate about a specific hobby, product, or technology. In my youth this was quite hurtful, and sometimes discouraged me from talking about my hobbies. There are entire subreddits dedicated to hating on specific things or people. As if they define themselves not by what they love, but by what they hate, and derive some sick satisfaction from mocking others. As I've gotten older, I realized these people are probably dead inside. So now I almost pity them. I can't imagine being so spiteful that I must shame another's passions. LPT: Always pursue your passions without shame, and encourage others to do the same.
koonsolo 4y ago
This "too cool for stuff" sounds like US culture. I never experienced that kind of thing in EU. We each had our own friend groups, and didn't really care what the other groups were into. I once heard an artist say (can't remember which one), that they loved playing in Europe, since everyone at a festival is there to have fun. While in US, everyone is there to look cool.
- awild 4y ago
  It's not a US thing and not even necessarily related to being bullied in school. Lots of parents scold their children for being into useless or eclectic hobbies.
- nxmnxm99 4y ago
  It's a nice sentiment but really isn't accurate.... unless you're suggesting nerds don't get bullied in Europe
  - lmm 4y ago
    Not in the same way. US high school clique dynamics are very much US-specific.
  - paganel 4y ago
    I was the nerd-ish type as a teenager back in 1990s Eastern Europe and I don't remember getting bullied. I knew things were slightly different in the US, I mean the whole "cool girls" group thing and all, as we were able to watch stuff like Saved by the Bell [1] on TV, but that kind of atmosphere seemed strange to us at the time. [1] https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0096694/ https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0096694/
    - gambiting 4y ago
      Same exact thing for me. Nerds definitely weren't getting bullied, if you were good at maths and physics maybe girls weren't into you but the "bullies" didn't really mess with people who were good at sciences(I guess partially because they had to copy their homework from someone, so keeping good relations with the "nerds" was actually a good survival strategy)
yieldcrv 4y ago
I always quizzically (but non-judgementally) dive deeper into people’s offbrand traits because I’m not sure if they are serious I recently hired a gardener on taskrabbit, and he was too cool for it so I’m trying to figure out “really? gardening bro?” and turns out he is totally hooking up with women on taskrabbit. like the modern day milkman! he’s also interested in plants and will do the work. so there is merit to trying to figure out what the edge is, where is the dopamine coming from that gets you to associate the interest with fun? in my experience, its worthwhile being skeptical, I’m either missing something or this person is completely unrelatable in a dozen other ways.
GuB-42 4y ago
> I sometimes have to remind myself that being super into football, nascar, or the bachelorette is just as admirable as being into my things. I would add music you don't like (ex: autotuned rap), "commercial" or "popular" everything (ex: Bud light), and sexual kinks (ex: pet play) to this list. If you peek a little, you may find even find these topics to be surprisingly deep. Maybe even deeper than the things you like. Or maybe not, but don't dismiss them because they don't fit your preconceived ideas.
gadders 4y ago
Unironic enthusiasm for a topic is great, but I think a lot of enthusiasm for something, especially if it's "cool" (coffee, craft beer) is mostly performative. They want to brand themself as similar to other people who are into that thing.
globular-toast 4y ago
I can relate to having it beaten out of you. There were definitely many years after school where I'd learnt to suppress and hide my geeky interests. There's no way, for example, I would have been visibly excited when a train went past. More recently I've stopped suppressing it, though. Now as a 36 year old man I will run to be able to see a train go past if I want to. It helps that I now have friends and a girlfriend who are just like me. It turns out if you find the right people these are attractive qualities.
ChrisMarshallNY 4y ago
> Even into adulthood, I occasionally find myself making fun of people for being into specific things. Yesterday I learned that there's an entire subreddit, dedicated to making fun of programmers. People take snippets of social media posts by programmers, and post them out of context (without links to the context), and everyone takes turns, making fun of the snippet. That looks like a lot of fun... </s> Hey, whatever creams your twinkie...
- stnmtn 4y ago
  What is the subreddit?
  - ChrisMarshallNY 4y ago
    I dunno. Something like “programming circle jerk,” or something. I suspect there’s hundreds of these types of things out there. I’d also suggest that participating in these fora could have … adverse … effects on one’s future career prospects. I can assure you that many HR background checking companies scrape social media, and are getting fairly good at “deanonymizing” posters.
shrugsworth 4y ago
Agree with you about un-ironic (authentic?) enthusiasm being one of the best human traits. I moved across the country and am getting settled in, trying to make new friends. The culture is a bit different, so it's been slow going. But I've found that digging into and understanding what people are super into is one of the most enjoyable things you can do, and probably the best way to understand who someone really is. Not just what they're into, but why. I've also found that most people really want to share / teach other people about these things, so that's a great way to connect. And I've also realized this has happened in a lot of the deep friendships I've had, just more organically.
ubermonkey 4y ago
Traditional nerd/geek culture has always been pretty pro-enthusiasm. I mean, it's built on enthusiasm. Chris Hardwick noted that being a nerd isn't about what you like; it's about how you like it, and that delta is really the almost manic enthusiasm that ensues. I'm sorry you had to work through this!

abrookewood 4y ago

The other thing that's great about having friends like this, is that they've done all the hard work for you! You can just adopt their setup/approach (within reason) and can be fairly certain that you are going to get a good result without needing to put in months of research.

switchbak 4y ago
That's most of the benefit of putting "Reddit" at the end of a Google search for an esoteric subject. I love when someone has outrageously strong opinions on things I know very little about.
- RF_Savage 4y ago
  And it works fine as long as they are not just parroting some strong opinnions to feel part of the group. But those reddit threads often do include some research and references, so one has a jumping off point for one's own search with some keywords.
  - switchbak 4y ago
    Absolutely, it's easy to think you're dealing with knowledge only to find out it was an uninformed yet strong opinion. It's also incredibly easy to game, so there's no way that'll last forever.

sublinear 4y ago

At the risk of sounding immature and causing offense (none intended), I think it's important to remember why your initial instinct in youth was to dislike unironic enthusiasm. I can only speak for myself, but was trying to avoid being labeled. I wanted to people to actually get to know me and not just use me as a means to an end. I am not merely my hobbies. I do enjoy helping people out from time to time, but I strongly dislike being someone's "_____ guy". Very easy to be taken advantage of. The world isn't always nice.

stephen_g 4y ago
I mean, if it works for you, then cool. For me, not getting into hobbies and things for that kind of reason would have been the source of massive regret about my life in hindsight. I have always loved getting really interested in all sorts of things, but it's true that it's important to not have a hobby that consumes you to the extent that it's basically the basis of your whole identity, or having only one thing you talk about so you're "that guy". But most people can be enthusiastic about various things and avoid that.
agileAlligator 4y ago
Irony/insincerity is a malaise of modern times. Being sincere about something leaves us vulnerable, open to attack. So we hide under successive layers of irony, until we ourselves aren't sure where our true beliefs lie.

bliteben 4y ago

I was recently struck by this tidbit about Cormac McCarthy: > As a child, McCarthy saw no value in school, preferring to pursue his own interests. He described a moment when his teacher asked the class about their hobbies. McCarthy answered eagerly, as he later said, "I was the only one with any hobbies and I had every hobby there was ... name anything, no matter how esoteric. I could have given everyone a hobby and still had 40 or 50 to take home."[15]

rootveg 4y ago
Not to mock but that sounds like a classic ADHD trait... coming from someone who in the last few month bought a e-piano, started painting and sailing
- rocketbop 4y ago
  Cormac McCarthy does not have ADHD.
- renewiltord 4y ago
  Everything a pathology, innit mate? ADHD is only ADHD if it impairs your functioning. If you're interested in a lot and can complete things then it's clearly not a disorder. And the man has written many books so clearly does not have an attention disorder.
  - noduerme 4y ago
    I swear, I did not read this before writing my response about pathologizing to the same post. I guess it's a type of thinking that presents a pretty narrow target. Easy to recognize as a crutch once you're aware of it.
- derefr 4y ago
  You're thinking of having 50 attempted hobbies that you pretend you'll get back to one day. (I know; I have ADHD too.) But McCarthy meant that he had 50+ concurrent consistently-actively-pursued hobbies/passions. Which is something that's possible... if you have a lot of time on your hands, and you never allow anything into your life that drains you mentally so much that doing it kills your motivation to do anything else for the rest of the day. (Which IMHO is really only an option for people who are either retired, "independently wealthy", or being homeschooled.)

leidenfrost 4y ago

I thought of that, but later in life I saw how most kids were ok with other kind of "nerds" as long as they were sociable and not ugky. I remember of a kid who was nerdier than me, but he didn't fit into the usual nerdy social anxiety and he also did boxing as a hobby so he was ok. I concluded that it was not really about interest.

mixmastamyk 4y ago
Yep, we had a few geeks on the football team, no one was bothered.
- kqr 4y ago
  I think the governing principle is that people want to belong to a social group, and to achieve that belonging, they need to be as un-like other social groups as possible, to make their affiliation clear. In other words, cool kids are fine with hanging out with un-cool kids, if it can be done in a way that does not involve un-coolness at all, so they don't become un-cool by association.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

BluSyn 4y ago

This resonates, as I've had bad experiences with being "too into" things when I was younger. Eg, being called a "fanboy" in a derogatory way, just because I'm really passionate about a specific hobby, product, or technology. In my youth this was quite hurtful, and sometimes discouraged me from talking about my hobbies. There are entire subreddits dedicated to hating on specific things or people. As if they define themselves not by what they love, but by what they hate, and derive some sick satisfaction from mocking others. As I've gotten older, I realized these people are probably dead inside. So now I almost pity them. I can't imagine being so spiteful that I must shame another's passions. LPT: Always pursue your passions without shame, and encourage others to do the same.

koonsolo 4y ago

This "too cool for stuff" sounds like US culture. I never experienced that kind of thing in EU. We each had our own friend groups, and didn't really care what the other groups were into. I once heard an artist say (can't remember which one), that they loved playing in Europe, since everyone at a festival is there to have fun. While in US, everyone is there to look cool.

awild 4y ago
It's not a US thing and not even necessarily related to being bullied in school. Lots of parents scold their children for being into useless or eclectic hobbies.
nxmnxm99 4y ago
It's a nice sentiment but really isn't accurate.... unless you're suggesting nerds don't get bullied in Europe
- lmm 4y ago
  Not in the same way. US high school clique dynamics are very much US-specific.
- paganel 4y ago
  I was the nerd-ish type as a teenager back in 1990s Eastern Europe and I don't remember getting bullied. I knew things were slightly different in the US, I mean the whole "cool girls" group thing and all, as we were able to watch stuff like Saved by the Bell [1] on TV, but that kind of atmosphere seemed strange to us at the time. [1] https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0096694/ https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0096694/
  - gambiting 4y ago
    Same exact thing for me. Nerds definitely weren't getting bullied, if you were good at maths and physics maybe girls weren't into you but the "bullies" didn't really mess with people who were good at sciences(I guess partially because they had to copy their homework from someone, so keeping good relations with the "nerds" was actually a good survival strategy)

yieldcrv 4y ago

I always quizzically (but non-judgementally) dive deeper into people’s offbrand traits because I’m not sure if they are serious I recently hired a gardener on taskrabbit, and he was too cool for it so I’m trying to figure out “really? gardening bro?” and turns out he is totally hooking up with women on taskrabbit. like the modern day milkman! he’s also interested in plants and will do the work. so there is merit to trying to figure out what the edge is, where is the dopamine coming from that gets you to associate the interest with fun? in my experience, its worthwhile being skeptical, I’m either missing something or this person is completely unrelatable in a dozen other ways.

GuB-42 4y ago

> I sometimes have to remind myself that being super into football, nascar, or the bachelorette is just as admirable as being into my things. I would add music you don't like (ex: autotuned rap), "commercial" or "popular" everything (ex: Bud light), and sexual kinks (ex: pet play) to this list. If you peek a little, you may find even find these topics to be surprisingly deep. Maybe even deeper than the things you like. Or maybe not, but don't dismiss them because they don't fit your preconceived ideas.

gadders 4y ago

Unironic enthusiasm for a topic is great, but I think a lot of enthusiasm for something, especially if it's "cool" (coffee, craft beer) is mostly performative. They want to brand themself as similar to other people who are into that thing.

globular-toast 4y ago

I can relate to having it beaten out of you. There were definitely many years after school where I'd learnt to suppress and hide my geeky interests. There's no way, for example, I would have been visibly excited when a train went past. More recently I've stopped suppressing it, though. Now as a 36 year old man I will run to be able to see a train go past if I want to. It helps that I now have friends and a girlfriend who are just like me. It turns out if you find the right people these are attractive qualities.

ChrisMarshallNY 4y ago

> Even into adulthood, I occasionally find myself making fun of people for being into specific things. Yesterday I learned that there's an entire subreddit, dedicated to making fun of programmers. People take snippets of social media posts by programmers, and post them out of context (without links to the context), and everyone takes turns, making fun of the snippet. That looks like a lot of fun... </s> Hey, whatever creams your twinkie...

stnmtn 4y ago
What is the subreddit?
- ChrisMarshallNY 4y ago
  I dunno. Something like “programming circle jerk,” or something. I suspect there’s hundreds of these types of things out there. I’d also suggest that participating in these fora could have … adverse … effects on one’s future career prospects. I can assure you that many HR background checking companies scrape social media, and are getting fairly good at “deanonymizing” posters.

shrugsworth 4y ago

Agree with you about un-ironic (authentic?) enthusiasm being one of the best human traits. I moved across the country and am getting settled in, trying to make new friends. The culture is a bit different, so it's been slow going. But I've found that digging into and understanding what people are super into is one of the most enjoyable things you can do, and probably the best way to understand who someone really is. Not just what they're into, but why. I've also found that most people really want to share / teach other people about these things, so that's a great way to connect. And I've also realized this has happened in a lot of the deep friendships I've had, just more organically.

ubermonkey 4y ago

Traditional nerd/geek culture has always been pretty pro-enthusiasm. I mean, it's built on enthusiasm. Chris Hardwick noted that being a nerd isn't about what you like; it's about how you like it, and that delta is really the almost manic enthusiasm that ensues. I'm sorry you had to work through this!