04-09-2015, 05:19 AM
(04-08-2015, 07:15 PM)Tuesday Pajamas Wrote: Finally we have some reviews out there which ask the questions we have been asking for seasons.
"Is The Big Bang Theory woefully out of step with the times? This week's Star Wars and Doctor Who fan-shaming episode suggests so..."
My question is why wasn't this written about The Bakersfield episode? (sorry Gripe) but this broke my heart. The nerd shaming has just got more intense over the seasons, the show is servicing the needs of the girl characters and their desire to take all the passion away from their men. There was always a hint but now it's all about how pathetic anyone is who likes, what is essentially, mainstream science fiction.
The Tardis destruction was the worst thing ever!
http://www.denofgeek.com/tv/the-big-bang...-incursion
I went to the mall yesterday and even the clothing for little children and babies is all Marvel/Avengers. There was a huge display of it. These themes are completely mainstream now. I know I mentioned this before, but if you look at the top-grossing movies of 2014, all but two or three out of the top 20 could be described as sci-fi or fantasy of one kind or another. Not the most criticially acclaimed or most award-winning, but the highest grossing, meaning that the average person is buying a ticket to see them. Indeed, out of the top 100, there was just as much sci-fi and fantasy as any other genre. The idea that the average person has never heard of Star Wars or Indiana Jones is just utterly bizarre. Most people know the gist of those stories even if they've never watched them, because it's part of the pop-culture fabric of our society, woven into the background.
A person who hates/disdains imaginative things is a closed-minded, spiritually narrow person whom I do not admire.
Granted, there is a difference between a casual fan and a hardcore fan. There's a difference between having a few t-shirts or pieces of memorabilia versus having a full-sized Tardis or a cosplay wedding or having your entire house decorated that way. Some people might view hardcore fans as extreme, but what is so harmful about it?
Personally, I am not heavily into the major fandoms like LOTR and Star Wars, but I enjoy them in a casual way, and I'm a sucker for anything with a magical/supernatural angle to it.
You'd think the guys were cooking meth or gambling away the rent money, the way this show shames them. For crying out loud, what harm are they doing? If an obsession starts to interfere with the rest of your life, that's a problem, but people can be fans/collectors of anything, it's not unique to geeky themes. Would it somehow be better if they were collecting stamps or rocks or Elvis memorabilia?
There's nothing "mature" or "grown-up" about hating fantasy. *That* is the intellectually and emotionally stunted point of view. There's something petty and ungenerous about it which I find hard to describe but very off-putting. That's a literal-minded person with a stingy, narrow worldview. I can understand disliking specific authors or specific movies, but to be embarrassed by *anything* whimsical or speculative shows some intellectual/spiritual poverty, IMO.
(Who the fuck is so terribly embarrassed/disdainful of juggling or magic tricks that they'll hide it away like they're hiding a murder weapon or a crack pipe? Oh, right, Bernadette. I'd like to hear how she became a scientist if she's not open to new ideas or multiple points of view, which would seem to be the very definition of science and discovery, IMO. A and B strike me more as the type of personality who, once upon a time, would've insisted that the earth is flat because "all the normal people think so." Of all the ludicrous things about this character, the notion that she's a brilliant and sought-after mind is the most laughable.)
A few quotes which say it better than I can:
"Some of my youthful readers are developing wonderful imaginations. This pleases me. Imagination has brought mankind through the Dark Ages to its present state of civilization. Imagination led Columbus to discover America. Imagination led Franklin to discover electricity. Imagination has given us the steam engine, the telephone, the talking-machine, and the automobile, for these things had to be dreamed of before they became realities. So I believe that dreams — day dreams, you know, with your eyes wide open and your brain machinery whizzing — are likely to lead to the betterment of the world. The imaginative child will become the imaginative man or woman most apt to create, to invent, and therefore to foster civilization. A prominent educator tells me that fairy tales are of untold value in developing imagination in the young. I believe it. "
--L. Frank. Baum, author of "The Wizard of Oz."
“When I was ten, I read fairy tales in secret and would have been ashamed if I had been found doing so. Now that I am fifty, I read them openly. When I became a man I put away childish things, including the fear of childishness and the desire to be very grown up.”
--CS Lewis.