It’s quite possibly simple coincidence, but I’ve got a sneaking suspicion that nerd culture is again shifting.  While this based on little other than anecdotal evidence, I think it’s worth discussing the possibility of a new sub-culture (although I’m sure such mutations occur by the minute).  That which is the post-sexual nerd.

Spiderman and "friends"

All your sterotypical notions of nerds, geeks and what not aren’t wrong.  There certainly is a slobbering audience that looks for little more than escapist fare, that which hetero-normatively contains a LOT of women.  Sometimes scantily clad, sometimes entirely nude, or simply playing a second fiddle to male leads, all these things permeate nerd media.  Largely, because the market suspects that this is what we want.  That we crave a parasocial relationship with these often grotesquely exagerated characters.  The switch to realism in comic artistry that birthed the bizzarely detailed (Liefield, Turner, McFarland, etc.) figures that we grew up with in the 90’s has come full circle, and now instead of craving such “realism” art in my consumption of comics, I shun it.  I pine for the stylized, unreal work of Mignola, Bachalo and Ramos, or the ultra-real (almost photographic) approach of Maleev.  “T and A” shots are unnecessary, plot and proper dialog are everything.

Recently, when Soul Calibur IV came out, almost everyone who played with me commented upon a staple of the series, the female roster’s breast size.  It’s always been unrealistic, but within the recent iteration, it went past the border of absurd, into utter lunacy, with costume designs to match.  This has also been seen with Tecmo’s Dead or Alive series, but my reaction has almost always been the same: “I really wasn’t paying attention to that.”  I’m simply not.  My interaction with the games have always been based on an “interface first”(“Is it fun?”) and competition perspective (“you’re goin’ down this time, pal!”).  The sexual themes aren’t the salient issues for me.  And aren’t for many of my cohorts either.

My experience with media is almost pitch perfect for the typical nerd.  Caucasian, middle-class, judeo-christian upbrining, heterosexual male, aged 18-24.   Yet, I don’t buy games for boobs, and I certainly don’t read comics solely to see the pinnacle of masculinity at work (though, I must admit do enjoying some superhero comics).  Hetero-normative sterotypes and overt sexuality in nerd media often is off-putting these days (or perhaps I’m just a prude).  Yet, with so many of those that I associate feel similarly, one can’t help but wonder if something else is at work.  I’m almost certainly willy to grant the notion that we’re in a minority.  So perhaps this isn’t a new sub-culture, and just a simple outlier of the regular distribution.

Even so, part of me is still curious if this attitude is pervasive.  Granted, everyone on this site (I’m pretty sure) is either in or completed college, which may be the confounding variable at work (what with all the critical thinking prowess that certainly must go with the degree). My suspicion is that this “post-sexual nerd culture” is much more interested in content than any other generation of nerds before it.  Our loyalty is less to character, more to story.  Game interface and plot construction, not exploitation of men or women.  What’s your experience been?  I’m definatly interested in a female viewpoint on this.