# How stigmatized was sci fi in the 80s and 90s?



## CmdrShepN7 (Dec 25, 2019)

I heard people who loved dragons and swords were shoved into lockers in the 80s and 90s. Was this true? Were the only people who were willing to get into stuff like DnD, fantasy, and sci fi people who spent most of their time in basements?

Why was 1980s, 1990s, and early 2000s American society focused on accumulating wealth and worshiping athletes?

Were there any people in those type periods who enjoyed geek stuff but were athletic and intelligent who ended up becoming military officers?


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## CupofJoe (Dec 25, 2019)

It wasn't in the UK. Or at least not near me. I won't say that being into DnD made anyone a high school hero but we were only as despised and demeaned as much as any other group and we did our share back.
We spent a fair amount of our time in basements or garages. If you are planning an EPIC Warhammer battle you need a lot of space...
I don't know much about American Culture except what I know of from film and TV etc. but high school stateside seems to be far more dominated by the Jock culture. In the UK most sport is and was done outside the school system.


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## BAYLOR (Dec 25, 2019)

Science Fiction and  Fantasy in the 1970's and 80 was viewed with a certain level of  disdain and derision by many older and younger people. .


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## tegeus-Cromis (Dec 25, 2019)

I imagine it depended on the context. I never felt the stigma, and never got bullied, whether I read SFF or comics or what have you. But then, I've never much cared what other people think of my tastes. I suppose people more sensitive to peer pressure, or in schools where jock-dominated social hierarchy was more prevalent, may have had different experiences. 

But I also think this notion of a stigma is played up now by corporate-appropriated (or created?) "fan culture" to create a consumer identity they can exploit. ( "_You_ are _special_ because you're a _true_ fan of the films/TV series/games/etc we peddle, and as proof of how much of a true fan you are, you -- OK, maybe not _you-you_, you're probably too young, but people _like_ you -- faced adversity back in the bad old days, which, uh, since we're trying to sell you this stuff based on nostalgia, were also the good old days -- it gets complicated, doesn't it? Oof -- and stayed true to your worship of our corporate product. Now buy this limited edition collectible already. You don't want to lose your true fan status, do you?" )


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## Toby Frost (Dec 25, 2019)

In England in the 1990s, there was no real internet, so there was very little of what we'd call "geek culture". There was a real sense of information being scarce: things like Warhammer catalogues were passed around my friends so that everyone could make a single postal order instead of buying online. The idea of someone becoming a celebrity for basically being a nerd, like Felicia Day, was alien: the concept of a woman being interested in such stuff - at least to us at a boys' school - would just have been inconceivable.

Interestingly, roleplaying, wargaming and heavy metal were closer then than they would be now. No doubt this dates back to prog rock songs about wizards and things like Michael Moorcock being linked to Hawkwind. In the 90s, Games Workshop had its own record label, most famously featuring a surprisingly heavy band called Bolt Thrower.

Schools probably varied a lot, but I never felt that I might be beaten up for being a nerd. To an extent, it was just a thing you did at a certain age (12-15 would have been normal). Older kids who had discovered girls and beer would often try to sell us their old Warhammer figures and the like. As CupofJoe says, we were ridiculed, but then everyone ridiculed everyone else almost constantly.

And I agree with the previous post that the fan-identity thing is played up for laughs/nostalgia/selling these days.


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## Venusian Broon (Dec 25, 2019)

Personally I never noticed even a Jock culture in 1980's school in Edinburgh. That was just something we saw in US movies/TV. Thus school wasn't as polarised - just kids being mean to each other.

But I suspect everyone had different experiences. Thrash west coast US metal was big around me (mid 80's) , but not connected at all to roleplaying or wargamming (did not know anyone at all into that).


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## Brian G Turner (Dec 25, 2019)

My observation is that being "nerdy" wasn't seen cool until into the new millennium. By that time the rise of the internet meant that being "techie" came with a real value proposition that people could relate to. Additionally, the development of internet culture was driven by nerd culture, which meant that mainstream people coming to the net were inevitably exposed to it. Along with the rise of Harry Potter, the LOTR films, and perhaps the Matrix, interests that were previously regarded as niche became much more mainstream.


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## Vince W (Dec 25, 2019)

Can't speak to American culture but playing D&D, reading fantasy and science fiction, and similar pursuits while not mainstream, were not enough to get someone bullied. At least not at my school. Sure girls wouldn't want to know you, but then I had other problems that made that point moot.


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## Star-child (Dec 25, 2019)

CmdrShepN7 said:


> I heard people who loved dragons and swords were shoved into lockers in the 80s and 90s. Was this true? Were the only people who were willing to get into stuff like DnD, fantasy, and sci fi people who spent most of their time in basements?
> 
> Why was 1980s, 1990s, and early 2000s American society focused on accumulating wealth and worshiping athletes?
> 
> Were there any people in those type periods who enjoyed geek stuff but were athletic and intelligent who ended up becoming military officers?


No, it wasn't true. Most of your post supposes a society that didn't exist.

"Nerds" are not people that play DnD. Nerds are people (men) with barriers to "normal" socialization that substitute obsessive in-group social behavior for more common activities. Everyone else just didn't want to spend the time it takes to "build" a character and wage a campaign when they could be doing things that are interactive and in the real world. Role playing isn't a bad thing, but it is a replacement for having a role in the world.

I say that as a kid who read comic books, SF and bought toys during high school and college in the '80s. Those personal interests in no way impacted dating, acting, sports activities, etc that filled the rest of my time. That's why I was never viewed as a nerd. (And 'yes', plenty of people like me ended up as military officers.)

Was SFF in the basement in the '80s? Star Trek Next Generation, Star Wars, E.T., Batman, Superman, Close Encounters, Dragonslayer, Aliens, Terminator, Bladerunner, Legend, Wrath of Khan. *No.* The '80s and late '70s was a boom time for SF, comic and fantasy in popular culture.


What people seem to misunderstand about the '80s is that the end of OPEC embargoes, large wars and many government business regulations made it a boom time after a long period of economic decline. The '60s counter-culture did not create a sustainable alternative economy, and most of those people settled down to normal economic activities - including consumerism.

What was revolutionary in the '80s was the rise of "alternative" pop culture. This appeared to start with music and expanded from there. Nowadays, it is easy to convince ourselves that the internet created the huge number of subcultures we have today, but really it started in the '80s because of the technology of that time - re-recordable cassette tapes, cable television, VCRs, personal Walkman stereos and the toll free phone numbers of mail order businesses. (That alternative culture was a gateway for acceptance of LGBTQ people in the mainstream.)


The frat boys of today bullying each other online about Avengers movies aren't "nerds". They are social people arguing about something as thoroughly mainstream as football, not "being nerds".

Today we have so many subcultures co-existing that actual nerds don't really stand out against the Goths, queer folk, etc that no one blinks an eye at anymore. That process started back then.


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## Teresa Edgerton (Dec 25, 2019)

I don't remember anything like that.  In fact, people outside of fandom and groups that overlapped— like the SCA, the larger Renaissance festivals, etc.— seemed mostly unaware and/or confused about just what science fiction and fantasy were about.  I can remember telling people who asked what I did for a living that I wrote fantasy novels and seeing, sometimes, a shocked look come over their faces, at which point I realized they thought I was writing erotica (yes, that kind of fantasy) so I hastily explained, "You know: swords and heroes and quests."  Which only some of the time brought a vague look of understanding, and the rest of the time blank looks.


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## CupofJoe (Dec 26, 2019)

Toby Frost said:


> In England in the 1990s, there was no real internet, so there was very little of what we'd call "geek culture". There was a real sense of information being scarce: things like Warhammer catalogues were passed around my friends so that everyone could make a single postal order instead of buying online.


Just had a wonderful flashback of getting together with a few friends to get to the minimum spend for Games Workshop. And then the unboxing [as it would now be called] when the figures/games arrived.


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## Stephen Palmer (Dec 26, 2019)

SF became cool again the moment _Neuromancer_ was published.
It was like a door being opened...


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## Stephen Palmer (Dec 26, 2019)

I used to write for Games Workshop in the early days. My first published work was for White Dwarf. Tbh though, I can't remember a thing about it, except I ripped Gene Wolfe off to create something called The Vivimancer. :/


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## Wyrmlord (Dec 26, 2019)

Vince W said:


> Can't speak to American culture but playing D&D


D&D was mainly demonized by the hysterical Christian families during the 1970s and 1980s. There still some of that in other parts of the country, but, with shows like Critical Role and Stranger Things, more and more people are embracing the game.


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## Wyrmlord (Dec 26, 2019)

Stephen Palmer said:


> SF became cool again the moment _Neuromancer_ was published.
> It was like a door being opened...


I get the book's significance for sci-fi, but, boy, was that thing a slog.


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## Vince W (Dec 26, 2019)

Wyrmlord said:


> D&D was mainly demonized by the hysterical Christian families during the 1970s and 1980s. There still some of that in other parts of the country, but, with shows like Critical Role and Stranger Things, more and more people are embracing the game.


I remember seeing some of it on tv and it only made me laugh at the ridiculousness of it.


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## Star-child (Dec 26, 2019)

Wyrmlord said:


> D&D was mainly demonized by the hysterical Christian families during the 1970s and 1980s. There still some of that in other parts of the country, but, with shows like Critical Role and Stranger Things, more and more people are embracing the game.


It may have been demonized by the fundamentalists, but it was also a bit of a joke to many people who simply viewed it as silly.


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## Ashley R (Dec 29, 2019)

It all depends on perspective.

For some films like Planet of the Apes, 2001 A space Odyssey, and Star Wars heralded in a wider cultural awareness of SF.

As for nerd/geek culture, I was pretty oblivious to it. There again I was a child whose parents moved twice during my upbringing, and I was as a result always pretty much an outsider, so being an SF&F fan was only a small part of any problems I faced.


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## hitmouse (Dec 29, 2019)

Stephen Palmer said:


> I used to write for Games Workshop in the early days. My first published work was for White Dwarf. Tbh though, I can't remember a thing about it, except I ripped Gene Wolfe off to create something called The Vivimancer. :/


White Dwarf was like treasure in the early 1980s. The hobby store in town used to get a couple of copies per month, and once they had gone that was it. 

Different world pre-internet, pre CGI, not just for sf/fantasy, but for all culture. I think, however, that the op has set up a bit of a straw man: his premise is imaginary, not historical.


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## HareBrain (Dec 29, 2019)

Stephen Palmer said:


> I ripped Gene Wolfe off to create something called The Vivimancer. :/



Ooh, I came across that article only a few weeks ago, after dragging a pile of old WD out of the cellar. (I wasn't paying hard enough attention to notice your name, I'm afraid.)


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## Vince W (Dec 29, 2019)

hitmouse said:


> White Dwarf was like treasure in the early 1980s. The hobby store in town used to get a couple of copies per month, and once they had gone that was it.


In the early days, White Dwarf was great because it covered a wide range of the gaming hobby and not just GW. When they became a strictly in house magazine it lost some of it's charm. Still, it was magic in early 80s.


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## Stephen Palmer (Dec 29, 2019)

HareBrain said:


> Ooh, I came across that article only a few weeks ago, after dragging a pile of old WD out of the cellar. (I wasn't paying hard enough attention to notice your name, I'm afraid.)


OMG. May this never see the light of day. Seriously!


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## Venusian Broon (Dec 29, 2019)

hitmouse said:


> White Dwarf was like treasure in the early 1980s. The hobby store in town used to get a couple of copies per month, and once they had gone that was it.
> 
> Different world pre-internet, pre CGI, not just for sf/fantasy, but for all culture. I think, however, that the op has set up a bit of a straw man: his premise is imaginary, not historical.



Pretty sure I saw _White Dwarf _on sale in my big Sainsbury's only a week ago. That beats my own favourite magazine _Fortean Times. _


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## Vladd67 (Dec 29, 2019)

Venusian Broon said:


> Pretty sure I saw _White Dwarf _on sale in my big Sainsbury's only a week ago. That beats my own favourite magazine _Fortean Times. _


Our local Tesco stocks both.


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## Venusian Broon (Dec 29, 2019)

Vladd67 said:


> Our local Tesco stocks both.


I would write an angry letter to Sainsbury's that _FT _isn't there, but I get _FT _posted to me anyway via subscription,


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## Foxbat (Dec 30, 2019)

Stephen Palmer said:


> I used to write for Games Workshop in the early days. My first published work was for White Dwarf. Tbh though, I can't remember a thing about it, except I ripped Gene Wolfe off to create something called The Vivimancer. :/


Snap! I had my first story published in White Dwarf. It was only 500 words and I can't remember what it was called but it was about a worm-like species (I think I called them Grxx) encountering a giant alien. The whole Grxx civilisation ended when the astronaut abruptly  stood on them. It was pretty bad.


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## Stephen Palmer (Dec 30, 2019)

Wow! And, yay!


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## Narkalui (Dec 31, 2019)

I got my first rejections from the Black Library... I don't think that counts does it?

I just googled The Vivimancer Stephen Palmer and found a website which no longer exists and this here thread. What number White Dwarf was it @Stephen Palmer?


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## Lew Rockwell Fan (Jan 1, 2020)

Warning: Brutal Honesty & Belligerent Opinions, about 40 words ahead:


CmdrShepN7 said:


> Was this true?


In a nutshell, no.


CmdrShepN7 said:


> Were there any people in those type periods who enjoyed geek stuff but were athletic and intelligent who ended up becoming military officers?


Of course.


CmdrShepN7 said:


> worshiping athletes


Actually, that's worse now than it was then. I'd add other sorts of pop entertainers, not just athletes. That's actually _much_ worse. Seriously, do you realize what a large fraction of the Hollywood pseudo-intellectuals that take themselves so seriously are high school drop outs?


CmdrShepN7 said:


> dragons and swords


As preface, I fully acknowledge, with no apology, that I'm a genre snob. While I don't disdain fantasy, and certainly there is a fuzzy borderland between it & SF somewhere in Meyers' Commonwealth, with all due respect, I must point out that "dragons and swords" is more characteristic of fantasy. Now, I'll get off my high thoat and address the question as regards SF.


CmdrShepN7 said:


> 80s and 90s


Regardless of when Ellison, first made his infamous remark, the era of the "SF ghetto" was earlier than that. It was one front in the older culture war that C.P.Snow wrote about. The noble Greek philosopher types who dealt with the Big, Abstract, Important, Ethereal questions (meaning the ones where nobody could actually _prove_ you were just a glib bull ejesta artist) vs. the grubby handed slave types who had the vulgarity to deal with the physically real and eventually even cast aspersions on Aristotle's physics by measuring things in the objective real world (How dare they?). Yeah, my bias is showing - if that's a problem, deal with it. I'm strongly partisan in that war - and it still goes on. Reality matters.

Asimov wrote eloquently on this factor in the decline of the "SF is trash" idea in one of his essays in the F&SF series (his finest work, BTW). Specifically about how this began to change with the launch of Sputnik. The changing perception of SF was part of the changing perception of _science_. 

Jane & Joe Sixpack and the Congress'en that pandered to them began to dimly perceive that those 4-eyed, pointy-headed intellectuals were the ones that could build the ICBMs and maybe they were useful after all. JFK's moon speech was part of this sequence. And then he was killed (a coup IMO, but that's another subject, and borders on the verboten here) & he became a Saint, whose vision Must Not be Questioned. So hey, ho, off to the moon we go. _Of course_ SF got a boost.

The other big factor in the change is more complex. The career track that lead to teaching English Lit, either at Uni or in HS, attracted a lot more of some types of people than others. Most of them were the type that crave a feeling of intellectual superiority, but couldn't pass algebra. They were uncomfortably aware that SF was superficially similar to their own subject matter so they felt they'd be expected to have an opinion on it. But they were also aware, that by and large, they didn't understand it. So they turned up their noses and dissed it. That didn't stop the engineering or physics students from reading it. Those profs were pretty effective in defining the "proper" view of SF as trash before the 60s.

But dramatic economic growth, followed by Vietnam, the Pill, and an era with no known venereal diseases that weren't trivially curable lead to the youth rebellion of the 60s. Drawing those links would be another long essay, but I'll just leave that stub. Suffice to say, "Question Authority" became the order of day and the supercilious English prof shrilly asserting that SF was trash wasn't blindly assumed to know what the Heck he was talking about. 

The flower children already _knew_ that it was the smart kids in high school that were always reading Analog. So, SF became _*cool*_. 

That was good and bad. The market exploded and publishers were desperate to cash in on it. But there wasn't really enough talent to go around. So a lot of powdered skim milk got sold as cream. And the poor, vacuous theater major in her bell bottoms & Birkenstocks, striving to look hip and catch the eye of the bearded boy in beads sat on the bench in the park with her copy of _Dangerous Visions_ pretending to read Science Fiction. Because The Establishment disapproved. Which made it chic.


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## Stephen Palmer (Jan 1, 2020)

Narkalui said:


> I just googled The Vivimancer Stephen Palmer and found a website which no longer exists and this here thread. What number White Dwarf was it @Stephen Palmer?



I honestly have no idea. It was approximately 35 years ago!


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## Narkalui (Jan 1, 2020)

I bought my first WD in '93, so well before my time then...


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## HareBrain (Jan 1, 2020)

Heh heh. I have it right here in my sweaty hands. Issue 67, July 1985. The article includes the word "goodly".



Stephen Palmer said:


> OMG. May this never see the light of day. Seriously!



Oops.



Narkalui said:


> I just googled The Vivimancer Stephen Palmer and found a website which no longer exists and this here thread.



You get a couple more hits with "Steve Palmer", which is the name the article was published under.


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## Narkalui (Jan 1, 2020)

I remember now, my first was issue 169, it had a Space Wolf Terminator (Logan Grimnar?) on the front


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## Toby Frost (Jan 1, 2020)

I recently got hold of the first issue I ever read. It contained instructions to build a model cottage. I now have an entire village of 28mm houses.


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## Stephen Palmer (Jan 1, 2020)

HareBrain said:


> Heh heh. I have it right here in my sweaty hands. Issue 67, July 1985. The article includes the word "goodly".



As in, a goodly load of bollocks?  
In my defence, m'lud, I was very young at the time.


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## tinkerdan (Jan 12, 2020)

I think this is going to be my stock answer to these type of assertions...


tinkerdan said:


> I think that if you could get a copy and read this book...
> 
> 
> 
> ...



This book talks about
1926-37 as being the Age of Wonder
1938-49 as the Golden Age
1950-61 as the Age of Acceptance
1962-73 as the age of Rebellion
The meaning of those is in the text for anyone interested they will need to read the book.

However this is starting with Magazines
And the Age of Rebellion moves closer to novels as magazines begin to wane.

The point is that there is a difference between the ages that media go through so I think the OP needs to be very specific about what media he means to discuss rather than have the discussion focus on Science Fiction in general and having a majority then end up trying to discuss movies and tv.

What goes  on in TV and Movies has less to do with stigma and more to do with profitability. The stigma is that the industry hates to lose money.
As for magazines the biggest time of stigma was from 1926 thru 1949.

The greater surge for novels came in the age of acceptance and beyond and I don't recall any stigma after the 70's--or nothing nearly as bad as prior to that.


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