Why is SF/F seen as geeky?

[Brian G Turner]

Something I was thinking about recently is the role of SFF as escapism - but more specifically, by comparison to other genres.

I've got to admit, personally I get frustrated with escapism for the sake of it - being whisked away to another world is fine, but give me something to think about after I've left, please!

BUT - thinking about other genres, whether romance, detective, or even modern fiction, is it the case that all fiction has an inherent element of escapism?

Or is it the case that great literature goes beyond that, with escapism as a secondary tool most genres pick up on? (I'm asking that because George Orwell's 1984 is consider a great piece of literature, but I don;t many people would willingly enter that reality if they didn't know it was Orwell!).

Fundamentally, what I'm trying to explore is why SF/F is regarded as "geeky".

I had initially thought that escapism and wish-fulfilment may be a principle reason, but it doesn't seem to stack up by comparison to other genre literature.

In which case, is it that SF/F uses technical concepts and challenges the imagination to such a degree that it cannot easily have mass appeal?

But then, by popularity of book sales, does that mean Tolkien be considered to have mass-appeal? Aside from being a leader in developing the fantasy genre, is there something present there missing from less popular writers?

Just trying to understand the bias.

(Perhaps it's all just the case that "reading" itself is considered "geeky"!)

 

[ghostofcorwin]

I'm not sure that fantasy fiction would be considered "geeky" in the same way as science fiction. I think fantasy suffers from a different stereotype... that it is all fundamentally following the same tired formula: basic good vs. basic evil; overly-portentous prose that mimics epic/mythological literature; lack of character development beyond a "wind em up and set em going" method (all plot motivation driven, not psychological); trite ideas (war is bad; ugly people/demons are evil; pretty people/ghostly figures in white robes are good; vegetation = good; metal = bad; love is the key to world peace; heroism is a product of fate rather than free will; etc. etc. This is a formula that tends to appeal to younger readers and those looking for comforting formulas, which makes it seem less "substantial" than other genres. Now I'm saying this with the awareness that there is plenty of sophisticated, non-conventional fantasy literature out there. Unfortunately the genre is brought down often by the mass of pedestrian works that most people think of as fantasy.

Problem with many science fiction writers is that they become too enamored of technical details and scientific validation, which is really not what would bring the mainstream reader into a book. The best SF is just good literature with emphasis on character, story, and strong themes. The technical stuff is more often than not part of the staging, not the focus. JMHO.

 

[Brian G Turner]

I'm not sure that fantasy fiction would be considered "geeky" in the same way as science fiction. I think fantasy suffers from a different stereotype... that it is all fundamentally following the same tired formula: basic good vs. basic evil; overly-portentous prose that mimics epic/mythological literature; lack of character development beyond a "wind em up and set em going" method (all plot motivation driven, not psychological); trite ideas (war is bad; ugly people/demons are evil; pretty people/ghostly figures in white robes are good; vegetation = good; metal = bad; love is the key to world peace; heroism is a product of fate rather than free will; etc. etc. This is a formula that tends to appeal to younger readers and those looking for comforting formulas, which makes it seem less "substantial" than other genres. Now I'm saying this with the awareness that there is plenty of sophisticated, non-conventional fantasy literature out there. Unfortunately the genre is brought down often by the mass of pedestrian works that most people think of as fantasy.

Problem with many science fiction writers is that they become too enamored of technical details and scientific validation, which is really not what would bring the mainstream reader into a book. The best SF is just good literature with emphasis on character, story, and strong themes. The technical stuff is more often than not part of the staging, not the focus. JMHO.

Very good points!

 

[Pyan]

I think a lot of it to do with the origins of the genre - the idea that SFF is somehow still tied in to the pulp magazines, to be read furtively and full of bug-eyed monsters, rockets and trolls or orcs. Nowadays there still seems to be the idea that if you're into SFF, you're still a bit set apart from the rest of the reading populace, because "that stuff isn't really proper writing, is it?"...

A good example of what seems to be the general view of things - when I mentioned at work that I was going to the FantasyCon, a couple of years ago, the very first thing that someone said was "Oh yes? Are you dressing up as a Klingon or something, then? Nuh, hur, hur"...

 

[ghostofcorwin]

I think a lot of it to do with the origins of the genre - the idea that SFF is somehow still tied in to the pulp magazines, to be read furtively and full of bug-eyed monsters, rockets and trolls or orcs. Nowadays there still seems to be the idea that if you're into SFF, you're still a bit set apart from the rest of the reading populace, because "that stuff isn't really proper writing, is it?"...

A good example of what seems to be the general view of things - when I mentioned at work that I was going to the FantasyCon, a couple of years ago, the very first thing that someone said was "Oh yes? Are you dressing up as a Klingon or something, then? Nuh, hur, hur"...

I think you're on to something here. The pulps were just a step away from comics, although both produced some really original ideas and changed our culture. I think one problem with sci-fi today is that it can be a hard genre to penetrate for the average reader. Same with fantasy that is "world-building" oriented, as the author feels compelled to invent new terms, create bizarre names, and throw the reader into the thick of it. I think it was H.G. Wells who said that a sci-fi book should contain one central new idea. More than that and you lose the reader. That may be overstated, but it is something to consider. I feel the same way with sci-fi that is overly technical. It just bogs down the narrative and seems awfully self-aggrandizing.... look at how much I know about engineering/science! Frankly, who cares? If I have to wade through a technical manual to get to the story, I am not likely to bother. And I'm fairly literate about scientific matters....

 

[j d worthington]

Pyan beat me to the punch on this one. Essentially, I think that the majority of this impression is one inherited from the early days of the pulps, when sf was largely written for (as many of the writers of the field have said at different times) "14-year-old boys" who were into engineering, physics, etc.... and not a few of whom were socially inept, to say the least. (Look at Asimov's comments about his own experiences in that regard, both in his autobiographies and in Before the Golden Age. He was not alone.)

Between that the entire "Buck Rogers" thing with the comics (followed quickly by Hollywood picking up on that and Flash Gordon), the general public got the idea of vacuous, flashy "space westerns" with about as much substance literarily as the average horse opera (also offered by Hollywood). The more intelligent members of the public knew even as early as the 1930s that the likelihood of highly-evolved, intelligent life on Mars, Venus, etc., was... limited, to say the least; and the fact that so many readers of the genre were of an age where critical faculties are still largely nascent, coupled with the intense partisanship between different fans and their favorite writers (many of whom were, to be honest, not that great as literature, however fun -- try reading a large amount of what was published in the pulps of the day, and you'll see what I mean)... all this and more were almost guaranteed to make certain that the genre got such a bad reputation. Of course, things haven't been helped any by the more extreme fans of Star Trek, Star Wars, Babylon-5, etc., either, who tend to reinforce that original stereotype of the perpetual 14-year-old boy who is socially inept....

 

[The Judge]

Yes, I was wondering whether it wasn't so much the genre nowadays, as some of the people out there reading it... (present company excepted, of course!) Those more... er... *searches for an alternative to Peter G's "fruit loops" * ... over-enthusiastic fans then become the face of sf to the world at large. If there were hard-core romantic fiction readers who attended conferences dressed up as Barbara Cartland and/or her heroines, we might not think 'geek' but I'm certain there would be equally uncomplimentary words flung around. Thinking about it, 'Mills & Boonish' already carries pejorative overtones.

 

[j d worthington]

Well, you certainly see this with the horror genre as well; there are plenty of conventions, and attendees often dress up as favorite characters/critters, and the like. And, of course, the horror genre also has something of an unenviable reputation to overcome as well... thanks to the splatterpunk movement, the "torture-porn" movies, and the like, which have become the "public face" of horror, another literary form which is extremely diverse and often eloquent and beautiful....

 

[Ice fyre]

I think the general public get an image projected from the media. It suits some parts of the media to laugh at the geeks others make us out to be weird'os who never wash, which is totally wrong I had my yearly bath last week!

We tend to be the more intelegent less socially able folk, which makes us appear to be geeky, which is a bit of a liberty, as I dont eat chickens, often.

 

[Interference]

Are comics considered "geeky"? Asking because that's the current main residence of most printed science fiction these days. (I'm thinking of The X-Men and large tracts of Batman material when I say this.) And now we see so many comics making it to film, I think we can certainly call them "mainstream".

Geekiness refers, I suspect, to the study of esoteric knowledge, which in science fiction is to do with the extrapolation of current scientific thought to an imaginative result and in fantasy is invented data which the quality writer adheres to flawlessly. No other (inviting the contradiction through generalisation, of course) field of fiction has these constrictions and it requires a certain determination of geekiness to learn the rules and then go and answer questions on them in pub quizzes.

 

[Winters_Sorrow]

I'm not sure "geeky" is the right word anymore. As you've pointed out in your original post Brian, books like Tolkein's Lord of the Rings has sold enough books through various reprints to be considered as much mainstream as any of the Dan Brown ilk.
The massive Hollywood movies also widened the appeal to many more than the traditional "geek" audience.

I tend to believe the reason it's still looked down on as a "childish" or odd pursuit is because the story itself is not set in a current day, real world setting (notable exceptions like Neil Gaiman aside), which straight away makes the reader realise that what they're reading is complete fiction and needs major leaps of faith to follow.

Compare that to the latest Tom Clancy novel or even the likes of Wilbur Smith, which is more historical in nature and I think that most of the general populace feel more at home reading stories which could conceivably happen in the real world. And that is why I believe that science fiction or fantasy novels will never escape the tag they currently have until we really do have flying cars, robots and/or ogres, trolls and magic in our everyday life (and what a world that would be!).

Which makes for an interesting question really. As "real" science progresses and more 'miraclous' things become science fact, just how fast & far will science fiction need to move to stay ahead of the game?

 

[Rodders]

Perhaps it's less about what it is and more about the obsession that we have for SF &F? Activities that are considered geeky always have their fair share of obsessives, of which i consider myself to be one.

 

[biodroid]

Man fears what he does not understand. It's a defense mechanism that manifests itself as ridicule, however light or heavy it may be.

 

[thesoothsayer]

Maybe because SF is read by geeks? Well, actually, I don't really know the exact definition of a geek, but I imagine it's to do with someone who's interested in science, maths, and other "uncool" stuff. I don't remember many people in school who liked science, and I imagine that most of them would avoid any book labeled SF if only because they think that the books will be filled with hard to understand ideas and concepts that seem like gibberish to them.

Then again, I could be completely wrong, and SF is read by people from across a whole spectrum of society who have not much interest in science in real life.

As for fantasy, I think it suffers from an image problem in the West to a certain extent. It seems to me that fantasy should be a natural favourite medium for story-telling and escapism, but it gets noses turned up at it by the masses. Do fantasy stories set in our world, be it historical or present day, sell better? If so, it could be due to the reason Winters_Sorrow's stated - a reluctance to suspend disbelief.

This question could probably be better answered if asked in another forum, though. It may be like the blind leading the blind here. Just a bunch of SF/F geeks speculating about why it's considered a geeky activity.

 

[chrispenycate]

So "geek" is invariably pejorative?

Once, a long time ago, I was known semi-affectionately as 'egghead', which was partly an insult, but partly a job description – if you want to know the answer to your absurdly complicated technical problem, ask him. Of course you won't understand his absurdly complicated technical solution but you will at least know that, in the passive, an answer is known, even if, in the active (and probably football playing), you don't know it.

I imagined that "geek" was a bit like that; not the guy with the best reflexes who wins the computer games, but the one you go to see when you can't get them to load. If so, the overlap with the SFF community would have been huge, and it would be no surprise that the two got equated in the technophobic racial subconscious.

Though didn't I score high in the geek test I suspect this was because of my being born too early for computers, not from any lack of natural aptitude.

 

[Pyan]

Geeks must be a lucrative subset of the human race, though - I Googled Geek Dating, on a whim, and it has about 3,290,000 hits...

geek dating - Google Search

Having said that, Science Fiction gets about 67,700,000, but Science Fiction Geeks only gets 2,700,000, or about 4%.

This probably means something, but I'm damned if I know what...


I must say, though, I haven't heard "geek" used as an actual insult that I can remember - I had the impression that it was more of a half-admiring term of reference, as in "Trouble with loading that game? I'll ask my mate to have a look at it if you want - he's a bit of a computer geek".

 

[StormFeather]

Not sure if this adds anything to the discussion here, but I heard a comment on the radio the other day, that SF readers were, on average, more intelligent than readers of any other fiction.

And I agree with Pyan on the geek thing. I class my nephew as a geek - in the nicest possible way. He started rewiring plugs at the age of 2, and could build a new computer from bits he bought at boot fairs by the time he was 13.

 

[MeriPie]

My boyfriend does computer science. He delights in calling me a geek because I know what WYSIWYG stands for, and what a VPN does, and I love Final Fantasy (and many other geeky things). I think it is a textbook case of the pot calling the kettle black.

 

[Rodders]

Not sure if this adds anything to the discussion here, but I heard a comment on the radio the other day, that SF readers were, on average, more intelligent than readers of any other fiction. QUOTE]

Ha. You can count me out of that. Although I have heard that SF books have twice the vocabulary of other books outside of the genre (Whoops. I nearly said "Normal books" there ). How true that it, i don't know.

 

[AE35Unit]

I think its because SF specifically, deals a lot with tech and stuff that 'only geeks would be interested in', as opposed to mainstream or Twilight type stuff which is more about 'real life' , relationships and character development. Of course WE all know that such is also often found in hard SF, but to most SF is geek, nerd territory, and I'm fine with that!