Fri, June 11, 2004
Dissension! Bring me the 27-sided die of justice!—8:39 AM
So a certain rabble-rouser, who shall remain anonymous until it is politically convenient for me to expose this person in public and bring much shame upon him/her, has just forwarded me this link:
I have no idea what the hell it means. My best guess is that it is an ongoing story based on the results of a Dungeons & Dragons game, although I suppose it could just be D&D fiction unrelated to any specific game. But I'm still confused. Wasn't there supposed to be a horse named Franc?
Anyway, from the context, this instigator implies that Tidball, the onebee.com Patron Saint of Off-Site Links, is either "spyscribe" (the chronicler in this case), or perhaps just one of the participants. I think the point that's meant to be made is, "Look at this geek! You must hate him!" Which I think is a little unfair to me, and a lot unfair to him (where "he" is spyscribe and/or the poor, innocent Tidball).
I guess I should go on the record as saying I'm not really so shallow that I judge people based on broad generalizations. I'm not a racist. There may be individual Mexican-Americans I dislike, even an anonymous one who cuts me off in traffic, but I'm not shouting "Kill all Mexicans!" I don't begrudge anyone's interest in fantasy role-playing games (if, in fact, that's the category D&D would fall into – I'm ignorant here). I don't begrudge anyone's appreciation of LOTR, in book or movie form. I begrudge the way the films were made, I begrudge the Oscar sweep, but I don't begrudge the fans. (I'd have to hate, like, half of America! And I already hate half for voting for Bush!) I think a rich and vivid imagination is a wonderful thing, and if a game like D&D is your chosen outlet for expressing that, more power to you. I'm meticulous and obsessive. I'm sure if I sat in on a game, I'd be caught right up in it. (Although maybe I'd skip the part where you wear puffy hats and walk around saying "Forsooth.")
Ha ha, only teasing about the hats. And that's the point here. Sure, D&D is very easy to make fun of. All of us do it. But 26-year-old virgins are easy to make fun of, too. I can laugh at myself, just as this merry band of D&D'ers can. Just because the jokes are easy doesn't mean they're malicious. I wouldn't dare to judge a group of people just because they play Dungeons & Dragons.
(Well, not anymore. In the tenth grade I had to stay after school to make up a Chemistry exam, and the room I had to do it in was also hosting the school's D&D club – a handful of spindly seventh and eighth graders with sunken chests and overactive sebaceous glands, who loudly proclaimed after every roll of the die, "You want to have sex with it!!" amid much snorting and wheezing and groping for inhalers. ([dice roll] "We encounter... a cow." "And you want to have sex with it!!" [laugh/snort/shove]) They kind of perpetuated the stereotype a tad much. I related this to a classmate, who said he was making up a test in a similar situation and apparently the distraction finally snapped him. He says he got all up in their shit, screaming, "You are inexcusable!" at the top of his voice. This was a pretty geeky looking guy; in a lineup, he'd get picked as the D&D grand wizard or whatever they have. So it's a really funny image for me to remember.)
So, if the point is to say "Tidball is a dork," well, yes. But who among us isn't? I don't think you can have a blog and not be a dork. But what's wrong with that? He's the coolest dork I know. He has an earring, for crying out loud! This new information doesn't really push the meter in either direction. If the point is to say "Jameson is a hypocrite," well, yes. I frequently rail against Bush for things that I'd easily let Clinton get away with. I frequently call for the head of Julianne Moore on a stick, but I'd give her daily pedicures for a year if she'd introduce me to Spielberg. I'm a hypocrite, and proudly so. However, I don't think I am in this case.
Shame!
Update: ;-)
(And if the emoticon isn't clear enough on the subject, please read the comments before allowing anything above to upset you. Thanks!)
"Holly" — Fri, 6/11/04 1:46pm
Oops. May Kettenek forgive me for sending you the link all by itself without any clarifying commentary.
The point was absolutely not to say Jeff is a dork or that you are a hypocrite.
Having surfed from your website onward to the storyhour while browsing my bookmarks, I though, "hmm, Jameson knows Jeff; I wonder if Jeff already showed him this link or not." So I just quirkily and idly thought you might be interested to check it out, fired off the link to you, and didn't give it any more thought than that. Now your readers are going to think I'm a royal sneaking jerk (perhaps even that I am "tricksssy"), since I've sat in on this very game and have always, I hope, been totally respectful. Which, for the record, I am (respectful). It was fun to sit in on the game and I enjoy reading the story hour.
So I really want them to know that there wasn't any insult intended here. D&D is geeky, yes, and I have just become irresistably addicted to Stargate SG-1. I like being a geek, and I like spending time with other geeks. They're nice. They're funny. They, unlike some people, understand why Lord of the Rings matters. ;-)
I just thought you might like reading a little of the story hour.
Sorry to expose my name, thereby depriving you of future political capital against me, but – with apologies to Anvil and spyscribe – Justice demands it.
Bee Boy — Fri, 6/11/04 3:08pm
You have to love her. She's spectacularly easy to bait. :-)
And she's overwhelmingly good-natured about it. Holly, I hope there's cheap, quick Internet where you're going, because it'll be like you never left.
(And certainly nobody will think you're a sneak or a jerk; that's one reason I left you anonymous – aside from the baiting, of course – so the readers who don't get sarcasm can hate you while the rest of them laugh with us/at us.)
Bee Boy — Fri, 6/11/04 3:17pm
Okay, I just finished reading Holly's email in which she's sincerely concerned that I was implying she was a meanie. So forgive me for being serious for a moment – for the official record, Holly's a sweetheart. When she sent me the link, I assumed there was a certain amount of wink/snark in it, since I'm so mean to LOTR around here, but I never doubted her affection for the gamers mentioned. They've met her, they know her; I'm sure they'd never doubt it either.
It's all in fun, and I'm giving Holly a pass on "not getting sarcasm" because when the stakes are high, you want to be careful. For future reference, I'm extremely difficult to offend. If, on this site, I seem outraged about something, I'm totally kidding. (Unless it's the Bush administration.)
(I thought the "Franc" reference would make it perfectly clear how adoring I truly am to all involved.)