Today’s post is by Jess Hartley. Recently, a commenter on Twitter asked why we were using the word tolerance instead of acceptance for our event and I asked Jess to handle a detailed response. She nails the reason why and really gives us all something to think about. In this post, she uncovers not only why I’m not defining what geek is, but also why I’m using the word tolerance. Let’s listen to what she has to say.

I take my interpretation of the word “acceptance” from the Eastern philosophical perspective. If I strive for acceptance in a situation, I seek to experience them without effort to change, protest or remove myself from it. And, while I’m great with the first two for most things, I’m afraid I’m really not up for the third.

One of the great things about being a part of Speak Out With Your Geek Out is that it’s inclusive of all forms of geekery. If you’re a “classic” geek and groove on sci-fi movies, computers, fantasy novels and roleplaying games, that’s awesome. Let your geek flag fly! But there’s also more than enough room for music geeks, history geeks, sports geeks, scrapbooking geeks – being geeky is about being more-enthusiastic-than-the-mainstream about whatever it is that floats your boat, regardless of the topic.

If I were to strive for acceptance of all geeks (by my definition) that would mean I was just as happy sitting and listening to Joe Nascar discuss the average times of his favorite driver as I am listening to folks talk about their White Wolf character. And, not only am I not; I have no desire to be. I think it’s completely cool for folks to be as geeky as possible about whatever their chosen focus is. That doesn’t mean I want to hang out and listen. To me, that is why I don’t use the term acceptance. I don’t believe we all have to be interested in, participate in, or even put our support (ie: expend time, energy or resources) towards a geekery that isn’t our own.

However, I do believe in tolerance of geeks and non-geeks alike. Just because I don’t want to spend an hour at my favorite convention attending a panel on fantasy football leagues doesn’t mean that I want to block a FFL geek from doing so, or that I don’t wish her the best in organizing it. I strive not to insult, look down my nose at, put myself above or in other ways treat other forms of geekery as less valuable, less okay, less valid than my own. To me, that is tolerance, and that is something I can strive for in every interaction I have with other people, whether virtual or face-to-face.

That is why I choose the term tolerance, rather than acceptance, when referring to how I want to interact with other geeks.

Ultimately, however, I think that the choice to use one word over the other is a personal one. I choose “Tolerance” because of what it means to me. If “Acceptance” works better for you, and that empowers you to be positive and inclusive; so be it! Let’s concentrate on that, rather than quibbling about the minutiae of whether one positive word is more appropriate than or should be used in place of another positive one.

Especially for word-geeks like me, it’s hard to fight the temptation to nitpick about definitions and interpretations. (Don’t even get me started on how “ironic” is misused!) But investing energy in that argument, and thus creating an unnecessary and potentially divisive line really detracts from the inclusive intent of Speak Out With Your Geek Out. I want less lines between me and the rest of the world, not more.

Came across a great post today entitled My Thoughts on Speak Out with your Geek Out. In it, Donna explains how she is already outspoken about her hobbies and wasn’t initially buying into the event. Then, she goes on to talk about how passionate and positive we were, after reading two other posts, and how that struck her. She’s now on board.

Donna is not alone. Many people have stepped forward (as of right now we’re over 600 bloggers on Facebook…). In part, that number has a lot to do with Amanda Yahner Valentine and Jessica Banks who have been filling the event page with their enthusiasm. Though, what’s been interesting is that not everyone has been super excited about the project off the bat. Some were looking for keywords: what defines geek? Others were saying they did this already. But this event is not about what we’re already doing, it’s about what we’re not. And for that, I was thrilled to see Donna’s realization that this may just be something different after all.

I laughed when Donna mentioned her sock collection because I have one, too. While both of us may be perfectly fine with that, there are so, so many people I know out there who aren’t. They are afraid of being isolated or having a stigma for doing what they do — kids and adults. Am I geektastic about my socks? Absolutely. But that’s not all there is to me, just like what Donna had mentioned in her post. We are not just one kind of geek; often, we are many flavors.

For all these reasons and more, this is why I am trying to keep the event as generic as possible.

I hope this week of positivity and light will inspire people to do and say some very awesome things. Which is why I can’t and will continue to strive not to define what geek is. The minute I put a keyword in there, is the minute someone either says: “Well, you’re not including my hobby…” or “You did include my hobby.” is the minute we go down the road of elitism, exclusion and isolation. Instead? What this is all about? That one thing, that one precious thing that is tying us all together — OUR ENTHUSIASM.

The reason why I’m attempting to keep this as simple as possible, is because the more complicated this is, the harder it will be for people to participate and the more challenging it will be to manage. If you don’t have a blog or website, there are many people who’d be willing to host your post, including me. I expect there will be some commentary about geek culture and whatnot that comes out of this, but I’m not sure that’s such a bad thing. Maybe all it takes is a little smile and a bunch of happy people to let us look a little deeper into ourselves and realize that maybe, just maybe, we’re not so different after all.

I, for one, am looking forward to seeing all these posts fly. Not just because of the people who share similar interests, but the ones who don’t. I’d love to read more about unique hobbies because hey, maybe one of you will inspire me to try yours.

It’s been almost a day since we really started pushing this idea and already we have well over a hundred people signed up on the Facebook event to blog about their geeky hobbies and vocations during the week of September 12th. WOW.

Today, I need your help to comment on these logos provided by two, different individuals. The logos will be used to identify the event and will be free to share with everyone. We’ll probably set up a Facebook fan page and a Tumblr account where people can aggregate their posts the week of, too.

The first is this one graciously provided by Suzanna Reeves.