Geek Culture Never Existed
The idea of “geek culture” is a completely subjective concept, which Patton Oswalt unwittingly demonstrates through his life experiences in the essay “Wake Up, Geek Culture. Time to Die.”
I. Although he does make some strong points about geek culture of the past, Oswalt fails to realize that there is in fact still a modern geek culture- it just does not consist of the same things that it did when he was younger.
A. Improper usage of “otaku”
B. Lost/Top Chef example
II. The idea that pop culture and geek culture are one and the same is an idea that is inherently flawed by the basic definition of both terms.
A. “Etewaf” as a legitimate concept- the Internet
B. Oswalt’s daughter and “Dr. Cali-gory”
Aging and seeing the development of a culture is not an excuse to claim that you know everything about it. The whole point of pop culture is for it to grow and change over time as people put their influences on it. It seems that this is a concept Oswalt does not grasp, as he appears to pine for his childhood over the modern day.
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