CONFESSIONAL thread (ANONYMOUS so tell us the juicy stuff!)

[DiSiLLUSiON]

I hate writing this but I need to get it off my chest.

It's about us : trek fans.

I'll stay anonymous, but trust me I am speaking from plenty of experience when I say :

As a group, they are the rudest, most anti-social people you'd ever met. No manners or social skills, snarky, rude, insconsiderate, self absorbed people who are in many cases so far off in their own world they cannot last five minutes in a social situation without making me mortified to be seen near them. I know we like to keep a happy spin on things on the board, but most are unemployed and living off welfare because they are just so damn rude nobody would want to be near them because of their basic lack of manners. I feel for people who have to pop 95 pills before they can enter into a conversation, but there is no excuse for the complete lack of consideration and rudeness that is the hallmark of most fans.

There are exceptions, but they are just that : exceptions.

I find it really frustrating because the rewards of finding a like minded Trek fan who is a regular human being are great, but you have to look very far to find them.

Sorry, but its true

Apparently I'm the only one, but I agree: I've found a lot of people here to be quite friendly. However, I've never had the pleasure of meeting some of the people on this board in real life, but the heavy Star Trek fans I did meet in real life have been -- without exception -- anti-social, rude, humorless, living in a bubble, an unwilling virgin, without self-esteem, without friends or any combination of the above. Those who were above 35 were also unemployed and living off welfare. This goes for other "hardcore" fans like Star Wars fans and such as well. It is only those fans of which you only notice after being friends for a few years who are actually normal, sociable people.

So it rings completely true in my experience, unfortunate as it is. And any cliché does have a basis in truth, so it's not that strange. It is also the major reason I don't go out of my way to show people I'm a fan of Star Trek in public; it embarrasses me to be considered to reside in the same group as those anti-social type of people.

However, most Star Trek fans will be normal. But these are usually also the ones who don't wear a costume every other week, don't get mad because of some unimportant detail in some unimportant episode, don't go talking about it to everyone that will listen and have other hobbies then Star Trek and a normal job and thus, when they go out, have other things to talk about. They don't go talking about Star Trek the first time you meet them. Those kind of fans are the ones you don't know about, until you accidentally discover it. I'm not saying every sociable Star Trek fan is "hidden" like that, but a lot of them are.

 

[ria 75]

I doubt that being a Star Trek fan ranks high on the list of common denominators of antisocial, loser types.

 

[Kirk's_Tights]

Honestly, unless you meet EVERY SINGLE STAR TREK FAN IN THE WORLD, you can't really form an opinion. My friend is a die hard Star Trek fan and he's the nicest, funniest guy.

The people who act the way the anonymous person states act that way for a reason that has nothing to do with Star Trek. I love Sailor Moon and I will get a bit angry when people diss it but I don't get to the point where I am chopping people's head's off or anything. I stand by my show 100% but how a person acts has little to do with what they like and more to do with their own personal life. These so called "loser virgins" act the way they do because of how they choose to live life.

If you sit in your room all day playing with your Star Trek toys, of course you wont have friends, wont get laid and will be a bitter human being. Guaranteed if these people had fun in life, they wouldn't be assholes.

 

[DiSiLLUSiON]

If you sit in your room all day playing with your Star Trek toys, of course you wont have friends, wont get laid and will be a bitter human being. Guaranteed if these people had fun in life, they wouldn't be assholes.

QFT.

 

[T'Bonz]

I've been to my fair share of Trek conventions.

I've met fans that would have fit the "get a life" skit. Fans that I'm mortified to be around. For sure.

Yet, I've met wonderful fans. Interesting, intelligent people. People with real lives, jobs, spouses, children. I am friends with some of them and care deeply about some of them.

I think that Star Trek does attract some of those who society rejects (as well as those interested in the future and sci-fi) which probably accounts for some of the ones who fit the stereotypes.

But they hurt no one. Be polite to them, move on if you can't hack it. If enjoying Trek lets them escape some private misery, good for them!

 

[Tim]

The mirror crack'd:

I hate writing this but I need to get it off my chest.

It's about us : trek fans.

I'll stay anonymous, but trust me I am speaking from plenty of experience when I say :

As a group, they are the rudest, most anti-social people you'd ever met. No manners or social skills, snarky, rude, insconsiderate, self absorbed people who are in many cases so far off in their own world they cannot last five minutes in a social situation without making me mortified to be seen near them. I know we like to keep a happy spin on things on the board, but most are unemployed and living off welfare because they are just so damn rude nobody would want to be near them because of their basic lack of manners. I feel for people who have to pop 95 pills before they can enter into a conversation, but there is no excuse for the complete lack of consideration and rudeness that is the hallmark of most fans.

There are exceptions, but they are just that : exceptions.

I find it really frustrating because the rewards of finding a like minded Trek fan who is a regular human being are great, but you have to look very far to find them.

Sorry, but its true

Moderating stressing you out, Holdfast?

 

[Gryffindorian]

(...)When you enter the US you go get to fill out a few forms, one that's utterly hilarious because if you answer yes to any of the utterly transpararent questions on it you need to contact the American Embassy before leaving the country. And you get that form when you're already on the plane over Iceland.
(...)
I arrive at customs at Newark in NY. I just wanted to get in, trough the airport quickly, and onward to my connecting flight to Atlanta. Everything goes fine until the guy sees the note. I literally see him freezing up. Part of me goes "Oh...shit!" while the rest holds out for hope.

Anyway he starts asking me more and more questions and I answer truthfully to all of them. Then he says to come with him, and he takes me over to another guy, gets to go with him to a holding area where I am to wait until can be taken care off. After sitting down I realise that there's about one blonde in this area, most of the people are of either arabic or mediteran descent. It's literally the most blatantly racist and prejudieced holding area ever.

Hey Emher, thanks for the story, I for one didn't know it.

I had a similar experience also 3 years ago. (They were tightening security in 2006 or what? ) I went to the same holding area and made the same observations, looking around the room. I was in Houston airport, needing to catch a connection to San Antonio where I was visiting a friend. I sat as innocently-looking as I could, reading a book, for the cameras.

The reason they detained me was I had spent 4 months in the US on a tourist's visa 10 years before. I was a visiting student (not on a student's visa but just sitting in on classes and using the library for a school term) and when I was informed I could get a 30 day extension to my 90-day tourist visa, a mere formality, I did it so I could stay until the end of the school term. I was having a blast experiencing American campus life - I spent more time having fun than researching for my MA, which is what I was there for. I ended up xeroxing a dozen books on the last week and basing my essay mostly on that. And I aced it.

Anyway, I went to the US several times between that stay in 1996 and 2006, including to New York in October 2001, but this was the first time they were bringing that up. (I had a brand new passport.) Calling it an overstay, asking me if I paid money for the extension or something. I told the hispanic dude at the desk about my fun time in college and my essay and mentioned the hispanic name of the friend I was visiting - precisely a friend from college 10 years before. He finally let me go saying from then on I should carry my old extension paperwork when I want to enter the country. I don't know if I have anything besides what appeared on my old passport which I don't have any more of course. They keep it when you get a new one.

I ran and panicked a bit at the long security checkpoint. People were actually missing their connections over that. Whoever they begged, they weren't moved to the front of the line. After the checkpoint I ran like mad through the entire airport and barely made my flight.

I thought, when you love America, the feeling is seldom returned. My friend said this probably happened because it was a small airport and the customs were puffing themselves up, not so busy that they'd let little things slide; that it wouldn't have happened in JFK. But if that sort of thing happened to you in Newark...

I haven't tried entering the USA again yet.

Is this a misquote? Looks like it. We're talkng about confessions, not airport security.

 

[trampledamage]

(...)When you enter the US you go get to fill out a few forms, one that's utterly hilarious because if you answer yes to any of the utterly transpararent questions on it you need to contact the American Embassy before leaving the country. And you get that form when you're already on the plane over Iceland.
(...)
I arrive at customs at Newark in NY. I just wanted to get in, trough the airport quickly, and onward to my connecting flight to Atlanta. Everything goes fine until the guy sees the note. I literally see him freezing up. Part of me goes "Oh...shit!" while the rest holds out for hope.

Anyway he starts asking me more and more questions and I answer truthfully to all of them. Then he says to come with him, and he takes me over to another guy, gets to go with him to a holding area where I am to wait until can be taken care off. After sitting down I realise that there's about one blonde in this area, most of the people are of either arabic or mediteran descent. It's literally the most blatantly racist and prejudieced holding area ever.

Hey Emher, thanks for the story, I for one didn't know it.

I had a similar experience also 3 years ago. (They were tightening security in 2006 or what? ) I went to the same holding area and made the same observations, looking around the room. I was in Houston airport, needing to catch a connection to San Antonio where I was visiting a friend. I sat as innocently-looking as I could, reading a book, for the cameras.

The reason they detained me was I had spent 4 months in the US on a tourist's visa 10 years before. I was a visiting student (not on a student's visa but just sitting in on classes and using the library for a school term) and when I was informed I could get a 30 day extension to my 90-day tourist visa, a mere formality, I did it so I could stay until the end of the school term. I was having a blast experiencing American campus life - I spent more time having fun than researching for my MA, which is what I was there for. I ended up xeroxing a dozen books on the last week and basing my essay mostly on that. And I aced it.

Anyway, I went to the US several times between that stay in 1996 and 2006, including to New York in October 2001, but this was the first time they were bringing that up. (I had a brand new passport.) Calling it an overstay, asking me if I paid money for the extension or something. I told the hispanic dude at the desk about my fun time in college and my essay and mentioned the hispanic name of the friend I was visiting - precisely a friend from college 10 years before. He finally let me go saying from then on I should carry my old extension paperwork when I want to enter the country. I don't know if I have anything besides what appeared on my old passport which I don't have any more of course. They keep it when you get a new one.

I ran and panicked a bit at the long security checkpoint. People were actually missing their connections over that. Whoever they begged, they weren't moved to the front of the line. After the checkpoint I ran like mad through the entire airport and barely made my flight.

I thought, when you love America, the feeling is seldom returned. My friend said this probably happened because it was a small airport and the customs were puffing themselves up, not so busy that they'd let little things slide; that it wouldn't have happened in JFK. But if that sort of thing happened to you in Newark...

I haven't tried entering the USA again yet.

Is this a misquote? Looks like it. We're talkng about confessions, not airport security.

No harm in ria75 telling her airport security story. Besides, being pulled over by airport security is a confession.

 

[Gryffindorian]

Posted by trampledamage:
No harm in ria75 telling her airport security. Besides, being pulled over by airport security is a confession.

Well, I must've skipped a page or two because I don't remember anyone confessing to an airport security "incident." Posters were talking about the philandering husband who couldn't keep his pants on, the married bisexual love affair, the whiny person complaining about Trek fans' attitudes, etc. Did I miss anything?

 

[Turbo]

Oh good, if you've skipped a couple pages, you won't mind if I respond to two pages ago!

EDIT: People who aren't in touch with their sexuality often go through great lengths to deny or hide their sexual orientation. I felt like that before I came to the realization that I could get attracted to both sexes.

I'm so very glad that I'm not the only one who did that. I was so deep in the closet I was practically suffocating, and my friends have commented on the difference several times since I came out. Kinda funny how that works, huh?

 

[trampledamage]

Posted by trampledamage:
No harm in ria75 telling her airport security. Besides, being pulled over by airport security is a confession.

Well, I must've skipped a page or two because I don't remember anyone confessing to an airport security "incident." Posters were talking about the philandering husband who couldn't keep his pants on, the married bisexual love affair, the whiny person complaining about Trek fans' attitudes, etc. Did I miss anything?

Oh, it's from ages ago - possibly the first two pages. Emher's story is a genuine confession (although public) because what he was pulled over for by security is carrying a dildo.

The first page in fact - post number 16

(If ria 75 has just read this entire thread in one go, I think she'll need to lie down in a quiet room for a while!)

 

[Cakes488]

Apparently I'm the only one, but I agree: I've found a lot of people here to be quite friendly. However, I've never had the pleasure of meeting some of the people on this board in real life, but the heavy Star Trek fans I did meet in real life have been -- without exception -- anti-social, rude, humorless, living in a bubble, an unwilling virgin, without self-esteem, without friends or any combination of the above. Those who were above
.

LOL an "unwilling virgin"... I guess that's why she's still a virgin? Doesn't a person have a right to be unwilling?

 

[DiSiLLUSiON]

Doesn't a person have a right to be unwilling?

Of course, but when someone comes up to you, start this whole tirade about how much they want to have sex but still can't find someone to share the bed with, I consider that unwilling. Or perhaps they do it on purpose, I guess, by rejecting any chances they have with the opposite sex ("she's not into Trek enough" "she has had too many boyfriends"), even though they say they want to. But then it would simply be stupid.

No matter why they are unwilling virgins, the fact that they shower me with the whole tale within the first 20 minutes of meeting them says enough. "Off, with your head!"

 

[Cakes488]

^ So let me get this straight: A woman came up to you bitchin how she wants to get laid -- but yet not by you....*gulp* I'm sorry my friend but there ya have it and yes I would take that personally LOL

 

[sidious618]

^ So let me get this straight: A woman came up to you bitchin how she wants to get laid -- but yet not by you....*gulp* I'm sorry my friend but there ya have it and yes I would take that personally LOL

Ouch.

 

[DiSiLLUSiON]

^ So let me get this straight: A woman came up to you bitchin how she wants to get laid -- but yet not by you....*gulp* I'm sorry my friend but there ya have it and yes I would take that personally LOL

Where do you get the idea that I was talking about a woman?

I was talking about the things I experienced when meeting Star Trek fans. When someone wants to have a drink, and asks me to come, I tend to say "why the hell not", since I'm always in for a good conversation. I don't mind what it's about, so I don't mind if they're Star Trek fans perse. But I expect them to act like sociable people, and I never meet 'n greet as a "date". If I want to talk to some random attractive girl, I simply go out in the weekend. A meet 'n greet, to me, is without expectations or any strings attached. It's a simple "have a drink, have a talk" kind of deal. Like posting on forums like these.

The ones who were "unwilling virgins", as they so aptly demonstrated, were both guys. Within 20 minutes, when he was done talking about the latest Trek episode, he began about his sex life (wth?) and how bad it was going for him. As if I was interested about such personal matters while I hardly knew him! It's not as if he sounded like an interesting fellow to debate with. And this happened on two different occasions, the latter with 2 guys at the same time. On the latter, there was also a female Star Trek fan, who evidently, thought it was quite normal to spill your sex life to complete and total strangers, since she quickly joined in about why she always needed lubrication.

I mean, seriously, if the conversation gets personal that's fine, but don't force it (and especially not within the first 20 minutes). That's just creepy. Is that really so strange? I'm not prude at all, but I do like to loosen up first and test the waters how much polarizing remarks I can safely make. And I'm more inclined to talk about such things in a bar, at night, while you're having fun instead of a terrace, when the sun is shining, where I'm more inclined to talk about light but sometimes serious topics, like religion or politics.

On another occasion, it started off quite friendly, just your normal "let's have a drink and discuss interests since we both chat now and then and have nothing better to do at the moment". Until the topic changed to Star Trek and I mentioned something about some episode -- I can't remember what, exactly -- and he started bitching about a whole load of completely irrelevant details, with frequent mentions of "canon". It was quite a monologue, actually, not a discussion. And he actually got somewhat angry because I didn't agree with him nor understood why these details were so important. Not only that, but he didn't seem to have knowledge about any subject other then Star Trek; he bluffed his way through most topics. I excused myself, left and went to the bar next door to meet some normal people and had a fine time, met a few nice girls, you know, the usual.

I quickly learned not to meet 'n greet with Star Trek fans before I have proof they won't pull weird stunts like that.

 

[sidious618]

I've never had a sci-fi fan that I just me tell me about their sex life and I've met a shitload of sci-fi fans.

 

[Gryffindorian]

Posted by trampledamage:
No harm in ria75 telling her airport security. Besides, being pulled over by airport security is a confession.

Well, I must've skipped a page or two because I don't remember anyone confessing to an airport security "incident." Posters were talking about the philandering husband who couldn't keep his pants on, the married bisexual love affair, the whiny person complaining about Trek fans' attitudes, etc. Did I miss anything?

Oh, it's from ages ago - possibly the first two pages. Emher's story is a genuine confession (although public) because what he was pulled over for by security is carrying a dildo.

The first page in fact - post number 16

(If ria 75 has just read this entire thread in one go, I think she'll need to lie down in a quiet room for a while!)

Ah, now I remember; thanks for refreshing my memory.

 

[trampledamage]

Well, I must've skipped a page or two because I don't remember anyone confessing to an airport security "incident." Posters were talking about the philandering husband who couldn't keep his pants on, the married bisexual love affair, the whiny person complaining about Trek fans' attitudes, etc. Did I miss anything?

Oh, it's from ages ago - possibly the first two pages. Emher's story is a genuine confession (although public) because what he was pulled over for by security is carrying a dildo.

The first page in fact - post number 16

(If ria 75 has just read this entire thread in one go, I think she'll need to lie down in a quiet room for a while!)

Ah, now I remember; thanks for refreshing my memory.

I should probably worry that I can remember things like that, but I can't remember what day it is...

 

[AstroSmurf]

^ I confess I have the very same issue. I can remember magazine articles almost word for word but I can never remember birthdays or where I parked the car.


And I have to respond to that "Trekkie" confession (even though I know I probably shouldn't). I admit it; I was offended. You see kids I am ambitious. I own four businesses. I have never taken a handout in my life and have worked like a dog to afford the things that I have. I am also very social. Actually I am so much so I have never been thrown into a situation where I couldn't find something to talk about with someone. I am stable and mentally healthy. I am also very normal sexually. (I am way to old to be spreading myself around but I do have very good luck relationship wise.) I also think of myself as a kind, decent person... or at least I try my best to be. Basically I hope I am the exact opposite of the person that the confessor described and from what I have seen, most of us are.

(So before you start slinging mud you might want to step back and reevaluate where these feelings are coming from. It would seem the problem might have a source closer than you think. Happiness starts with you.)