Published: Tuesday, November 17, 2009 in The Whitworthian.

Welcome to The Muse, where you can come when you’re not sure what exactly you want out of your newspaper reading experience. Each week, I’ll deliver something off the wall/unexpected/totally bonkers up for your reading pleasure, and you can then write me scathing letters about how I’m contributing to the death of serious journalism.

When I first came to Whitworth University, I was impressed by its academic standards. The students were smart, the faculty factual, the studying studious and the alliterations atrocious.

However, as the years have flown by the seams have started to show. Where once there was harmony, the seedy underbelly of melody has revealed itself. Where once there was knowledge, the crafty misuse of terminology has grown dominant.

In one of the more disturbing and unsettling examples of this, it has come to my attention that there is a disagreement–nay, worse, a full-fledged debate–over the difference between the terms “Nerd” and “Geek.”

There is a grievous schism over the very epistemology of these terms. And thus, it has fallen to me to set the record straight.

I must make one important caveat: I am only addressing the male species in this column. I briefly considered talking about the female analogues to these two categories, but then I realized that it would inevitably be sexist and probably put my life in jeopardy.

Since I am but a man, I will not attempt to understand the confusing mess that is female social grouping.

We shall start with the more distasteful of the two: the Nerd.

The Nerd is fortunately less common on college campuses than he is in the halls of high school, but he still may be observed if one is diligent. The Nerd wears glasses–this is non-negotiable. These glasses must be disturbingly thick and are probably held together by duct tape. Quite often the Nerd is dressed in clothing of a single color, perhaps with stripes, and has hair that could pass convincingly for the nest of a Suessian bird of prey.

The Nerd rarely, if ever, engages in hygienic activities, preferring instead to spend shower time lawling the hours away in front of World of Warcrack, or perhaps painting a royal insignia on the power shield of a Space Marine Terminator captain.

For that is one of the defining characteristics of the Nerd: he is nerdy about something. It can be anything. You can have a tabletop game nerd; a video game nerd; a photography nerd; a collector-of-irritating-Hawaiian-shirts nerd. Nerds come in every shape and size, but they are all incredibly over-informed about some subject that a normal human being would never need to know about.

Normal humans have no desire to become nerds because of the second defining characteristic of the Nerd: he is socially awkward and often downright repugnant. No one wants to be seen with the Nerd; the Nerd, however, is OK with that because everyone else is basically a bottom-feeding plebe with no life, unable to rattle off the stats of a level 80 warlock from memory.

Standing in contrast to this pariah of humanity is the Geek. The Geek shares some things in common with the Nerd–they are both over-informed about some subject or other. There are math geeks, programming geeks, geeks who are really into cooking and nunchucks… the list goes on. The key difference between the Nerd and the Geek, however, is that women will voluntarily talk to them. Geeks may break into a sweat over the latest “Star Trek” comic book release, but they have the ability to hold a conversation about the weather without it turning into a commentary on the effects of storm clouds on zombies.

If you ever just sit around campus people watching, you can pick these people out. Most of the individuals you’ll see are just straight up normals. You’ll know the Nerds and Geeks when you see them.

The Nerds will be wearing their glasses, be dressed in solid brown, or perhaps yellow, somehow moving down the hello walk in a fetal position. There will be a wide bubble void of life surrounding them, as even squirrels don’t want to be seen with a Nerd. Hide behind your newspaper, because if this person comes up to you and starts talking you’ll be stuck in a never-ending conversation about the strengths and weaknesses of Jean-Luc Picard as a leader of men.

The Geeks, on the other hand, will be walking quickly, dressed in trendy fashion, typing away on their geek-device of choice (a Palm Pre or iPhone, probably) while holding a conversation with a beautiful girl.

Ultimately, it is the overarching goal of both the Nerd and the Geek to live life happily ever after with an attractive woman. It can be theorized, therefore, that Geeks are merely higher on the social evolutionary scale than Nerds, having risen above the level of female anathema that is Nerd-ness to something that chicks dig, like Michael Cera or Jim from “The Office.” Geeks know that it’s cool to be over-informed as long as they take showers now and again.

So, to you Nerds out there, take note. Comb your hair, get contacts, and try a deodorant other than Essence of Ork. It’ll do wonders for your social life, and you’ll have to carry about a +20 Stick of Warding at all times to keep back the waves of women begging you for a date.

At least, that’s what the Geeks keep promising me…