So, did anyone else notice the brouhaha over that article over at gizmodo about one woman’s experience dating a Magic: The Gathering champion, which some folks claimed read kind of mean? The essential thesis was that the guy probably ought to have mentioned his MTG affiliation in his online dating profile, given that he’s so involved in the hobby that he’s got his picture on one of the cards (he’s also a big time WSOP player who’s won millions, which I suppose applies many of the same gaming skills); and that for the author, the guy’s geek affiliation was a deal-breaker.

Some folks got pretty upset about this, largely geeky folks jumping to the conclusion that this was some kind of anti-geek prejudice at work. To be fair, as the pandagon response points out, a lot of the whining is coming from part of the Venn Diagram where “geeky” crosses with “NiceGuy™”, an area where years of resentment, low self esteem, and social awkwardness combine to form an uncomfortable level of sexism and male privilege. I know for geeks: this happens. Most of us grow out of it, but some of us don’t.

What I see here is essentially a story of two people who went on a date or two, and didn’t click. No harm, no foul, it happens all the time. If anything, the article read with the tone of “OMG you guys, I went on a date…with a NERD! How weird is that?” which, I can imagine, re-ignite memories of high school social strata and persecution in certain folks. Tone aside, though, at the heart of things, the idea is that she knows that a geeky type wouldn’t be a good fit for her, and she, being largely mundane, wouldn’t be a good fit for a geek. Incompatible personalities are a fact of life; it’s probably best to up front about who you are if you’re looking for compatible matches on an online dating service.

It’s probably more complicated than that, since this theory depends on people actually knowing what they want, which doesn’t happen at least as often as it does.

In a subsequent piece this morning, Amanda proposes the development of a geek scale, along the lines of the Kinsey Scale. If that takes, you could easily just drop your number into a dating service profile, and be good to go. A 0 or 1 would indicate complete mainstream-ness – your average one would enjoy, on a totally superficial surface level, entertainments like Two and A Half Men, read nothing but James Patterson or whatever Oprah suggests, and enjoy the song stylings of former American Idol contestants. A 6 would be a full-on LARPing neckbeard with a home (usually his parents’ basement) full of evidence of major obessions, like Magic Cards, comic books, threadbare black t-shirts and dreams of building the perfect robotic girlfriend, because he’s too afraid to talk to a girl in real life (at least out of character).

Most of us would fall somewhere in the middle.

At least that’s the theory.