With gaming now become much more mainstream, its suprising that as dedicated gamers, we're still seen as geeks, nerds or generally uncool. Why is this? Personally I have no idea, but I do know one thing. We're never going to be taken seriously if we shy away from our culture whilst out in public. Every other "way of life" so to speak, shoves itselfs in our faces whilst we're out and about, let alone on the internet. Hip hop culture is huge, the current "Emo" phase today's teenagers appear to be going through (or has that moved on yet?) is up and in our faces when out shopping. So why don't we, as gamers, stand proud and decalre that we wont be ignored, laughed out, or generally treated as people that "need to grow up".

I';ve rambled enough, and I've kind of forgotten my point here for one reason or another. But, I think, its about time we stopped disguising ourselves as "normal members of society", worried that we may be labled as some psychopath thats ready to go on a gun rampage. How do I intend on doing this on a personal level? I have no idea, but surely, wearing say, a gaming T-Shirt wouldn't harm matters. After all, its culturally acceptible to wear a band t-shirt, why not show off your favourite game by doing the same? So I say to you, members of Destructoid, get out there and declare your passion for videogames in whatever way you can (within your countries/states laws obviously) and declare "I'm a gamer, respect me".


Be warned though, you may get thrown into the looney bin if you actually stand on something high and shout that, although don't let me stop you if you really want to!