There’s room in nerd-dom for NFL fans too

When you get right down to it, there really isn’t that much that separates nerds from football fans.

One of the greatest things about the nerd community is it’s a place for people with different interests. It doesn’t matter if you love “Star Wars,” “Warcraft,” “Pokemon” or “Dungeons & Dragons.” There is a place for you. That acceptance, however, doesn’t seem to extend to football fans.

I can tell you this from experience. Every year around September, I feel an overwhelming urge to talk about what’s going on in the National Football League. I long to gab about who’s bad, who’s awesome and how the Patriots are getting away with cheating again. And every year, I get rebuffed by my friends. Sure, they’ll pour buckets of praise on Peter Capaldi for playing guitar on Doctor Who (and, judging by what I’ve heard, I play guitar better than Capaldi — seriously). But no love for a perfect 60-yard bomb or a bone-jarring tackle.

Beyond that, sometimes it feels like, no matter what you like or how nerdy you are, fellow nerds will consider your nerd cred damaged if you like football. I don’t get that, because if you really examine it, you realize football fandom is every bit as nerdy as any other fandom.

If you’re a nerd, think about the way you revere the creators of your favorite movie, comic book or TV show. You love them for creating universes that feel like a second home and characters that are as close to you as your own family — even closer, in some cases. But what you’re really doing is admiring someone for creating something you love at a level you’re not capable of yourself.

Football fans cheer for guys like Aaron Rodgers for much the same reason. They marvel at the way NFL players run, pass and tackle the way nerds marvel at great writers or comics artists. I wouldn’t be surprised if the psychological mechanism that drives nerds to worship Steven Moffatt or Joss Whedon is the same thing the drives NFL fans to worship Tom Brady or Cam Newton. At its most basic level, hero worship is all the same.

Think about the way you collect toys, statues or other knickknacks that immortalize your favorite pop culture characters. Part of being a nerd, right? Well, football fans do the same thing. It’s just that instead of buying action figures or T-shirts, they buy jerseys and autographed balls.

And what about cosplay? Dressing up as a beloved character from geek culture seems like one of the most nerdy things you can do. And yet, if you keep on eye a people in the stands at football games, you see the same thing.

And it’s not just the crazy people who ditch their shirts and paint their chests. If you’ve ever watched an Oakland Raiders home game, you’ve probably seen the guys who don painted shoulder pads and Darth Vader masks to cheer for the Raiders. There was Barrel Man, the Denver Broncos superfan who wore a cowboy hat and an orange barrel, and little else, to Denver home games. He was as dedicated as any Batman or Sherlock fan.

When you get right down to it, there really isn’t that much that separates nerds from football fans. So why is there so much enmity between our two groups? We should celebrate the similarities between us. We both love something passionately, and what we love becomes part of who we are.

I know that football fans have historically made life miserable for nerds, but I feel maybe we nerds should make the move to extend the olive branch to football fans.

We have much more in common than you might think. There are probably many nerds who are closet football fans and football fans who love Spider-Man or “The Lord of the Rings.” We should stop putting one another down and join forces. Think of the awesome parties we could throw then.

Besides, we’ll always have basketball fans to make fun of …