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Comment by jkestner | Hacker News Reader

Word. When I got to MIT, I found my community. I didn't realize up to then that I had been restraining some of my nerdiness.

Same thing with my wife. When we met, I discovered that I didn't have to censor the literary references... she read way more than I.

I love being around people I can be myself with.

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Nobody likes to feel lonely in a crowd. Everybody prefers the company of their herd.

However there is plenty to learn from those who are not like you, even if you struggle to understand them, or they you.

Variety is the spice of life. Avoiding the company of most others -- or the correlate of exclusively preferring the company of one group -- risks stagnation.

Ah yes, embracing your inner elitist.

It's not elitist to like something that makes you happy, even if that thing is being around a group of wealthy, intelligent people. Elitism is about how you treat the other people. Being elitist would mean refusing to socialise with any group other than the one MIT crowd because they're too 'dumb' to be fun around. I don't think that's what jkestner is suggesting; that he found a group he's happy with doesn't mean he refuses contact with the other groups.

That response is why I usually censor myself.

The desire to have a community and shared culture doesn't make one elitist. The GP could have as easily said they found bookish people they could relate to by becoming a librarian. Would that have sounded elitist or was the MIT name-dropping what upsets you?

"Elite" simply means "drawn out of the larger pool". Sure, there is a lot of social baggage around that word, as in a sense of superiority, but the in the general case there is no such implication.

What's wrong with hanging around with folks who get your jokes (and vice versa)? They don't have to form the totality of your identity.

Somehow it seems uncontroversial when someone finds a group of, say, fans of their favorite team (or rock band) and says, "now I am with my people!" Is there some peculiar difference in regards to books or maths jokes?

Is it elitist to want to be around other kids you can mentally relate to? I suffered in school until I transferred to a 7th grade public magnet school. For the first time in my life I felt like I belonged because I could be myself with the other kids, most of whom happened to be from poor immigrant families (it is not a class or culture issue).

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