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Message: <blockquote data-quote="stevelabny" data-source="post: 2443077" data-attributes="member: 9298">Possibly. But as I previously stated, there's a BIG difference between making it a crusade, and making it a conversation. I am NOT suggesting being loud and outspoken. I'm suggesting being NORMAL. For example:Sunday, the gaming group I run finished our almost 2 year , 1st-20th levl campaign. After we finished, we showed up to a non-gamer friends house for a BBQ.  Late. Other friends of this friend were there.  These included a "normal" looking couple and a small pack of gay guys.  As we started stuffing our faces,  I mentioned that we were late because our d&d game ran long. I didn't go on some long rant about why d&d is acceptable, I didn't ask everyone there if they wanted to play. I just mentioned that that's what *I* had just been doing.  The same way I've previously said "I was at the zoo" or "I was at a baseball game" or "I was with the gf's family" Because playing d&d is just as normal as any of those activities. At the BBQ we also discussed movies, tv shows, the new nyc subway bag-searches, the possibility of making my backyard habitable,  baseball and food. Then we sat down to play poker. I'm sitting next to the "normal" guy while we were playing poker, and he mentioned that he plays Warhammer and we started talking about gaming in general. See...my casual mention of d&d as something I do, led to his admitting that hey, he games too. And led to a whole discussion. Did everyone else at the party do the same? no. Did I bore them? no. But now I know that the next time I see this guy, we can talk about gaming again, and who knows, maybe possibly we can one day game together. Same thing can happen with ANY hobby. When I mentioned movies, I found out the movie tastes of almost everyone at the party. When I mentioned baseball, I found out which people weren't baseball fans, and which people were. When I mentioned that I'm a Buffy and Angel fanboy at a prior BBQ this summer to a friend's brother's girlfriend, did she mock me for being a geek?  No, she got me some Buffy-swag from her job at the local tv station.  conversation = free stuff. The more I read threads like this, the more I'm convinced that people just don't know how to talk. They either think everything they do is "personal" or think that everything they say is going to be a target for ridicule or a fight. But if you don't TALK to people, you don't find the others who SHARE your interests. What I really want to know is...how did you guys (you guys = those who dont talk about their interests)  make any friends? Do you still hang out with the same people you met when you were in school?  Do you spend months working with someone before you dare ask what they have planned for the weekend?  And if you talk about all your interests except for d&d, then you're proving my point that you are the reason the stigma still exists.</blockquote>

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