The Geeks Shall Inherit the Earth

It is 2011, in the wake of several teenage suicides and mass media coverage rallying the nation to address school bullying. Enter Quirk Theory.

Danielle, “The Loner,” struggles to fit in at school, especially when it comes to finding a place to sit in the cafeteria. In gym class her peers persuade her into joining the “I Hate Danielle Club.” The “Cafeteria Fringe” are the people who are excluded from the school’s “in” crowd.

Conformity has become intrinsic to American high school culture due to the No Child Left Behind law and an excess of standardized tests. Leaders like author JK Rowling, musician Bruce Springsteen, and television host Tim Gunn were all ostracized at school. They exemplify Quirk Theory, which is the idea that the traits that earned them ridicule at school are what make these individuals stand out successes later.

To investigate this issue, Robbins followed a few students for a year, issuing each a unique challenge, and conducted hundreds of interviews with students, teachers, and counselors. “Blue” from Hawaii founded his high school’s first gaming club, but his classmates ignore and exclude him. In eighth grade, Flickr employed him to take photographs, but his peers still considered him a “geek.