The Geeks Shall Inherit the Earth - Alexandra Robbins [160]
The reputation of a low-status group can have a reverse halo effect, or forked-tail effect, on the trends it adopts; because the dorm was considered geeky, its geekiness spread to wristband wearing. Notice that the effect didn’t go both ways. The geeks were happy to wear wristbands, even though the target dorm had been wearing them for a week. Berger didn’t interview the geeks, but, he said, people “may want to be treated like members of other groups and, to reach this goal, may poach the cultural tastes of those groups.” Or maybe the geeks cared more about the cause than about the superficial image of the trend.
REGAN, GEORGIA | THE WEIRD GIRL
From the middle of the crowd, Regan watched Crystal’s band perform its last show before Regan left Georgia. As she listened to her girlfriend rap, Regan already missed her. After a year of dating, Regan and Crystal thought of each other as spouses. They planned to conduct their relationship long-distance until Regan returned from Bangladesh, at which point both of them hoped to move to the East Coast. “We can make it through anything because we can tell one another the truth,” Regan said.
Regan knew that Crystal loved every bit of her, quirks and all. Once, Crystal had written Regan a list entitled, “100 Reasons Why I Love Regan.” Crystal happened to list many of the same qualities that Johnson teachers had made fun of: Regan’s refusal to drink, for example, her “love and respect for all living things,” her intelligence, her honesty, her independence, her vegetarianism, her creativity, her feistiness, her self-pride, her ability to be profound one minute, silly the next, the inner strength she called upon to stand up for what she believed in, even her love of dinosaurs.
“You’re so sure of yourself,” Crystal wrote. “You’re always ready to take the lead. I adore that about you. I love that you are open-minded alongside strong convictions. You stay true to what you believe. You aren’t afraid to tell me straight up. I love that you have the most vivacious personality I have ever come across. I love that you’re going to Bangladesh to stand up for something that matters. It’s beautiful that you want to live as they live and learn outside of what ‘us’ Americans are used to. . . . Regan, I would actually give you the world if it was mines.”
Crystal took the mic and announced the next song. Regan gave the stage her full attention. Crystal had told Regan in advance that this new song was about her. As the lyrics unfolded, Regan melted with love and pride. Crystal had captured Regan in lyrics, poetically summarizing some of the items from her list and even throwing in a Shakespearean reference. The song expressed something that Crystal had told Regan often: What Crystal loved most about her was her individuality and the way that she followed her heart.
The song meant a lot to Regan. “When I was a teenager, I had a hard time with people wondering why I didn’t want to take the easier path,” Regan said later. “Only as I’ve grown older have I found that people find this characteristic attractive. I think it’s mostly because most people don’t follow their hearts. Most people do what is expected of them; most people take the path well-traveled, just to get by. Now, in the adult world, when someone meets me, they tend to admire me because I know what I want, I know who I am, and I go for it. Every day when I wake up, I know that my dreams are just beginning.” It did not escape Regan—to whom I had not yet explained quirk theory—that the precise qualities that caused people to exclude her in