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I don't buy the nerd only theory. I think it just seems that way if you don't look around. For example, here in Philadelphia as in many other major cities, most of the public schools (and in Philly most of these schools are generally considerd the antithesis of education) along with many other local schools of course, are very active in chess. There are many stories of inner city kids who had otherwise been failing or lagging in school, then getting involved in chess and doing great with it; e.g., a young kid can barely read, write, and do arithmetic but he excells in chess. In addition to schools, many inner city playgrounds have local teams of kids who compete with kids from other neighborhoods. This level of chess is quite alive around here. In the city it's easy to focus only on the gangs, guns, drugs, violence, killing but there positive things going on, too, and chess is a big one.
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