Here’s a little something different to read this morning: Wired’s Natania Barron recently offered “5 Tips for Raising Your Girl Geek,” advice for parents of girls who fall into that hard-to-define category with which many of us (me included) identify: being a geek. Yes, boys can be geeks, too, but that’s more common. Girl geeks are a rarer breed.

I liked the post for what it says about raising girls to be proud of being smart, of taking an interest in topics not traditionally seen as “girls’” subjects, and about nurturing their own special flavor of geekiness. I also think there are parallels with the issues faced by geek girls and those that many LGBTQ youth face, geeks or not. Barron writes:

Geek girls don’t watch the right shows. They don’t go to the right movies. They don’t listen to the right music. And unfortunately, pop culture provides the clues by which kids sort each other out; it’s almost as obvious as the clothes they wear. . . . Often girl geeks fall into this odd no-man’s land. We are passionate about the things we like, but share them with very few. Especially in a high school or junior high-school setting. That can lead to teasing, isolation, and ultimately, depression.

Barron’s advice is also broadly relevant:

Geek doesn’t mean you have to shun what everyone else does; it just means that you have your own slant on it. And it also means you’re smart enough to think outside the social box. If anything, being a geek means the rules don’t apply!

No matter how geeky your daughter is, fostering her sense of self-worth is the most important thing.

Are geeks and LGBTQ youth natural allies, even where the categories don’t overlap? Are LGBTQ youth more likely to manifest geekiness or, conversely, are LGBTQ geeks more likely to be out, being more comfortable with living outside the norm? Or are they mostly unrelated though occasionally concurrent identities? As a proud LGBT geek myself, I can’t separate the two in my own mind. What do you think?