Standing out in a "noneccentric, nonsarcastic way."

So what did all those elite boy's school kids think of John Kerry when he was 16? From a good long article in the NYT:

"I think hatred is too strong a word ... Loathing is too strong a word. He may have seemed a little calculating to some people, and perhaps to me as well at the time, but he wanted to be liked. He may have just been a little more obvious about it. Not bad training for a politician. He wanted recognition, and in a place like that, anybody who did stand out in a noneccentric, nonsarcastic way, some people might be a little suspicious of."

The trials of being a not rich enough, not Protestant, not Republican, and openly serious about politics.