Quotes About Conformity

Boys are rewarded for playing games where they line up by height and then run into walls. Perhaps I'm making that up--or perhaps you should do a Google search for "Guy Runs into Wall for Fun.

What happens when self-erasure has been the norm for so long that the You cannot find its way back to I?

One of the most odious forms of anti-Semitism was precisely this: to complain that Jews aren't sufficiently like other people, and then, the opposite, once they've become almost totally assimilated with their surroundings, to complain that they're just like everybody else, not even a fraction distinguished from the average.

La ortodoxia de la razón idiotiza a la humanidad mucho más que cualquier religión. Karl Kraus

he had done nothing wrong; there had always been others above him; he had never done anything but obey orders; he had never hurt a single human being.

Quando se cresce junto de uma figura tão fora do comum, a única revolta possível é o conformismo.

Oh, 'twould be marvelous if the world and its moral questions were like some game board, with plain black players and white, and fixed rules, and nary a shade of grey.

Consistency is the sign of a narrow mind.

Political correctness doesn't change us, it shuts us up.

Of course, figuring out what actually works in reducing childhood obesity is not really the point of these programs. (If it were, then the government might finally stop categorizing french fries as "vegetables.") The real point is the same thing it always is: conformity, control, and eventually fundamental transformation.

people radically change their behavior when they know they are being watched. They will strive to do that which is expected of them. They want to avoid shame and condemnation. They do so by adhering tightly to accepted social practices, by staying within imposed boundaries, avoiding action that might be seen as deviant or abnormal.

you believe you are always being watched and judged, you are not really a free individual.

mass surveillance kills dissent in a deeper and more important place as well: in the mind, where the individual trains him- or herself to think only in line with what is expected and demanded.

what goals drive all institutions of authority. "Doing something wrong," in the eyes of such institutions, encompasses far more than illegal acts, violent behavior, and terrorist plots. It typically extends to meaningful dissent and any genuine challenge. It is the nature of authority to equate dissent with wrongdoing, or at least with a threat.

Doing something wrong," in the eyes of such institutions, encompasses far more than illegal acts, violent behavior, and terrorist plots. It typically extends to meaningful dissent and any genuine challenge. It is the nature of authority to equate dissent with wrongdoing, or at least with a threat. The

This is a deal that invites passivity, obedience, and conformity. The safest course, the way to ensure being "left alone," is to remain quiet, unthreatening, and compliant.

These are people who have become convinced that they themselves are not going to be personally targeted—because they are unthreatening and compliant—and therefore either deny that it's happening, do not care, or are willing to support it outright.

once the citizenry acquiesces to a new power, believing that it does not affect them, it becomes institutionalized and legitimized and objection becomes impossible.

So, I became a chameleon ... [a]nd after a while I hardly knew what I really felt and thought because I became so good at adapting.

If the shoe doesn't fit, must we change the foot?

Any woman who chooses to behave like a full human being should be warned that the armies of the status quo will treat her as something of a dirty joke; that's their natural and first weapon.

We are all trained to be female impersonators.

Anger is supposed to be "unfeminine," so we suppress

In short, these rebels punished their families, but only in the traditionally feminine way: they punished themselves.