Sometimes it seems the only accomplishment my education ever bestowed on me was the ability to think in quotations.
Margaret DrabbleRead
Our desire to conform is greater than our respect for objective facts.
Interpretation
People often prioritize fitting in with others over recognizing the truth.
This quote by Margaret Drabble suggests that the human tendency to conform and align with social norms often overshadows the value of objective truth and facts. It highlights the conflict between societal pressure and individual understanding, indicating that people may disregard reality in order to belong or be accepted by a group.
In practice
In a discussion about social media influences, this quote can highlight how peer pressure often leads to misinformation.
Sometimes it seems the only accomplishment my education ever bestowed on me was the ability to think in quotations.
Family life itself, that safest, most traditional, most approved of female choices, is not a sanctuary: It is, perpetually, a dangerous place.
I'd rather be at the end of a dying tradition, which I admire, than at the beginning of a tradition which I deplore.
I contend that non-violent acts exert pressure far more effective than violent acts, for the pressure comes from goodwill and gentleness.
Maybe the best thing would be to forget being right or wrong about people and just go along for the ride. But if you can do that -- well, lucky you.
One can quite understand vegetarianism. One can quite understand meat-eating. But it is difficult to understand why a person who is a flesh-eater should object to one kind of flesh, namely cow's flesh. This is an anomaly which call for explanation.
To be alive, it seemed to me, as I stood there in all kinds of sorrow, was to be both original and reflection, and to be dead was to be split off, to be reflection alone.
Again I ask whence it happened that the fall of Adam involved, without remedy, in eternal death so many nations, together with their infant children, except because it so seemed good to God? A decree horrible, I confess, and yet true.
It is never right to do wrong or to requite wrong with wrong, or when we suffer evil to defend ourselves by doing evil in return.
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