There are people whose souls have just withered, people who are willing to go along with anything evil - anything so as not to be suspected of disagreeing with whoever is in power.
Interpretation
The quote highlights the danger of conformity and the moral decay that can result from loyalty to corrupt power.
Vasily Grossman's quote reflects on the moral compromise individuals may face when they choose to align themselves with corrupt or evil powers rather than stand for their beliefs. It suggests that a person's soul can wither in the process of surrendering to the pressures of conformity, failing to disagree even in the face of wrongdoing, which ultimately erodes their integrity and humanity.
In practice
In a speech about the importance of standing up for one's beliefs, this quote could serve as a powerful reminder.
And in this silence of the dumb and these speeches of the blind, in this medly of people bound together by the same grief, terror and hope, in this hatred and lack of understanding between men who spoke the same tongue, you could see much of the tragedy of the twentieth century.
Why do people have memories? It would be easier to die - anything to stop remembering.
Good men and bad men alike are capable of weakness. The difference is simply that a bad man will be proud all his life of one good deed - while an honest man is hardly aware of his good acts, but remembers a single sin for years on end.
The outcome of fear is disappointment and shyness is frustration.
Some people are walking around with full use of their bodies and they're more paralyzed than I am.
As a black woman in the industry, you really do have to hold your head higher, stick your chest out, be kind and polite and generous even when you don't want to be sometimes. I learned that and, also, just to never take no for an answer.
My skin's not a normal sight. When a photographer says, 'I don't know what it is, but that's just not it...' I know. They like the different colours of my skin. They're not getting them with a particular outfit.
Unless men are active allies, we'll never end violence against women and girls.
I would never call myself a cancer survivor because I think it devalues those who do not survive. There's this whole mythology that people bravely battle their cancer and then they become survivors. Well, the ones who don't survive may be just as brave, you know, just as courageous, wonderful people.
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