The life you have led doesn't need to be the only life you have.
Anna QuindlenRead
The pursuit of otherness, the sense that we are somehow different than our brothers and sisters, no matter where we find them, allows for all the other great evils: racism, sexism, homophobia, violence against gay people and against women.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote emphasizes that the feeling of being different from others leads to various societal evils.
Anna Quindlen highlights how the human tendency to perceive ourselves as separate or different from others fosters a culture of discrimination and violence. This 'otherness' is a root cause for many societal issues, including racism, sexism, and homophobia, as it promotes a lack of empathy and understanding among individuals.
Themes
OthernessDiscriminationEmpathySocietyDivision
In practice
Example use cases
During a speech on equality, one might use this quote to emphasize the importance of unity.
More from Anna Quindlen
All quotes →The future is built on brains, not prom court, as most people can tell you after attending their high school reunion. But you'd never know it by talking to kids or listening to the messages they get from the culture and even from their schools.
Anna QuindlenRead
I read and walked for miles at night along the beach, writing bad blank verse and searching endlessly for someone wonderful who would step out of the darkness and change my life. It never crossed my mind that that person could be me.
Anna QuindlenRead
With reference to the younger generation..."If the experience of their exhausted, insomniac, dispirited elders makes them decide they'd prefer not to go straight from the classroom to the cubicle to the coffin, it doesn't mean they're lazy. It means they're sane."
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Ideas are only lethal if you suppress and don't discuss them. Ignorance is not bliss, it's stupid. Banning books shows you don't trust your kids to think and you don't trust yourself to be able to talk to them.
Anna QuindlenRead
I conveniently forgot to remember that people only have two hands, or, as another parent once said of having a third child, it's time for a zone defense instead of man-to-man.
Anna QuindlenRead
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Go another step. Try to live one entire day without words at all. Do it not as a law, but as an experiment. Note your feelings of helplessness and excessive dependence upon words to communicate. Try to find new ways to relate to tohers that are not dependent upon words. Enjoy, savor the day. Learn from it.
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However fascinating you may think you are, there is a limit to what you can know about yourself.
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