Norm Quotes

“Stop being okay with the norm, seek to transform.”
― Constance Chuks Friday

“Now domestication and sophistication of men by women are the norm and acceptable by society, but they are terrible for manhood.”
― Debasish Mridha M.D.

“In Debt, the anthropologist David Graeber tells the story of Tei Reinga, a Maori villager and “notorious glutton” who used to wander up and down the New Zealand coast, badgering the local fishermen by asking for the best portions of their catch. Since it’s impolite in Maori culture (as in many cultures) to refuse a direct request for food, the fishermen would oblige—but with ever-increasing reluctance. And so as Reinga continued to ask for food, their resentment grew until “one day, people decided enough was enough and killed him.”
This story is extreme, to say the least, but it illustrates how norm-following and norm-enforcement can be a very high-stakes game. Reinga flouted an important norm (against freeloading) and eventually paid dearly for it. But just as tellingly, the fishermen who put him to death felt so duty-bound by a different norm (the norm of food-sharing) that they followed it even to the point of building up murderous resentment. “Couldn’t you just have said no to Reinga’s requests?!” we want to shout at the villagers.”
― Kevin Simler, The Elephant in the Brain: Hidden Motives in Everyday Life

“When someone deviates from an accepted norm, they signal a gap in the system. A hole that hasn’t been plugged. The danger with exposing a foundation’s failings is it opens the door to the possibility that it’s a faulty structure altogether and should be torn down and built anew.”
― Romina Garber, Lobizona

“Almost everywhere people marry, monogamy is the official norm and infidelity the clandestine one.”
― Esther Perel, The State of Affairs: Rethinking Infidelity

“To apply norm, soldiers needed.”
― Toba Beta, My Ancestor Was an Ancient Astronaut

“If "RACE" becomes the norm, then harmony will not prevail.”
― Henry Johnson Jr, Liberian Son

“We schamen ons natuurlijk niet om wat we doen, maar om de mogelijkheid dat dat wat we doen niet hoort. En terwijl nergens definitief vastligt hoe we horen te handelen, wekken we met ons schaamtevolle gedrag het bestaan van zo'n norm juist tot leven.”
― Coen Simon, Schuldgevoel

“Since when has bringing stolen money to churches for Pastor’s blessings become a Nigerian norm?”
― Sunday Adelaja

“Never repaired, his glasses looked as if they'd been thrown at his face, dirty grayish lumps of Reba's sticking plaster holding the frames together in a tentative accord with the forces of gravity.”
― T.C. Boyle, Drop City

“Because of the unlimited potential packed within each person, attaining greatness should have been the norm, not an oddity.”
― Assegid Habtewold, Soft Skills That Make or Break Your Success: 12 soft skills to master yourself, become a team player, and lead your company to absolute success

“A sweaty bum crack will become the norm in a climate changed world.”
― Steven Magee

“A norm doesn't have to be logical to exist in a civilized society, it just has to be non-prejudicial.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Neden Türk: The Gospel of Secularism

“To do good seemed to take a great deal of effort, like moving a mountain, while to do seemed easy.
Worse still, many people took evil as the expected norm - until it was publicly detected in the actions of the person in power. Then it was played up relentlessly till it was out of all proportion to reality. Often, the person involved was ruthlessly crushed as a fly under a sledge-hammer.”
― P.V. Narasimha Rao, The insider

“Madness and sanity are judged by majority norms.”
― Adrian Tchaikovsky, Alien Clay