Welcome to our collection of quotes on conformity. In a world that often encourages fitting in over standing out, conformity can be both a survival mechanism and a stifling force. Throughout history, individuals have grappled with the balance between adhering to societal norms and expressing their unique identities. From philosophers to activists, artists to leaders, the concept of conformity has sparked insightful reflections and poignant observations.
These quotes delve into the complexities of conformity, exploring its impact on personal freedom, creativity, and social dynamics. Some celebrate the comfort and security found in conformity, while others challenge its constraints, advocating for individuality and authenticity. Whether you’re seeking inspiration, contemplating societal pressures, or simply pondering the nature of conformity, these quotes offer diverse perspectives to ponder and discuss. Discover the wisdom, wit, and wisdom encapsulated in the following quotes on conformity.
I do sometimes painful things to my body in an effort to conform to culturally imposed beauty ideals. Stella Young
As far as what I do, my value as a writer is certainly not to try to recapitulate a 19th century form. Certain styles of narrative don’t conform to my style of experiencing the world. Mark Leyner
I think that women out there should just be happy with how they look, and they shouldn’t really try to conform to any stereotype. Just be happy and, hopefully, healthy. Rebel Wilson
You don’t have to conform to a very specific aesthetic today, whereas 1950s women definitely had to. Romola Garai
Why has government been instituted at all? Because the passions of men will not conform to the dictates of reason and justice, without constraint. Alexander Hamilton
To her credit, Madam Walker discerned that black women wanted to conform to white Victorian models of beauty. She was aware of the double- sidedness of her products – helping black women appear more European in look, with straight hair – but she always maintained that she was simply selling products that promoted hair growth. A’Lelia Bundles
Once conform, once do what others do because they do it, and a kind of lethargy steals over all the finer senses of the soul. Michel de Montaigne
Reality does not conform to the ideal, but confirms it. Gustave Flaubert
The decree of a coercive tribunal would not need to conform to the true standard of wages, the final productivity of social labor. It would introduce into distribution a genuinely arbitrary element, with a very large ultimate power to pervert the natural system. John Bates Clark
Our memories are convenient lies we create, cribbing images from others’ experiences. We discard the personal specifics which don’t conform to the ideal conventional beauty created by art directors and cinematographers. Damian Loeb
The first five albums I did, I tried a little bit of everything. I was trying not to conform at all. Carlene Carter
I have worked hard and learnt that I have to make a decision – whether I am going to conform and protect myself or not. I chose not to. M. Night Shyamalan
I think a lot of people have lost respect for the individual, you know, the individual, the person who doesn’t conform. Erykah Badu
Banks properly established and conducted are highly useful to the business of the country, and will doubtless continue to exist in the States so long as they conform to their laws and are found to be safe and beneficial. Martin Van Buren
A lot of people kind of… conform. I don’t want it to sound like I’m saying don’t care about championships. That’s not my point. But what I’m saying is a lot of people give in to the pressure of, ‘I didn’t have this; I didn’t have rings.’ Damian Lillard
I don’t do nonfiction anymore. Eventually, you just feel constrained by the facts. You want to go where the words take you, and people’s actual lives don’t always conform. And you can’t know them that well. Tom Drury
The terrorist isn’t a problem because he doesn’t conform; he’s a problem because he does. It’s what he conforms to that makes him dangerous. Howard Jacobson
Its funny, because for females in general – not just in music, but the corporate ladder as well – anything we do has always been harder for us. When it comes to music, the industry wants you to conform, to look like this and to sound like this and do this or that. It makes it harder. It’s harder for us to come out and be bosses and lead the pack. Missy Elliott
I grew up with my cousins, who were as close as brothers, and frankly, I didn’t like what girls were expected to do. I liked horseback riding, playing football, going to rodeos. I wanted to be in jeans all the time, and I couldn’t figure out why I was supposed to conform to a certain standard, so I didn’t. S. E. Hinton
I was a brownie for a day. My mom made me stop. She didn’t want me to conform. Sandra Bullock
Mathematics takes us into the region of absolute necessity, to which not only the actual word, but every possible word, must conform. Bertrand Russell
Why does your mind conform? Have you ever asked? Are you aware that you are conforming to a pattern? It doesn’t matter what that pattern is, whether you have established a pattern for yourself or it has been established for you. Jiddu Krishnamurti
Sexual performance problems, such as impotence and frigidity, are 70 to 90 percent changeable. But a homosexual who wants to be a heterosexual – that’s close to unchangeable. And a transsexual – say a man who believes he’s really a woman in a man’s body – is completely unchangeable; you’d have to change the body to conform to the psyche. Martin Seligman
To hard necessity ones will and fancy must conform. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
The young always have the same problem – how to rebel and conform at the same time. They have now solved this by defying their parents and copying one another. Quentin Crisp
Very early in my career, I thought I had to conform to one style of leadership – lead by being the loudest one in the room, with the sharpest elbows. Peggy Johnson
The idea of old was to conform yourself to a style of cooking, it was not to create a style of cooking. Now the chef is so much into ‘I want to sign that dish and say I am the one who made that dish.’ Jacques Pepin
I like being the odd one out in L.A. Because if you conform, you become something you hate. I love being the odd one out. It’s not about ‘Look at me! Look at me!’ It’s about really becoming someone else. Tracey Ullman
I’m not going to conform to some consumer need. Billie Joe Armstrong
If you have your own agenda and your own style and you don’t easily conform to what the masses are doing, you’re looked upon as being difficult. Whereas, I think of it as just being an individual. Anita Baker
I did not try to conform to anybody’s ideal of what a Latin celebrity or movie star should be. I took a lot of hits for it. Rosie Perez
Some people wish above all to conform to the rules, I wish only to render what I can hear. There is no theory. You have only to listen. Pleasure is the law. Claude Debussy
If there is anything the nonconformist hates worse than a conformist, it’s another nonconformist who doesn’t conform to the prevailing standard of nonconformity. Bill Vaughan
When I conform to truth, I do not conform to an abstract principle; I conform to the nature of God. Kenneth L. Pike
I wouldn’t even have braces on my teeth. I think they are horrible and this idea that everyone should conform and be perfect is ridiculous. Georgia May Jagger
This is the very devilish thing about foreign affairs: they are foreign and will not always conform to our whim. James Reston
Some people look gender non-conforming because they want to look that way – they don’t want to conform to society’s expectations. Caitlyn Jenner
In this perfect world, there are certain imperfections that catch your eye. That’s what works for me. I don’t concentrate on being perfect, but instead put that effort behind my craft and being true to myself. I don’t conform to pressures outside of me. I am confident about myself. Sonakshi Sinha
Woe betide the man who refuses to conform. Eugene Ionesco
Success brings with it pressure to conform. I always thought that success would lead to freedom, but the opposite is true: more people get involved, and committees make decisions, and it becomes a fight to stay free. Nick Park
Everywhere I look, there are ads marking Mother’s Day. Mostly they conform to stereotype: flowers, jewelry, perfume. Not a lot of books. Not many computers. Few tools. Little that’s useful. Margaret Heffernan
The biggest risk I’ve ever taken is going on American Idol and trying to be myself. I wasn’t going to try too hard to conform, and I knew that it could possibly not work out. Adam Lambert
I think the thing that you’ve seen with Donald Trump is that he doesn’t – he doesn’t look to the past and say, ‘I’ve got to conform to these precedents.’ Sean Spicer
I had a meeting with Umar Akmal and discussed exactly where I thought he was. We are looking at the skillset that he brings to the Pakistan team. Obviously, he is a very intelligent player but he knows that he has to conform. He knows that he has got to pass the fitness standards that are required of him. Mickey Arthur
Whatever you do, be happy with you. Don’t conform. You are who you are, and you shouldn’t change that for anybody. Aimee Teegarden
This is the devilish thing about foreign affairs: they are foreign and will not always conform to our whim. James Reston
No one familiar with the common law of England can read the Constitution of the United States without observing the great desire of the Convention which framed that instrument to make it conform as far as possible with that law. Samuel Freeman Miller
The respected intellectuals are those who conform and serve power interests. Noam Chomsky
I’m not going to change the way I look or the way I feel to conform to anything. I’ve always been a freak. So I’ve been a freak all my life and I have to live with that, you know. I’m one of those people. John Lennon
No city owns me, you know what I’m saying? I’m from New York, but no city owns me. Nobody can bottle up my sound and box me in. Yes, I am a rapper, but am I a New York rapper? No. I am from New York, I love New York to death, but I will not conform myself to one place, no. ASAP Ferg
Want to depose the government of a poor country with resources? Want to bash Muslims? Want to build support for American military interventions around the world? Want to undermine governments that are raising their people up from poverty because they don’t conform to the tastes of Upper West Side intellectuals? Use human rights as your excuse! Stephen Kinzer
You may be educated abroad, you may be a great scientist, politician, but you always have a sneaking fear that if you don’t go to temples or do the ordinary things that you have been told to do, something evil might happen, so you conform. What happens to the mind that conforms? Investigate it, please. Jiddu Krishnamurti
If you’re naturally a certain size, I think it suits you and you can see that. There’s no point in trying to conform for the sake of it. People are meant to be different shapes, and their different shapes are so interesting and, ultimately, why people fall in love with them. Miranda Hart
There came a time when these two incompatible notions of who I was, well, something had to give. Either that ‘something’ is where you acquiesce to the world around you and you conform, or you sort of defiantly break whatever remaining bonds connect you to that world and create for yourself a different set of values. Sean Parker
Through my unique style of playing, I want to prove that you don’t have to conform to be accepted. The greatest value comes from loving yourself for who you are. Lindsey Stirling
I did documentary film for a long time, and I spent a lot of time behind the camera, fervently wishing that the reality I was filming would conform to my narrative propriety. But you can’t control it. Ruth Ozeki
Fairy tales opened up a door into my imagination – they don’t conform to the reality that’s around you as a child. I started reading when I was three and read everything, but I wanted to be an actress. Kate Atkinson
You know the question: ‘How do you get to Carnegie Hall?’ Answer: ‘Practise?’ Well, in my case, I got there by not practising. I didn’t finish my music degree. And when I got into the pop world, I decided not to conform because I figured that the point of being an artist was that you shouldn’t be like anyone else. Rufus Wainwright
Gawker started out speaking the truth to power, and then it became about bullying anyone who didn’t conform to their social justice orthodoxy. They wanted to inflict pain on people with no platform simply for the sake of inflicting pain. Mike Cernovich
I know I’m never going to be a big pop star, because I’m not willing to conform. Justin Townes Earle
To seek understanding before taking action, yet to trust my instincts when action is called for. Never to avoid danger from fear, never to seek out danger for its own sake. Never to conform to fashion from fear of eccentricity, never to be eccentric from fear of conformity. Steven Brust
If ergonomists have their way, future products won’t be built for some hypothetical average person but will conform to the biomechanical needs of whatever particular human body happens to come into contact with them. Mary Roach
Men cannot make Scripture conform to their lifestyle; they must make their lifestyle conform to Scripture. Edwin Louis Cole
When Jennifer Lawrence says it’s ‘dumb’ to go hungry to make other people happy, she’s saying it with the carefree attitude of a woman who probably will never have to make that choice to conform. Jennifer Armintrout
I just know that I’m innovative. I’m a quick thinker… In Washington, I just want to be a senator who finds a way to drive change and not figure out a way to conform. Cory Booker
Although images of perfection in people’s personal lives can cause unhappiness, images of perfect societies – utopian images – can cause monstrous evil. In fact, forcefully changing society to conform to societal images was the greatest cause of evil in the twentieth century. Dennis Prager
I personally believe that any country that has a nuclear program should conform to international regulations and should have international regulatory bodies that check to make sure that any nuclear program moves in the right direction. Abdullah II of Jordan
You can grow up without having to conform, stop going to shows, stop having a record collection, start being politically iffy. Johnny Marr
People expect your behavior to conform to known patterns and conventions. Your task as a strategist is to upset their expectations. Robert Greene
A few years ago I lost 30 pounds, and people still wanted to criticize. And honestly, I’m happy with myself if I’m a little heavier. I realized: ‘Why am I trying to conform to someone else’s idea of beauty?’ I think I’m beautiful either way. Khloe Kardashian
I cannot make the universe obey me. I cannot make other people conform to my own whims and fancies. I cannot make even my own body obey me. Thomas Merton
Popular kids don’t necessarily know who they are because they’re so busy trying to conform. It’s the outcasts who are more attuned to who they are. They’re more self-aware, more real. Alexandra Robbins
Salvation lies in imitating Christ, in other words, in imitating the ‘withdrawal relationship’ that links him with his Father… To listen to the Father’s silence is to abandon oneself to his withdrawal, to conform to it. Rene Girard
I have the freedom to take chances, to say no. I have the freedom to be who I really want to be, rather than have to conform to this or that just to stay alive. Robert Redford
At every point I am besieged by people who would like me to conform to some social norm of whatever sort of social group they expect me to be a part of. I never have any identification with these social groups. Sean Parker
We’ve become used to processing images that are part of the non-linear narrative theory. I think there’s a thinner line between fantasy and normality. People spend much more time in their own heads now. There’s so much to conform to, so many influences coming at you. Irvine Welsh
Why has government been instituted at all? Because the passions of man will not conform to the dictates of reason and justice without constraint. Alexander Hamilton
The paradox of faith is that when we conform our lives to Christ then we gain our true freedom. And its fruit is profound and lasting happiness. Vincent Nichols
I’m really happy to be me, and I’d like to think people like me more because I’m happy with myself and not because I refuse to conform to anything. Adele
Women in figure skating, like in every other industry, are expected to conform to an unrealistic standard of beauty. Unhealthy habits are often encouraged to promote a thin frame, and young girls idealize a skewed definition of ‘fit.’ Tessa Virtue
We are more likely to cheat if we see others doing so. We tend to conform to accepted norms of reasonable behaviour, rather than adhere to strict rules. Evan Davis
I’d done my time in corporate America, from McDonald’s making shakes to Morgan Stanley making deals and, yet, I felt awfully constrained by the uniform – not just my clothes, but how I felt I needed to conform – that a traditional job required me to wear. Chip Conley
I’m going to start work on developing a series for HBO, because I’m naturally given to episodic stories of considerable length. And I won’t have to listen to complaints about how wordy and long my work is if you can watch it on your telephone on the subway: You can make it conform to your day as if it were a book. Tony Kushner
Suppose we were able to share meanings freely without a compulsive urge to impose our view or conform to those of others and without distortion and self-deception. Would this not constitute a real revolution in culture. David Bohm
Spatial racism, the erasure of black faces in a predominantly white city, is in full effect in both Crown Heights and Center City Philadelphia. This racism demands that bodies that don’t conform to a mandated ‘white’ status quo can be redlined out of a space. Anthea Butler
I don’t like the idea of fitting into a mould so as to conform. What I like is the danger, the difference – being unpredictable. Emmanuelle Seigner
I thought for a very long time that I had to conform or maybe change the way I look, or maybe the hijab was dimming my beauty. I took a moment, and then I realized, you know what, there’s a lot of girls who do wear this, and this is their reality. It just made me even more prouder to wear it. Halima Aden
The government is supposed to conform to our will. By taking the most important thing you have, your health and your health care, and turning that over to the government, you fundamentally shift the power, a huge chunk of it, from the people to the government. This is not the direction that we want the government to go in this nation. Ben Carson
Judges cannot – nor should they try to – align our legal system with the Church’s moral teaching whenever the two diverge. They should, however, conform their own behavior to the Church’s standard. Amy Coney Barrett
But for everyone, I think, there is always a pressure to conform, and I guess as you get older you realize it’s less interesting to do that. It starts with you, though, saying, ‘I know what I like doing and that’s what I’m going to do.’ Felicity Jones
You’re made aware of what the industry is and what you need to conform to; I don’t fit that, and I’m never going to. Jessie Cave
Pop music allows you to be who you are without having to wear a social uniform or to conform, which some people find impossible to do. Siobhan Fahey
It is not the end of the physical body that should worry us. Rather, our concern must be to live while we’re alive – to release our inner selves from the spiritual death that comes with living behind a facade designed to conform to external definitions of who and what we are. Elisabeth Kubler-Ross
We must assent to the will of Heaven above and conform to the wishes of men on earth below, but the government should assert the majesty of its warlike might in order to drive away the hordes of fierce and cruel men. We know that the dispositions of these outer barbarians are as ravenous as those of wolves. Zhang Zhidong
Once conform, once do what other people do because they do it, and a lethargy steals over all the finer nerves and faculties of the soul. She becomes all outer show and inward emptiness; dull, callous, and indifferent. Virginia Woolf
I have no patience for anyone who thinks they’ve figured things out, no patience for people who think they’re right at the expense of everyone else. The world is too connected and too complicated to conform to any of our rigid ideas of what it should be like. Moby
Am I coasting on some early success? Yeah. It was a good lucky break for me. But I would rather earn my way back again than simply conform to what people are expecting. Liz Phair
It is obvious that discrimination exists. Women do not have the opportunities that men do. And women that do not conform to the system, who try to break with the accepted patterns, are stigmatized as odd and unfeminine. Shirley Chisholm
I am not trying to conform to an unrealistic model of beauty. I am, however, being proactive in being the healthiest I can be. Octavia Spencer
You either go along with the system – conform to what is expected to be a hit – or you have very tough going. Budd Schulberg