Henry Golding Quotes

Quite a few people have to believe something is normal before it becomes normal - a sort of 'voting' situation. But once the threshold is reached, then everyone demands to do whatever it is.

I think what he loved about me the most was that I wasn't part of that world. But once we were together publicly, he wanted to change me into that social animal.

People are going to behave however the social norms permit, and beyond that.

The whole system of society tells you what to do.

In civilized life, where the happiness and indeed almost the existence of man, depends on the opinion of his fellow men. He is constantly acting a studied part.

Something I've always written about is social expectations: that the eyes of the community are on you all the time, expecting you to line up with certain social norms, certain behaviours. Whenever you forgot about them, they'd be strongly reiterated to you, in no uncertain terms.

In America there is not one single element of civilization that is not made to depend, in the end, upon public opinion.

I just feel like in society and in public, we have this unspoken expectation that we're all trying to meet. And there's so much pressure to try to fit in.

In society, there is enormous pressure for us to try and look good, to be politically correct, to say the right things, to be polite and basically to sacrifice ourselves on the way.

A widely held, but rarely articulated, belief in our society is that the ideal self is bold, alpha, gregarious. Introversion is viewed somewhere between disappointment and pathology.

I think people perceive me completely differently than how I perceive myself. I see myself as a sweet, cosy, motherly type. We all want people to be more glamorous and daring and adventurous than they actually are.

Civilization is a conspiracy. Modern life is the silent compact of comfortable folk to keep up pretences.

I think behind closed doors people behave differently no matter what period we're looking at, because people have to stand up straight in public but can slouch behind closed doors - can you imagine wearing those corsets?

I shall be glad when you have strangled the invincible respectability that dogs your steps.

I don't imagine my parents are too excited about my kind of life. The surrounding weirdness bothers them. Still, I think they're pretty good. Their lives are based on what their friends think, just like ours are.

If society fits you comfortably enough, you call it freedom.

I deliver very traditionally, and people aren't threatened. I think if I cursed or seemed wilder, I couldn't get away with the amount of very opinionated politics I get away with.

I am different than some people would like me to be. I just don't buy into that the personal can be political.

Peer pressure is just that: pressure.

I have been told by people that I should not be seen clubbing with good-looking women, but I can't see why not. Why be a pop star otherwise?

Dress codes and gestures and attitudes have always inspired me, as has youth culture in general, although now I question it more. If you analyze youth cultures over history, there has always been something strict about them - you have to be like this or like that.

My mother's mantra was, 'How would it look to the neighbors?' And so you don't do anything because you're worried about how it would look to the neighbors.

People are less likely to think it's immoral to walk away from their home if they know others who have done so. And if enough people do it, the stigma begins to erode.

I guess I'm concerned that vulgarity has now officially entered the mainstream of our culture, and I think people have to respectfully stand up and say, 'No thanks.'

I don't care much about society.