Skip to content
quotesby

About this quote

What does it mean?
A satirical pledge encouraging individuality while mocking conformity.
In plain terms
Being unique can become a new conformity.
What can you take from it?
Avoid swapping one trend for another.

Where it applies

  • group activities
  • public speaking

Putting it to work

  • think critically before adopting trends
  • value authentic self

Questions to consider

  • When does uniqueness become a fad?
  • How can you stay authentic?

Another view

The joke may undermine genuine self‑expression.

More from Steve Martin

  1. I like a woman with a head on her shoulders. I hate necks.

    Permalink to quote #9
  2. It's so hard to believe in anything anymore. I mean, it's like, religion, you really can't take it seriously, because it seems so mythological, it seems so arb…

    Permalink to quote #11
  3. It was so sweet backstage, you should have seen it - The Teamsters were helping Michael Moore into the trunk of his limo.

    Permalink to quote #8

Related quotes

  1. Mass democracy, mass morality and the mass media thrive independently of the individual, who joins them only at the cost of at least a partial perversion of hi…

    Al AlvarezAl Alvarez quote #4
  2. One is always afraid of upsetting their conventionalities.

    Queen of Romania MarieQueen of Romania Marie quote #5
  3. Our dangers, as it seems to me, are not from the outrageous but from the conforming; not from those who rarely and under the lurid glare of obloquy upset our m…

    Learned HandLearned Hand quote #9