Mormons... are so strong, they can handle wealth, they are confident. I think it is because they are not bogged down by rules for equality, but have a firmly defined system of relative status and responsible command.
Mary Douglas

Our technological infrastructure alienates us from each other. No need to form a workplace community, everybody there will be out in a year or two, and so will you, looking for a better place.
Mary Douglas

Pretensions to moral superiority are devastatingly destructive.
Mary Douglas

Real equality is immensely difficult to achieve, it needs continual revision and monitoring of distributions. And it does not provide buffers between members, so they are continually colliding or frustrating each other.
Mary Douglas

Religion can make it worse. Are you supposing that if people were encouraged to believe in a transcendent reality, and to be encouraged by grand rituals and music and preaching, to love their neighbors, then they would put jealousy and frustration aside?
Mary Douglas

Since 1970, relationships can be more volatile, jobs more ephemeral, geographical mobility more intensified, stability of marriage weaker.
Mary Douglas

Some scholars have been arguing that a civilizational clash between organized religions is the next step in human history.
Mary Douglas

The history of the Church of Rome is a constant leakage of members into such breakaway cults, which go on splitting.
Mary Douglas

The natural response of the old-timers is to build a strong moral wall against the outside. This is where the world starts to be painted in black and white, saints inside, and sinners outside the wall.
Mary Douglas

The theory of cultural bias... is the idea that a culture is based on a particular form of organization. It can't be transplanted except to another variant of that organization.
Mary Douglas

What did our nation ever do to provoke these madly vicious enemies? What is seen as injustice in one place is seen as just requital in the other.
Mary Douglas

When we are reflecting on terrorism we can grieve for many things we do and have done.
Mary Douglas

Without that assured American largesse Israel would have been obliged to come to an accommodation with her neighbours.
Mary Douglas

Yes, disappointment over perceived unfairness, injustice, promises not kept, tends to go hand in hand with increasing prosperity. Expectations are dashed. What can I say!
Mary Douglas