Robert E. Lane Quotes

An ideology can be defined as a group of beliefs that individuals borrow; most people borrow an ideology by identifying with a social group ... with a body of sacred documents and heroes.

Beliefs are also both functional and social. Functionally, beliefs inform us when we choose our actions, given our preferences. But many of our beliefs are also social, in that others see and react to our beliefs. So beliefs can also allow us to identify with groups, to demonstrate our independence and creativity, and to signal our wealth, profession, and social status.

Religion and culture are two important ways in which we as humans find our identity. That's certainly true for me.

Fashion has a political role insofar as following it can give you the impression to belonging to a certain social group or a private club.

Human beings are a social species. We like to hang together in groups, just like wildebeests, just like lions. Wildebeests don't hang with lions because lions eat wildebeests. Human beings are like that. We do what that group does that we're trying to identify with.

I think - something I learned recently looking up the meaning of ideology. If you look in American encyclopedias, it says, you know, 'Rules for - basic rules for a system of economics or politics.' If you look in the Oxford, it says that, and then it says... 'Despite - and people will hold these propositions despite events.'

The most important thing to a lot of people, is to belong to something that's hip or whatever. To be a part of something that's not society, just a clique.

Sports teams, people who follow sports teams, religion, churches, work - any company, I find that people just generally have a need to belong to something larger than themselves.

Every different social group that I encountered had its different set of rules, so you learn very quickly how to pick up the nuances and change yourself accordingly. When you are not from anywhere, you have to try to find what's universal. You are always trying to fit in.

The Jews invented a portable religion in the shape of the Bible, the Torah, and eventually the Talmud, and with other portable forms of writing. So it's now possible to carry the religion, that is embedded in that writing, away from the ruins of political and military power.

As a social primate species, we modulate our morals with signals from family, friends and social groups with whom we identify because in our evolutionary past, those attributes helped individuals to survive and reproduce.

Religion cannot and should not be understood by their texts alone. The lived history of a community of believers defines a religion; a great deal depends on how the custodians of the faith chose to interpret, defend and exploit or abuse its sacred texts.

One strength of the Communist system ... is that it has some of the characteristics of a religion and inspires the emotions of a religion.

It is not the Bible that produced religion and morals, but religion and morals that produced the Bible.

I can find for you in any holy book, the Koran, the Bible, violent prescriptions.

That's interesting: people deriving their identities from their music.

If you don't like the word 'religion,' you can replace it with 'ideology' - it's largely the same thing. At the heart of both religion and ideology is the question of authority and where authority is coming from.

When I was in college, I wasn't in a fraternity or anything. I always wanted to jump around to all different types of cliques.

People have multiple identities.

When you mention the word ideology, everyone has communism in the back of their minds, which was an entirely well formulated ideology and statement of belief. You read the Communist Manifesto and you know what the core of it is.

I'm not talking about the people. I have nothing against the people. I have nothing against the Indonesian people or the Arab people or the Muslim people. I'm talking about the ideology.

We are undermining a generation's happiness by depriving them of national identity, religious identity, and gender identity

The reverence for the Scriptures is an element of civilization, for thus has the history of the world been preserved, and is preserved.

However much we guard against it, we tend to shape ourselves in the image others have of us.

Our sense of being a person can come from being drawn into a wide social unit; our sense of selfhood can arise through the little ways in which we resist the pull. Our status is backed by the solid buildings of the world, while our sense of personal identity often resides in the cracks