No matter how many communes anybody invents the family always creeps back.

— Margaret Mead

One of the most dangerous things that can happen to a child is to kill or torture an animal a getaway with it.

— Margaret Mead

One of the oldest human needs is having someone to wonder where you are when you don't come home at night.

— Margaret Mead

Sister is probably the most competitive relationship within the family, but once the sisters are grown, it becomes the strongest relationship.

— Margaret Mead

Thanks to television, for the first time the young are seeing history made before it is censored by their elders.

— Margaret Mead

There is no greater insight into the future than recognizing...when we save our children, we save ourselves

— Margaret Mead

There is no hierarchy of values by which one culture has the right to insist on all its own values and deny those of another.

— Margaret Mead

There is no reason to think a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens cannot change the world; Indeed, that's the only thing that ever has.

— Margaret Mead

The young, free to act on their initiative, can lead their elders in the direction of the unknown... The children, the young, must ask the questions that we would never think to ask, but enough trust must be re-established so that the elders will be permitted to work with them on the answers.

— Margaret Mead

We make our own criminals and their crimes are congruent with the national culture we all share. It has been said that a people get the kind of political leadership they deserve. I think they also get the kinds of crime and criminals they themselves bring into being.

— Margaret Mead