Daily Inspiration Quote by Norman Jewison

Jewison’s punch here isn’t shock value; it’s a trapdoor under the reader’s moral comfort. By starting with Nazis, he reaches for the clearest symbol of modern evil, then yanks the focus away from monster-mythology and toward something more banal: self-image. The line works because it refuses the easy story where bigotry is a conscious choice made by people twirling their mustaches. Instead, Jewison argues that prejudice often survives by hiding inside ordinary narratives of decency, tradition, “common sense,” even love of family or country.

The second move is smarter: “I’ve never met...” puts the claim in the register of lived experience rather than abstract sociology. Coming from a director, that matters. Jewison spent a career staging moral conflict for mass audiences (think In the Heat of the Night), and he understands how characters justify themselves. He’s pointing at a cinematic truth and a civic one: the villain rarely auditions for the role. People don’t say, “I am a racist.” They say, “I’m just being realistic,” or “I’m protecting my neighborhood,” or “I’m not political.”

Subtext: the real danger is not only explicit hate but the psychological need to see oneself as good. That need makes racism and antisemitism elastic, able to rebrand as humor, safety, merit, or “heritage.” Jewison’s intent is diagnostic, not rhetorical: if we keep imagining bigots as self-aware aberrations, we’ll miss them in institutions, in polite conversation, and in ourselves.