Dignified

Dignity is a term used in moral, ethical, legal, and political discussions to signify that a being has an innate right to be valued and receive ethical treatment. It is an extension of the Enlightenment-era concepts of inherent, inalienable rights. Dignity is often used in proscriptive and cautionary ways: for example in politics it is usually used to critique the treatment of oppressed and vulnerable groups and peoples, but it has also been extended to apply to cultures and sub-cultures, religious beliefs and ideals, animals used for food or research, and plants. Dignity also has descriptive meanings pertaining to human worth, although there is no exact or agreed upon definition of this worth. In general, the term has various functions and meanings depending on how the term is used and on the context.

Famous quotes containing the word dignified:

“I believe that one of the most dignified ways we are capable of, to assert and then reassert our dignity in the face of poverty and war’s fears and pains, is to nourish ourselves with all possible skill, delicacy, and ever-increasing enjoyment.”
—M.F.K. Fisher (1908–1992)

“The dignified catastrophes of tragedy bear little resemblance to the slow ruin inflicted by life.”
—Mason Cooley (b. 1927)

“I am actually what my age and my upbringing have made me—a bourgeois who adheres to the British constitution, adheres to it rather than supports it, and the fact that this isn’t dignified doesn’t worry me.”
—E.M. (Edward Morgan)