Cutting the inconvenient protrusions from the jigsaw pieces

There is a school of thought that goes like this....

(1) To manage data means to put it in a database
(2) A 'database' means a relational database. No other database approach is really any good.
(3)  If the data does not fit into the relational data model, well just compromise the data so that it does. Why? See item (1).

I have no difficulty whatsover with recommending relational databases where there is a good fit between the data, the problem to be solved, and the relational database paradigm.

Where the fit isn't good, I recommend something else. Maybe index flat files, or versioned spreadsheets, documents, a temporal data store....whatever feels least like I am cutting important protrusions off the data and off the problem to be solved.

However, whenever I do that, I am sure to have to answer the "Why not just store it in [Insert RDB name]?" question.

It is an incredibly strong meme in modern computing.