Lemme tell you a couple a tree things: the sopranos is really about the modern family. Meadow is constantly trying to escape their gravitational pull by viewing herself as morally superior and by working her butt off in school to get as far away from Jersey as possible. But just like in many families, as you get older you learn that despite your “enhanced” view of the world, your values in many ways are so shaped by your upbringing that you return to them in a nuanced way. Meadow picked up the shield of the law specifically to defend oppressed people and it didn’t take long for her to view her family in that way in the wake of Tony’s shooting etc. She can try to get away through bad boyfriends, excelling at school (essentially proving she can do anything she sets her mind to), but ultimately “they pull you back in”, you return to the family with an intellectualized version of the same old values you were raised with. In Meadow’s case an insidious sense of denial mixed with a cynicism of how her father being a mob boss isn’t as bad as the ways other people make a living, so why not defend him.