Feminist Quotes

"I want to emphasise the importance of approaching both our theoretical explorations and our movement activism in ways that enlarge and expand and complicate and deepen our theories and practices of freedom. Feminism involves so much more than gender equality and it involves so much more than gender. Feminism must involve consciousness of capitalism (I mean the feminism that I relate to, and there are multiple feminisms, right). So it has to involve a consciousness of capitalism and racism and colonialism and post-colonialities, and ability and more genders than we can even imagine and more sexualities than we ever thought we could name. Feminism has helped us not only to recognise a range of connections among discourses and institutions and identities and ideologies, that we often tend to consider separately. But it has also helped us to develop epistemological and organising strategies that take us beyond the categories ‘women’ and ‘gender’. And feminist methodologies impel us to explore connections that are not always apparent. And they drive us to inhabit contradictions and discover what is productive in these contradictions. Feminism insists on methods of thought and action that urge us to think things together that appear to be separate and to disaggregrate things that appear to naturally belong together."

"You can totally be a feminist who has insecurities. Feminism isn’t about pretending we all feel like Wonder Woman, it’s about being honest when we don’t, and having the conversation on why that is."

"There are a few misguided wits who think they are being complimentary when they declare a woman is ”too much”. While it is admirable and desirable to be enough, only masochists want to be ”too much”. Being, claiming, or accepting the status allows others to heap responsibilities upon the back of the ”too much” woman, who naturally is also referred to as ”super.” ”Super Woman” and ”Earth Mother.”
The flatterer, for that is what the speaker means to be, exposes himself as an manipulator who expects to ingratiate himself into ”Earth Mother’s” good graces, so that she will take his burdens upon her and make his crooked ways straight.
When the complimenter is confronted, he will quickly disavow any scurrilous intent and with hurt feelings declare, ”I meant ”too much” to be a sign of my appreciation. I don’t see how you could misread my meaning. You must be paranoid.”
Well, yes. A certain amount of paranoia is essential in the oppressed or in any likely targets of oppressors. We must stay vigilant and be very careful of how we allow ourselves to be addressed.
We can too easily become what we are called with all the unwelcome responsibilities the titles makes us heir to."

"when your little girl
asks you if she’s pretty
your heart will drop like a wineglass
on the hardwood floor
part of you will want to say
of course you are, don’t ever question it
and the other part
the part that is clawing at
you
will want to grab her by her shoulders
look straight into the wells of
her eyes until they echo back to you
and say
you do not have to be if you don’t want to
it is not your job
both with feel right
one will feel better
she will only understand the first
when she wants to cut her hair off
or wear her brother’s clothes
you will feel the words in your
mouth like marbles
you do not have to be pretty if you don’t want to
it is not your job"

"The truth is—despite stereotypes that paint feminists as forever negative—doing feminist work requires boundless optimism. It means believing that people have the ability to be better, that culture can change, and maybe even that people who hate can learn to love. It’s exhausting. Sometimes reminding ourselves how hilariously stupid the opposition can be is a necessary break from the burden of idealism."

"[TW: rape]
First you’re taught to fear a phantom, a man in black, a man with a knife, a man who’ll pounce in dark alleys. Well-intentioned women—mothers, aunts, teachers—will train you to protect yourself: Don’t wear your hair in a ponytail; it’s easier to grab. Hold your keys in one hand; hold your pepper spray in the other. Avoid dark alleys. When you reach young adulthood, the lessons change. They acquire an undertone of disgust: Don’t drink so much. Don’t wear such short skirts. You’re sending mixed signals; you’re putting yourself at risk. If you follow the advice and it never happens—if you end up one of the three out of four—you can convince yourself that safety is a product of your own making, a reflection of inherent goodness. But if you’re paying attention, you realize something doesn’t add up. Because it keeps happening: to your sisters; to your friends; to little girls and grown women you’ll never meet, in places like Cleveland, Texas; Steubenville, Ohio; New Delhi. Good people, bad people, neutral. It keeps happening in TV shows and novels and movies—they open on the missing girl, the dead girl, the raped girl. If you’re paying attention, you begin to realize that it isn’t happening. It is being done. And you are not safe. You have never been safe. You were born with a bulls-eye on your back. All you have ever been is lucky."

"A lot of these dudes, when you challenge them, will say that they don’t have any real feelings about this and that they’re just trolling for the fun of it. They don’t really hate women, they just think it’s funny to… treat women as if they hate them. And… well, first of all, you’re lying to yourself, there’s clearly more to it than that. And, second of all, that doesn’t make it any better! Only somebody who hates women and sees them as less than human would even think that’s a meaningful distinction!"

"When faced with someone behaving outside of their gender role, we as a society are more likely to dismiss the individual as an outlier— “you’re acting like a girl” —rather than accept that our definition of ‘what a girl acts like’ is completely off in the first place."

"I chose to be a writer in girlhood because books rescued me. They were the places where I could bring the broken bits and pieces of myself and put them together again, the places where I could dream about alternative realities, possible futures. They let me know firsthand that if the mind was to be the site of resistance, only the imagination could make it so. To imagine, then, was a way to begin the process of transforming reality. All that we cannot imagine will never come into being."

"I’d like to raise both of my middle fingers to him and anyone who thinks profanity is somehow more harmful to our children than images of violence and misogyny."

"I wish men could understand we’re not here auditioning to be your girl."