Top 100 What Is Feminism Quotes
#1. I guess what I'm trying to say is that this book doesn't play by the feminist rules we've come to know and accept. But what is feminism if it isn't refusing to play by the rules?
Emily May
#2. What is feminism? Simply the belief that women should be as free as men, however nuts, dim, deluded, badly dressed, fat, receding, lazy and smug they might be. Are you a feminist? Hahaha. Of course you are.
Caitlin Moran
#3. What do you think Amy Poehler is doing right now?
Georgia Clark
#4. When we were only acquaintances, you let me be myself, but now you're always protecting me... I won't be protected. I will choose for myself what is ladylike and right. To shield me is an insult. Can't I be trusted to face the truth but I must get it second-hand through you? A woman's place!
E. M. Forster
#5. On a planet where for thousands of years, even today, a woman's worth has been judged exclusively by the productivity of her womb, what the hell is the point of a barren woman?
Elissa Stein And Susan Kim
#6. Does rejecting feminism mean rejecting women's equality? No, because that's not what feminism is about. Rejecting feminism means recognizing that women don't need feminism to make them equal to men because they already are equal--just not the same.
Suzanne Venker
#7. What feminism calls patriarchy is simply civilization , an abstract system designed by men but augmented and now co-owned by women.
Camille Paglia
#8. As feminism has changed academia by enlarging what is taught, academia has sometimes changed feminism.
Gloria Steinem
#10. At the end of the day, feminism is not about what choice you make, it's about having the ability to make a choice.
Jennifer Baumgardner
#11. When people ask me do I believe in feminism - well, I didn't even know I was a feminist. I was the top of the bill; I've always been the top of the bill. So I don't know what equality is.
Cilla Black
#12. The way to fight a woman is with your hat. Grab it and run.
The guy who said that was a wise man. He knew what most men don't - Women are powerful creatures who should be handled with care, or they can become very, very dangerous.
Christina Dodd
#13. You have to have your personal life, and at the end of the day I think what people forget, especially when you're online, is that you're a person too, right, and that you're not this ideal of feminism, that everything you do like feminism just like falls in your wake.
Jessica Valenti
#14. I am a feminist, but I'm not an extremist. I know what feminism is, but I'm not all women empowerment, marching in the streets. I'm not a die-hard girl's girl.
Scheana Marie
#15. I mean what else is there for a woman to do if she doesn't want to go from the parental to the marital home with nothing in between? 'An educated woman,'Millie amended. 'An educated woman,' Ursula agreed.
Kate Atkinson
#16. There is little difference between man and beast, but what ambition and glory makes.
Margaret Cavendish
#17. It is amazing what a woman can do if only she ignores what men tell her she can't.
Carol K. Carr
#18. Male experience is what patriarchal culture uses to represent human experience, even when it is women who most often live it.
Allan G. Johnson
#19. There is a simple explanation for why men haven't found women funny. It's because men only ever experience women in relation to men: they never get to see what women are like with one another. Shows like ours started to let men in on the joke.
Magda Szubanski
#20. One female who knows what to do
is better than a thousand males who don't.
Mihri Hatun
#21. A lot of men wonder what a woman wants. The answer is power. There are many ways to get it, but the easiest way is to tear other girls down. Any girl can play that game, but there's no way to win, except not to play at all.
Mara Wilson
#22. I am a feminist, and what that means to me is much the same as the meaning of the fact that I am Black; it means that I must undertake to love myself and to respect myself as though my very life depends upon self-love and self-respect.
June Jordan
#23. This is the real problem feminism faces. Too many people are willfully ignorant about what the word means and what the movement aims to achieve.
Roxane Gay
#24. Those who are so eager for women and girls to go back to the kitchen might think again about just what it is we might be up to in there. You can plan a lot of damage from a kitchen. It's also where the knives are kept.
Laurie Penny
#25. Our culture is getting better and better at encouraging women to speak, but it's not doing enough to listen to what they say when they do.
Lilit Marcus
#26. My spirit is willing to do what is right; and my flesh, I hope, is strong enough to accomplish the will of Heaven
Charlotte Bronte
#27. Why is this the "new feminism" and not what it looks like: the old objectification?
Ariel Levy
#28. Ladies, when you write a poem for Feminism because that is what we sometimes do, remember that it's never about them. It's only about you.
Danielle Valenilla
#29. You can tell whether some misogynistic societal pressure is being exerted on women by calmly enquiring, 'And are the men doing this, as well?' If they aren't, chances are you're dealing with what we strident feminists refer to as 'some total fucking bullshit'.
Caitlin Moran
#30. Pornography is to sex what McDonalds is to food. A plasticized, generic version of the real thing.
Gail Dines
#31. I've thought about what is an alternative word to feminism. There isn't one. It's a perfectly good word. And it can't be changed.
Annie Lennox
#32. So, what you're saying is, just because a warrior is a woman doesn't mean they yhave to wear a chain mail bikini? Like, they could wear...real armor?
Jeremy Whitley
#33. Before modern feminism, stories of female ambition were silenced or erased; even now, they are told with apology ("Yes, it's a great honor to be a Nobel Prize laureate, but really, what I love best is staying home and being a mother to Kevin and Annie").
Harriet Lerner
#34. I'm a huge supporter of women. What I'm not a supporter of liberalism. Feminism is what I oppose. Feminism has led women astray. I love the women's movement, especially walking behind it.
Rush Limbaugh
#35. A girl's got to use what she's given and I'm not going to make a guy drool the way a Britney video does. So I take it to extremes. I don't say I dress sexily on stage - what I do is so extreme. It's meant to make guys think: 'I don't know if this is sexy or just weird.
Lady Gaga
#36. I don't think anybody cares about unwed mothers unless they're black or poor. The question is not morality, the question is money. That's what we're upset about.
Toni Morrison
#38. People have accepted the media's idea of what feminism is, but that doesn't mean that it's right or true or real. Feminism is not monolithic. Within feminism, there is an array of opinions.
Judy Chicago
#39. Sadly, a lot of what passes for feminism these days is just moaning about men, congratulating ourselves on nothing in particular, and mocking them for being big kids while doing everything we can to keep them that way.
Julie Burchill
#40. WANTING to be anything is the whole point of feminism. HAVING TO BE SOMETHING is what feminists fight against, or at least the ones I know.
Alida Nugent
#41. Ah, Feminism in the nineties, what a What is yours what is mine field.
Dennis Miller
#42. Men define intelligence, men define usefulness, men tell us what is beautiful, men even tell us what is womanly
Sally Kempton
#43. What I've heard from younger women and women my age is that the albums changed their lives or it was the first time they had heard feminism that they could relate to. So that's great.
Kathleen Hanna
#44. It is a tragedy beyond the power of language to convey when what has been imposed on women by force becomes a standard of freedom for women: and all the women say it is so.
Andrea Dworkin
#45. Here is, very simply, what I learned about Jesus and the ladies: he loves us. He loves us. On our own terms. He treats us as equals to the men around him; he listens; he does not belittle; he honors us; he challenges us; he teaches us; he includes us..
Sarah Bessey
#46. Now the question we must ask is ... what kind of _practices_ [theology] motivates, what kind of _gaze_ onto others, the guest, the new arrivant, it offers us to carry with us; _not_ who my neighbors are _but_ to whom I am being a neighbor.
Namsoon Kang
#47. Your indignant behavior over the slightest perceived gender inequality makes it almost certain that inequality is what you masturbate to at night.
Kitty Thomas
#48. I myself have never been able to find out precisely what feminism is: I only know that people call me a feminist whenever I express sentiments that differentiate me from a doormat.
Rebecca West
#49. Meanings with no purpose are useful for meaningless debates on what the "meaner" meant. And that's what #politics is all about - misreading.
Will Advise
#50. No matter what men think, abortion is a fact of life. Women have always had them; they always have and they always will. Are they going to have good ones or bad ones? Will the good ones be reserved for the rich, while the poor women go to quacks?
Shirley Chisholm
#51. Feedback is an opinion, grounded in observations and experiences, which allows us to know what impression we make on others.
Sheryl Sandberg
#52. Mother, what is a Feminist?"
"A feminist, my daughter,
Is any woman now who cares
To think about her own affairs
As men don't think she oughter.
Alice Duer Miller
#53. The modern woman is the curse of the universe. A disaster, that's what. She thinks that before her arrival on the scene no woman ever did anything worthwhile before, no woman was ever liberated until her time, no woman really ever amounted to anything.
Adela Rogers St. Johns
#54. Many of my movies have strong female leads- brave, self-sufficient girls that don't think twice about fighting for what they believe with all their heart. They'll need a friend, or a supporter, but never a savior. Any woman is just as capable of being a hero as any man.
Hayao Miyazaki
#55. Too many people have a cramped idea of what feminism is, and all it does is marginalize women and discourage more of us from using that label. The
Luvvie Ajayi
#56. Feminism is the ability to choose what you want to do.
Nancy Reagan
#57. The ultra-right would have us believe that families are in trouble because of humanism, feminism, secular education, or sexual liberation, but the consensus of Americans is that what tears families apart is unemployment, inflation, and financial worries.
Letty Cottin Pogrebin
#58. I think transwomen, and transpeople in general, show everyone that you can define what it means to be a man or woman on your own terms. A lot of what feminism is about is moving outside of roles and moving outside of expectations of who and what you're supposed to be to live a more authentic life.
Laverne Cox
#59. He say, Celie, tell me the truth. You don't like me cause I'm a man?
I blow my nose. take off they pants, I say, and men look like frogs to me. No matter how you kiss 'em, as far as I'm concern, frogs is what they stay.
Alice Walker
#60. Men need to understand, and women too, what feminism is really about.
Annie Lennox
#61. Feminism is what I do with my life, it's how I spend my days, it's my job, it's not just an opinion I have among many other opinions.
Jaclyn Friedman
#62. While falling in love is fun, it's not everything, and it's not the antidote to an unfulfilled life, despite what Reese Witherspoon movies may tell you.
Jessica Valenti
#63. The actual handbag is neither here nor there
it's what you keep in it that's the most important thing.
Caitlin Moran
#64. Men tend to treat women as fragile creatures, but our bodies were built to withstand pain and hard work, think with profound insight. We were created to do what men can't. And if that isn't reason enough for us to be treated equal, I'm not sure what is.
Caroline George
#65. I really don't care what people say. It's amazing that feminism continues to exist at all, considering how much counter-feminism is out there.
Nellie McKay
#66. I'm a progressive. What I find is that a subsection within the left that instead of standing for consistency in progressive values, so feminism as applied to mainstream society, as well as within minority communities, gay rights to mainstream society as well as within minority communities.
Maajid Nawaz
#67. Consciousness-raising is at the very least supposed to bring about an intimacy, but what it seems instead to bring about are the trappings of intimacy, the illusion of intimacy, a semblance of intimacy.
Nora Ephron
#68. To cherish my purity and set boundaries are, in my opinion, the highest forms of feminism - a woman who saves her body proves she is strong and secure enough to resist the men who seek to claim her, that she's more than what lies between her legs.
Caroline George
#69. You might be thinking who is this Harry Potter girl? And what is she doing up on stage at the UN. It's a good question and trust me I have been asking myself the same thing. I don't know if I am qualified to be here. All I know is that I care about this problem. And I want to make it better.
Emma Watson
#70. It's difficult to see the glass ceiling because it's made of glass. Virtually invisible. What we need is for more birds to fly above it and shit all over it, so we can see it properly.
Caitlin Moran
#71. Feminism is something you do. It's a verb. It's what you are. It's an activity; it's something you're actively engaged in.
Kathleen Hanna
#72. Recently we've been hearing a lot about women "having it all." Myself, I think that is not really an accurate description of female lives today. It seems to me that what we have been up to is DOING it all.
Sylvia Ann Hewlett
#73. Women need to do more. We need to find out what it is we're afraid of, and go beyond.
Colette Dowling
#74. I've thought often about why - why?! - anyone, especially other women, would try to disrupt feminist work that combats violence. What in the world could be the point of that? The only reason I've come up with, and I think it makes sense, is fear of becoming that "impure" woman.
Jessica Valenti
#75. Girls get Screwed. Not that kind of screwed, what I mean is, they're always on the short end of things. The way things work, how guys feel great, but make girls feel cheap for doing exactly what they beg for
Ellen Hopkins
#76. It was feminism that made it possible for women to go to the Ivy League and women to be astronauts and women to have their own TV shows. What happened, though, was that the generation after feminism, which is my generation, misunderstood what feminism was saying.
Debora Spar
#77. Although the reason for the existence of women is obvious enough, nobody has any real idea what point there is in being a man. Men have however, made many attempts to justify their existence.
Steve Jones
#78. People associate feminism with hate - with man hate - and that's really negative. I don't think that's what feminism is about at all - it's really positive. I think that's why women became reluctant to use the word.
Emma Watson
#79. I'm not sure how we got to this place, where a girl's only value is in what kind of marriage she has, how capable she is of keeping a man happy.
Amy Engel
#80. We fought very hard for feminism, for women's rights. What I'm seeing today is a very opposite thing. I don't know why, but I see women being put back in the place. And I hate it. We're losing all we worked so hard for and it really bums me out.
Stevie Nicks
#81. Twerking is not feminism. Thats what I'm referring to. It's not - it's not liberating, it's not empowering. It's a sexual thing that you're doing on a stage; it doesn't empower you. That's my feeling about it.
Annie Lennox
#82. A self-made man - not of woman born but alchemized, through sheer force of will, by the man himself. This is what I want to be. I want to be a self-made woman. I want to conjure myself out of every sparkling, fast moving thing I can see. I want to be the creator of myself. I'm going to begat myself
Caitlin Moran
#83. What would one do if one were forced to choose between saving an innocent child's life or engaging in unchaste behavior? This is, after all, the choice that some unfortunate women are put to - sell their bodies, or see their children starve.
Courtney Milan
#84. Some of the biggest advocates for feminism seem to believe that in order to feel powerful you have to make another woman subservient, and that is not what feminism is about at all.
Tori Amos
#85. When girls see women in leadership roles speaking out for what they believe in, they see it is possible for them, too. Instead of a faraway dream, their aspirations become real, concrete and achievable. Womanhood starts to look more inviting.
Tabby Biddle
#86. A girl is nothing to herself; only to her husband can she become something. What can she become? I asked. Why, she said, the mother of his children. But I am not the mother of anybody's children, I said, and I am something.
Alice Walker
#87. Feminism is to sexism what black nationalism is to racism; the most rational response to the problem.
Pearl Cleage
#88. Feminism is liberalism, and look at what it's doing, look at what it's promoting, look at what it's condoning. All the while, we have to live in this lie that there's some sort of Republican War on Women. We don't do this to women! We don't objectify women like this.
Rush Limbaugh
#89. What I am proud of, what seems so simply clear, is that feminism is a way to fight for justice, always in short supply.
Barbara Strickland
#90. Feminism is not dead, by no means. It has evolved. If you don't like the term, change it, for Goddess' sake. Call it Aphrodite, or Venus, or bimbo, or whatever you want; the name doesn't matter, as long as we understand what it is about, and we support it.
Isabel Allende
#91. She wagged a finger at him. "You're mispronouncing that word."
"Your pardon?" He groped, trying to remember what he'd said. "Suffragette? How does one pronounce it, then?"
"Suffragette," she said, "is pronounced with an exclamation point at the end. Like this: 'Huzzah! Suffragettes!
Courtney Milan
#92. My recipe for life is not being afraid of myself, afraid of what I think or of my opinions.
Eartha Kitt
#93. People expect girls from good middle-class families to be smart
but what they mean by smart for a girl is to have nice handwriting and a neat locker and to do her homework on time. They don't expect ideas or much in the way of real thought.
Adelle Waldman
#94. Your true passion in life is what you'd be doing if somebody handed you 100 million dollars.
Maggie Young
#95. I should never be able to fulfill what is,I understand, the first duty of a lecturer-to hand you after an hour's discourse a nugget of pure truth to wrap up between the pages of your notebooks and keep on the mantelpiece forever.
Virginia Woolf
#96. When a woman walks into a room, her outfit is the first thing she says, before she even opens her mouth. Women are judged on what they wear in a way men would find incomprehensible.
Caitlin Moran
#97. What feminism means for me is simply that women, like men, are complete human beings with limitless possibilities.
Fahmida Riaz
#98. I think that there have been a lot of fear-based assertions that feminism is about aggression, and that is incorrect and untrue. Feminism is about equality; that's what it's about.
Jenny Slate
#100. What Rob Brezsny does with words is grammarye, the Old English term for magic. With his strange brew of macho feminism and poetic rationalism, Brezsny weaves a yarn crazy enough to be true and real enough to subvert the literalist virus of cynicism now immobilizing the collective mindscape.
Antero Alli
