Quotes About Empowerment

In the words of so many daughters who don't yet know that a female fate is not a personal fault, I told myself: I'm not going to be anything like my mother.

At first, feminists were assumed to be only discontented suburban housewives; then a small bunch of women's "libbers", bra burners, and radicals; then women on welfare; then briefcase carrying imitations of male executives; then unfulfilled women who forgot to have children; then women voters...that really could decide elections. That last was too dangerous, so suddenly we were told we were in a "postfeminist" age...

I began to understand that self-esteem isn't everything; it's just that there's nothing without it.

if girls were raised a little more like boys—if they had more right to say no, to declare boundaries, to develop a strong personal identity, to be angry, to rebel—they would be less likely to be revictimized as adults.

Laughter is a rescue.

I don't think feminism can just be imitative or integrationist. By definition, it must transform. But in the short run, there are goals we agree on. And it's in the short run that we must act.

The best thing about self-defense is knowing there is a self

Perhaps because women are seen as good listeners, I find that a traveling woman - perhaps especially a traveling feminist - becomes a kind of celestial bartender.

Pound for pound, she was stronger than Arnold Schwarzenegger.

In retrospect, the second cause for delay makes less feminist sense: the long popularity of assertiveness training. Though most women needed to be more assertive (or even more aggressive, though that word was considered too controversial), many assertiveness courses taught women how to play the existing game, not how to change the rules.

In the words of so many daughters who don't yet know that a female fate is not a personal fault

safety. As Elizabeth Cady Stanton wrote, "When the slave leaves bondage, his first act is to name himself.

I'm beginning to realize the pleasure of being a nothing-to-lose, take-no-shit older woman.

Everytime a woman looks in a mirror and criticizes her body, a girl is watching.

Whatever you've imagined your limits of strength and daring to be, the strongest woman in the world can inspire you to go beyond them. That's what champions are for.

It was a constitutional convention for the female half of the country. After all, we had been excluded from the first one.

If I had one piece of advice to give to young girls, I would say, "Don't listen to my advice. Listen to the voice inside." It's not important that they know who I am, it's important that they know who they are.

It seems more hopeful to talk about what came before patriarchy--and could show us a way beyond it.

Every woman knows there is a big difference between help that is designed to keep you dependent, and help that is designed to make you independent.

Whether by dowry murders in India, honor killings in Egypt, or domestic violence in the United States, records show that women are most likely to be beaten or killed at home and by men they know. Statistically speaking, home is an even more dangerous place for woman than the road. Perhaps the most revolutionary act for a woman will be a self willed journey-and to be welcomed when she comes home.

Women can't have it all if that means doing it all.

The idea that women are "our own worst enemies" forces us to admit that we don't have the power to be, even if we wanted to. When

Marilyn supplied sex so that she would be allowed to work, but not so that she wouldn't have to work.

Now when I'm asked with condescension why I don't drive, I just say: Beacause adventure starts the moment I leave my door.