Phyllis Chesler: Male

“Miracles of consciousness aside, I see no way for women to defeat or transfer patriarchy without achieving power. Unlike male groups, women have little power with which to either avoid or commit violence. Women traditionally are physically weak and politically powerless in a culture that values physical strength and its extended representation in the form of weaponry and money. Women, like men, must be capable of violence or self-defense before their refusal to use violence constitutes a free and moral choice, rather than "making the best of a bad bargain." Survival is the characteristic property of power.”

Phyllis Chesler

Women and Madness (2005), p. 341, and see Women and Madness (1972), p. 292 (similar text).
Women and Madness (1972, 2005)

Women , Men , Money , Way

“Should or can there be a single standard of behavior for both sexes? Is there such a thing as a biologically rooted female culture that should remain separate from male culture, partly because it is different than or superior to male culture?

Women must convert their love for and reliance on strength and skill in others to a love for all manner of strength and skill in themselves.”

Phyllis Chesler

Women and Madness (2005), p. 346, and see Women and Madness (1972), p. 298 (similar text).
Women and Madness (1972, 2005)

Love , Women , Sex , Behavior

“I am not saying that a female-dominated or Amazon society based on the oppression of men is any more "just" than is a male-dominated society based on the oppression of women. I am merely pointing out in what ways it is better for women.Perhaps someday a choice between forms of injustice will not be necessary.”

Phyllis Chesler

Women and Madness (2005), p. 338 (emphasis in original), and see Women and Madness (1972), pp. 287–288 (similar text).
Women and Madness (1972, 2005)

Women , Men , Way

“Amazon society, as mythology, history, and universal male nightmare, represents a culture in which women reign culturally supreme because of their gender. Amazon societies are also important because women were trained to be warriors—military and, presumably, in other ways as well. ...

In Amazon societies, women were mothers and their society's only warriors; mothers and their society's only hunters; mothers and their society's only political and religious leaders. No division of labor based on sex seems to have existed in such societies. Although Amazon leaders existed and queens were elected, the societies seem to have been … ones in which any woman could aspire to and achieve full human expression.

In Amazon society, only men, when they were allowed to remain, were, in widely differing degrees, powerless and oppressed.”

Phyllis Chesler

Women and Madness (2005), pp. 335–336 (emphases in original), and see Women and Madness (1972), pp. 284–285 (similar text).
Women and Madness (1972, 2005)

Women , Men , Sex , Way