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Warren Farrell Quotes
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Warren Thomas Farrell is an American educator, activist and author of seven books on men's and women's issues.

Farrell initially came to prominence in the 1970s as a supporter of second wave feminism; he served on the New York City Board of the National Organization for Women . Although today he is generally considered "the father of the men's movement", he advocates that "there should be neither a women's movement blaming men, nor a men's movement blaming women, but a gender liberation movement freeing both sexes from the rigid roles of the past toward more flexible roles for their future."His books cover history, law, sociology and politics ; couples' communication ; economic and career issues ; child psychology and child custody ; and teenage to adult psychology and socialization . All of his books are related to men's and women's studies, including his March 2018 publication The Boy Crisis. Wikipedia  

✵ 26. June 1943
Warren Farrell photo
Warren Farrell: 467 quotes15 likes

Warren Farrell Quotes

“Sometimes I have a feeling, when I look back on my life, that all I’ve been through has prepared me perfectly for just what I’m doing now.”

Warren Farrell

Source: Interview by Jonathan Robinson (1994), p. 163.

“Sitcoms routinely portray women hitting men, almost never portray men hitting women. When he fails to leave, it is not called “Battered Man Syndrome”; it is called comedy.”

Warren Farrell

Women Can't Hear What Men Don't Say (2000)

“Listening in response to criticism mandates a shift in our internal psyche that marks perhaps the most important single evolutionary shift humans can make.”

Warren Farrell

Source: Women Can't Hear What Men Don't Say (2000), p. 41.

“How can I call security a woman's primary fantasy if I am saying it is also her primary need? Because while her primary need is the security of a home and a family circle, her primary fantasy is that someone else will earn enough to pay for them. Hence the focus of 2 billion women on the latest royal wedding.”

Warren Farrell

Source: Why Men Are the Way They Are (1988), p. 16.

“Why did virtually every culture reward its men for enduring violence? So it would have a cadre of people available to protect it in war.”

Warren Farrell

Women Can't Hear What Men Don't Say (2000)

“If we have integrity about our desire to support men to express feelings, every institution and attitude between the sexes will require questioning and adjusting.”

Warren Farrell

Source: Women Can't Hear What Men Don't Say (2000), p. 18.

“What makes a teenage boy’s anxiety so overwhelming is that a teenage boy’s socialization is the demand to perform without the resources to perform. As a result, not only are his risks many, but his failures many. And so apparent… Second, the biggest winners—the football players—are receiving love via self-abuse. For some boys, receiving love via self-abuse creates anxiety. But losing love creates even more anxiety.”

Warren Farrell book The Myth of Male Power

Source: The Myth of Male Power (1993), Part II: The Glass Cellars of the disposable sex, p. 167.

“When I feel very loved, when I nurture and support people, my experience is deepened. I feel connected to a larger purpose and meaning.”

Warren Farrell

Source: Interview by Jonathan Robinson (1994), p. 71.

“Implicit in the Hollywood formula of mom-by-option and dad-by-default is mom never at fault…to a fault.”

Warren Farrell

Source: Father and Child Reunion (2001), p. 93.

“Ralph had lost real power by trying to gain the appearance of power. He was a leader. But he was following a program for leaders; therefore, he was a follower… he was, as he put it, a high-level mediocre.”

Warren Farrell

Source: Why Men Are the Way They Are (1988), p. 9.

“By starving our children of men, we have made them more vulnerable to the very abuse we are trying to prevent.”

Warren Farrell

page 97.
Father and Child Reunion (2001)

“After divorce, women’s biggest fear is economic deprivation; men’s biggest fear is emotional deprivation.”

Warren Farrell

Women Can't Hear What Men Don't Say (2000)

“Raising children was not designed for single parents. (Which is why divorce was such a taboo prior to birth control.)”

Warren Farrell

Source: Father and Child Reunion (2001), p. 187.

“[M]en who work to make it as computer whizzes or owners of black Porsches[…] are confused when they're told they are not vulnerable enough. We can't fall in love with men who appear invulnerable and expect vulnerability. Why did he want a black Porsche? Because he never saw an ugly woman get out of one.”

Warren Farrell

Source: Why Men Are the Way They Are (1988), p. 106.

“One danger of a man succeeding is that it teaches his wife and daughter not to worry about success.”

Warren Farrell

Source: Why Men Are the Way They Are (1988), p. 148.

“Contract killings never get recorded as a woman killing a man.”

Warren Farrell book The Myth of Male Power

Source: The Myth of Male Power (1993), Part III: Government as substitute husband, p. 281.

“When I lose my larger sense of supporting people to be their best, I lessen my contact with the God inside me.”

Warren Farrell

Source: Interview by Jonathan Robinson (1994), p. 101.

“For thousands of years women chose men based on their ability to provide. The more women increase their mastery of the workplace, the more they open themselves to partnership with a new type of man. It is my hope that Part One has begun a paradigm shift in the way we view men. As we saw women doing financially better than men in male-dominated professions, it hopefully offers a more generous view of the male attitude toward women in the workplace. As we contemplate making sacrifices to earn more, it is my hope we appreciate the sacrifices men have made to nurture the family by being their family's 'financial womb.”

Warren Farrell

Especially the sacrifices of 'working dads' and of dads' 'invisible juggling act'.
Source: Why Men Earn More (2005), p. 122.

“We are all gifted of the mouth, retarded of the ear.”

Warren Farrell

Source: Women Can't Hear What Men Don't Say (2000), p. 40.

“During the past thirty years, the women’s movement has supported women to express virtually every feeling women felt. To other women. To Men. To society. Women’s feelings became course curriculum, women’s studies, TV specials, talk shows, and Lifetime cable. Women’s feelings were called both education and entertainment. Men’s were repressed until they were called ulcers.”

Warren Farrell

Women Can't Hear What Men Don't Say (2000)

“Sexism is discounting the female experience of powerlessness; the new sexism is discounting the male experience of powerlessness.”

Warren Farrell

Source: Why Men Are the Way They Are (1988), p. 194.

“Women attempt suicide more often because they want to become the priority of those they love rather than always prioritizing them.”

Warren Farrell book The Myth of Male Power

Source: The Myth of Male Power (1993), Part II: The Glass Cellars of the disposable sex, p. 171.

“We would not think of allowing a man to determine a woman’s life merely because a fetus he helped create was in her womb; then why would we allow a woman to determine a man’s life merely because a fetus he helped create is in her womb?”

Warren Farrell

Source: Father and Child Reunion (2001), p. 137.

“As females enter the workplace, will our tendency to protect women create rules that will also protect men? Yes and no. Yes, when, for example, the new concern for doctors working fewer than eighty hours per week also affects men. No, when working-class jobs get divided into the males taking the hazardous jobs… and women taking safer jobs. And in professional careers, if males take irregular hours and specialties such as surgery, while females take regular hours and specialties like psychiatry, then we will only reinforce the female-protected class and the male-disposable class.”

Warren Farrell book The Myth of Male Power

Source: The Myth of Male Power (1993), Part II: The Glass Cellars of the disposable sex, p. 213.

“Is a man’s body at stake? Any time a man is asked to work to pay child support, he is using his body, his time, his life -- not for nine months, but for a minimum of 18 to 21 years. So the motto of the feminist with integrity is, “It’s a woman’s and man’s right to choose because it is a woman’s and man’s body at stake.””

Warren Farrell

Source: Father and Child Reunion (2001), p. 132.

“The legal bias for special protection for women has begun to wreak havoc with the Constitution's guarantee of equal protection.”

Warren Farrell book The Myth of Male Power

Source: The Myth of Male Power (1993), Part II: The Glass Cellars of the disposable sex, p. 238.

“Sexually, of course, the sexes aren’t equal. It is exactly a woman’s greater sexual power that often makes a man so fearful of being rejected by her that he buys himself drinks to reduce his fear. In essence, her sexual power often leads to him drinking; his sexual power rarely leads to her drinking. If anything is evidence of her power over him, it is his being expected to spend his money to buy her drinks without her reciprocating.”

Warren Farrell book The Myth of Male Power

Source: The Myth of Male Power (1993), Part III: Government as substitute husband, p. 320.

“The United States follows the pattern of men taking the financial risks even within a given field. Women physicians are three times as likely as men to work for the government or an HMO; men physicians are much more likely to be self-employed in a solo practice.”

Warren Farrell

Source: Why Men Earn More (2005), p. 108.

“In brief, sending a father-deprived child into the world and assuming everything is okay because the dad provides money is like sending a drunken driver onto the highway and assuming everything is okay because the gas is paid for. It doesn’t mean that the drunken driver will not get to his or her destination. It just means that the risks are enormous. And the consequences of failure are forever.”

Warren Farrell

Source: Father and Child Reunion (2001), p. 122.

“Men learn to call pain “glory”; women learn to call the police.”

Warren Farrell

Women Can't Hear What Men Don't Say (2000)

“People who get higher pay are more willing to relocate--especially to undesirable locations at the company's behest… A corporate secretary may change companies in the same town; a corporate executive is more likely to change towns with the same company. A talented corporate secretary sees an invitation to relocate as an invitation; a future corporate executive sees an invitation to relocate as an opportunity--and an obligation.”

Warren Farrell

Source: Why Men Earn More (2005), p. 93-94.

“Alan Alda is loved not because he's sensitive, but because he's successful and sensitive.”

Warren Farrell

Source: Why Men Are the Way They Are (1988), p. 134.

“Single women often fear that the men they are going out with wouldn't be comfortable with less career and more child. Perhaps. If a woman selects a man with a lot of career ambition, she'll get what she selected. The solution? Choose among men who would love to be married to a career woman who valued his being home full-time with the children for a few years. Can't find these men? State your interest on your Match. com profile--the Internet's the best net to catch the right fish. You'll be surprised.”

Warren Farrell

Source: Why Men Earn More (2005), p. 83-84.

“When mining… and other death professions are discussed in feminist publications, they are portrayed as examples of the male power system, as male-only clubs. However, when Ms. Magazine profiled female miners, the emphasis was on how the woman was ‘forced’ to take a job in the mines because it paid the best, and how taking such a job was the only way she could support her family.”

Warren Farrell book The Myth of Male Power

Source: The Myth of Male Power (1993), Part II: The Glass Cellars of the disposable sex, p. 116.

“Killing the criticizer, then, is part of our evolutionary past; listening in response to criticism is part of our evolutionary future.”

Warren Farrell

Source: Women Can't Hear What Men Don't Say (2000), p. 41.

“A single woman who supports herself is called a career woman, while a single man who supports himself is called a playboy…Ironically, a woman who commits and becomes financially dependent is considered more mature than a man who does not commit but is financially independent.”

Warren Farrell

Source: Why Men Are the Way They Are (1988), p. 154.

“If we penalize mothers for denial of “visitation time” we must also penalize fathers who don’t show up for “visitation time.” The issue is not fathers’ rights to visitation time, but both parents obligations to their children. The issue is how to make both parents real parents despite what parenting was never designed to deal with -- divorce.”

Warren Farrell

Source: Father and Child Reunion (2001), p. 187.

“Divorces led to bodies of men (called legislatures) protecting women collectively as other men (called husbands) failed to protect women individually.”

Warren Farrell book The Myth of Male Power

Source: The Myth of Male Power (1993), Part II: The Glass Cellars of the disposable sex, p. 238.

“The one-sided funding creates one-sided images that reinforce the press defining as progress an examination of only women’s issues. Thus, a quarter century’s-worth of studies showing domestic violence against men to be more than equal to domestic violence against women receive so little publicity as to barely make a dent on the public’s consciousness.”

Warren Farrell

Source: Father and Child Reunion (2001), p. 241.

“Laws are made with such attention to protecting women that, if a man's constitutional rights conflict with a woman's protection, his rights disintegrate before her protection disintegrates.”

Warren Farrell book The Myth of Male Power

Source: The Myth of Male Power (1993), Part II: The Glass Cellars of the disposable sex, p. 237.

“When women and men have approximately equal life expectancies, it seems to be because women die not only in childbirth (fewer than thought) but about equal from… diseases; poor sanitation and water; inadequate healthcare; and diseases of malnutrition. In industrialized societies, early deaths are caused more by diseases triggered by stress, which breaks down the immune system. It is since stress has become the key factor that men have died so much sooner than women.”

Warren Farrell book The Myth of Male Power

Source: The Myth of Male Power (1993), Part II: The Glass Cellars of the disposable sex, p. 182.

“If an employer had to pay a man one dollar for the same work a woman could do for 59 cents, why would anyone hire a man?”

Warren Farrell

Source: Why Men Earn More (2005), p. xix.

“In 1969, nationwide, female professors who had never been married and never published earned 145% of their counterpart male colleagues.”

Warren Farrell

Source: Why Men Earn More (2005), p. xxii.

“While we call role models 'leaders', most 'leaders' are really followers. Most 'leaders' follow their bribes. And we are the people who offer the bribes. We in essence give men two bribes to risk their lives: pay and praise… A man who self-selects for a death profession expects his body to be used in exchange for pay. The unspoken motto of the death professions is 'My body, not my choice.”

Warren Farrell

Source: Why Men Earn More (2005), p. 40.

“It is ironic that a movement that made its reputation championing the irrelevance of biological differences when those differences were to most women's disadvantage immediately returned to biological determinism when those differences were to the most women’s advantage.”

Warren Farrell

Source: Father and Child Reunion (2001), p. 136.

“Perhaps the best reason to consider the hard sciences is that, well, one study suggests science, engineering, medicine, and dentistry graduates live longer than arts graduates (or law grads). So whatever money you make you can keep a bit longer.”

Warren Farrell

Source: Why Men Earn More (2005), p. 18.

“A father’s traditional role prepared him to love his family by being away from the love of his family.”

Warren Farrell

Women Can't Hear What Men Don't Say (2000)

“The deeper purpose of a more positive attitude toward men is a better life for the children who are parented by the men who are their dads and stepdads; less shame for our sons who will become men; and, for our daughters, a deeper understanding of men's desire to please that leaves them feeling their willingness to please is not unrequited but returned--allowing our daughters to feel less lonely and more loved. If we earn more and love less, we pay for a home in which we do not live.”

Warren Farrell

Source: Why Men Earn More (2005), p. 123.

“There is little life where no one will listen. These are fathers, sons and families who are needlessly lost.”

Warren Farrell

Source: Father and Child Reunion (2001), p. 241.

“A man cannot tell whether a woman is in love with him or his security blanket until she is financially and psychologically independent enough to leave. Until a woman has learned how to leave, even she cannot be sure she has learned to love.”

Warren Farrell

Source: Why Men Are the Way They Are (1988), p. 182.