“To blame feminism for women's “lesser life” is to miss entirely the point of feminism, which is to win women a wider range of experience. Feminism remains a pretty simple concept, despite repeated — and enormously effective efforts to dress it up in greasepaint and turn its proponents into gargoyles. As Rebecca West wrote sardonically in 1913, “I myself have never been able to find out precisely what feminism is: l only know that people call me a feminist whenever I express sentiments that differentiate me from a doormat."”

Backlash (1992)

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "To blame feminism for women's “lesser life” is to miss entirely the point of feminism, which is to win women a wider ra…" by Susan Faludi?
Susan Faludi photo
Susan Faludi 8
American feminist 1959

Related quotes

Rebecca West photo

“I myself have never been able to find out what feminism is; I only know that people call me a feminist whenever I express sentiments that differentiate me from a doormat or a prostitute.”

Rebecca West (1892–1983) British feminist and author

"Mr. Chesterton in Hysterics," in The Clarion, (14 November 1913), re-published in The Young Rebecca: Writings of Rebecca West, 1911-17 (1982), p. 219.
Variant: I myself have never been able to find out what feminism is; I only know that people call me a feminist whenever I express sentiments that differentiate me from a doormat or a prostitute.
Source: Young Rebecca: Writings, 1911-1917

Andrea Dworkin photo

“Feminism is hated because women are hated. Anti-feminism is a direct expression of misogyny; it is the political defense of women hating.”

Andrea Dworkin (1946–2005) Feminist writer

Context: Anti-feminism is also operating whenever any political group is ready to sacrifice one group of women, one faction, some women, some kinds of women, to any element of sex-class oppression: to pornography, to rape, to battery, to economic exploitation, to reproductive exploitation, to prostitution. There are women all along the male-defined political spectrum, including both extreme ends of it, ready to sacrifice some women, usually not themselves, to the brothels or the farms. The sacrifice is profoundly anti-feminist; it is also profoundly immoral...

"Anti-feminism," Right Wing Women (1983), pp. 230-231.

Emma Watson photo

“It just always reveals to me how many misconceptions and what a misunderstanding there is about what feminism is. Feminism is about giving women choice. Feminism is not a stick with which to beat other women with. It’s about freedom, it’s about liberation, it’s about equality. I really don’t know what my tits have to do with it. It’s very confusing.”

Emma Watson (1990) British actress and model

"Actress Emma Watson says revealing photo does not undermine feminism" http://www.reuters.com/article/us-people-emmawatson-idUSKBN16C0QV, Reuters, in response to critics of her photos in Vogue magazine (March 5, 2017)

Margaret Thatcher photo

“The feminists hate me, don't they? And I don’t blame them. For I hate feminism. It is poison.”

Margaret Thatcher (1925–2013) British stateswoman and politician

As quoted by Paul Johnson in Failure of the Feminists http://www.spectator.co.uk/features/6766663/failure-of-the-feminists/, The Spectator, 12 March, 2011.
Attributed

Emma Watson photo

“It just always reveals to me how many misconceptions and what a misunderstanding there is about what feminism is. Feminism is about demonizing. Feminism is a stick with which to beat other women with. It’s about oppression, it’s about hatred, it’s about harming men. I really don’t know what my tits have to do with it. It’s very confusing.”

Emma Watson (1990) British actress and model

"Actress Emma Watson says revealing photo does not undermine feminism" http://www.reuters.com/article/us-people-emmawatson-idUSKBN16C0QV, Reuters, in response to critics of her photos in Vogue magazine (March 5, 2017)

Courtney Love photo
Bell Hooks photo
Camille Paglia photo

“Feminism was always wrong to pretend that women could “have it all.””

Camille Paglia (1947) American writer

It is not male society but mother nature who lays the heaviest burden on woman. No husband or day care can adequately substitute for a mother’s attention. My feminist heroes are the boldly independent and childless Amelia Earhart and Katherine Hepburn, who has been outspoken in her opposition to the delusion of “having it all.”
Source: Sex, Art and American Culture : New Essays (1992), p. 89

Related topics