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161 " I'm a feminist. Mostly. I'm an asshole. Mostly. "
― Mikki Kendall , Hood Feminism: Notes from the Women That a Movement Forgot
162 " To be aware of what is happening in this world is to be in an almost perpetual state of rage. "
163 " What she needed was the food, the cash. What she didn't need was my assumptions. Or to have to feel grateful, or that there was something to be ashamed of in seeking help. And maybe if we could admit that most women are poor, that many are struggling to feed themselves and their children or their other family members, we could start addressing this issue that affects most women with all the power it requires. We could stop acting like food insecurity is a sin or a shame for any individual and treat it rightfully like an indictment of our society. "
164 " Often it is easier for the community to focus on the girls than on potential predators. "
165 " A better deal for white women could not be, would not be, the road to freedom for Black women. "
166 " But if we believe that only some people deserve safety, that the right to your own body has to be earned through adhering to arbitrary rules, then are we really seeing each other as equals? As human beings at all? "
167 " We have to shift the focus on anti-rape narratives away from what victims can do to prevent it and toward teaching people not to be predators in the first place. We have to stop ignoring the cultural messages we are complicit in transmitting that say some people deserve to be sexually assaulted. "
168 " I like not living up to the expectations of people who don’t like me. I enjoy knowing that my choices won’t be acceptable to everyone. "
169 " After all, cis women can and do oppress trans women, white women have the institutional and social power to oppress women of color, able-bodied women can oppress people with disabilities, and so on. Oppression of women isn’t just an external force; it happens between groups of women as well. While the oppressed can and do fight oppression, what happens when the people who are supposed to be your allies on one axis are your oppressors on another? "
170 " But when it comes to the inner city, suddenly the morality of poverty must be debated. "
171 " One of the biggest issues with mainstream feminist writing has been the way the idea of what constitutes a feminist issue is framed. We rarely talk about basic needs as a feminist issue. Food insecurity and access to quality education, safe neighborhoods, a living wage, and medical care are all feminist issues. "
172 " Children of color enter into prepubescent life with the painful awareness that no matter how many changes our bodies are going through, there’s nothing about puberty that can meet standards set by white-centric, unreasonable standards of beauty. Nor is there any part of adolescent development that can counter the anti-Blackness, the stereotypes, the hypersexualization, and other issues facing marginalized communities. "
173 " What I do have is a deep desire to move the conversation about solidarity and the feminist movement in a direction that recognizes that an intersectional approach to feminism is key to improving relationships between communities of women, so that some measure of true solidarity can happen. "
174 " I know we can come to a place wherewe embrace differences instead of pretending that freedom comes from erasingthem. "
175 " A one-size-fits-all approach to feminism is damaging, because it alienates the very people it is supposed to serve, without ever managing to support them. "
176 " America’s history has been defined by its violence, the question of how to respond to it largely answered by law enforcement obtaining bigger and better weapons to counter the ones held by criminals. We’ve taken war weapons to the streets and homes of civilians with no idea what harm these weapons can do, or that escalation is never a solution. "
177 " They need feminism to recognize that everything that affects women is a feminist issue, whether it be food insecurity or access to transit, schools, or a living wage. "
178 " Respectability narratives discourage us from addressing the needs of sex workers, incarcerated women, or anyone else who has had to face hard life choices. No woman has to be respectable to be valuable. "
179 " The sad reality is that while white women are an oppressed group, they still wield more power than any other group of women—including the power to oppress both men and women of color. "
180 " Gun-related deaths are now the second-leading cause of death for American children, who are fourteen times more likely to be killed with guns before age fifteen than children in other high-income countries. "