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1 " Feminism has fought no wars. It has killed no opponents. It has set up no concentration camps, starved no enemies, practiced no cruelties. Its battles have been for education, for the vote, for better working conditions, for safety in the streets, for child care, for social welfare, for rape crisis centres, women's refuges, reforms in the law. If someone says, 'Oh, I'm not a feminist', I ask, 'Why? What's your problem? "
― Dale Spender , Man Made Language
2 " Look what happened to John Stuart Mill when he openly and fully acknowledged the intellectual contribution made by Harriet Taylor to his work! At first he was not taken seriously, but when he continued to insist that Harriet Taylor's intellectual stature was comparable to his own, he was perceived as besotted, as swayed by the wiles of an unscrupulous woman, and his declaration was dismissed. "
― Dale Spender , The Writing or the Sex?, Or, Why You Don't Have to Read Women's Writing to Know It's No Good
3 " The assumption that women'sresources are available to men and that women's creativity is but the rawmaterial waiting to be wrought into artistic shape by gifted men is one whichis prevalent in literary circles—and one which demands serious and systematicattention. "
4 " It is my contention that the population in general and male literary critics in particular entertain a negative image of women and their words, to the extent that it is widely believed that you don't have to read women's writing to know it's no good! "
5 " But for women, the conflict between sex role and artistic commitment goes much deeper: The successful woman is-almost by definition-the one who sacrifices her self, her creativity and intellectuality, who puts them into personal (read "male") and not professional (read "competition") commitments. "
6 " So central, however, is reading to feminist reality that it is not unusual to find women acknowledging that a particular book "changed my life"; and so central is writing to feminist experience that it is not unusual to find a feminist defined as "a woman who writes". "
7 " Women who want to get rid of the belief that women writers are deficient might be better advised to challenge those who are doing the disqualifying, rather than to insist that they are not women, but human. "
8 " In a society where men dominate, where women are just another one of all the planet's resources which are available to them, it is predictable that women should be required to hand over their intellectual valuables and that these should go to replenish and enrich the reputations of men. How else could male supremacy be maintained? "
