Charlotte Perkins Gilman Quotes

In the industry, I am judged by what I wear. If I want to be taken seriously, I have to hire a team of stylists. It's an occupational hazard. But it's not as though I am any less of a feminist.

All sorts of articles and letters appear in the papers about women. Profound questions are raised concerning them. Should they smoke? Should they work? Vote? Marry? Exist? Are not their skirts too short, or their sleeves? Have they a sense of humor, of honor, of direction? Are spinsters superfluous? But how seldom similar inquiries are propounded about men.

I'm fascinated by how much we, as women, have to subjugate and hide ourselves in order to get on in the world.

What works for a man, still does not work for a woman - both in terms of how they see themselves and how we see them.

They had always told me that I wrote like a man.

If you're female, and you want to express your femininity, you're actually demonized in the 'Free To Be... You And Me' generation.

Why can't a woman be more like a man?

When a woman behaves like a man why doesn't she behave like a nice man?

My mom always taught me to be sweet and polite and cross my legs because it's what the guys like. Actually, they like a raunchy girl once in a while.

Women in salsa - women everywhere - we always gotta be defending ourselves.

How can a woman be expected to be happy with a man who insists on treating her as if she were a perfectly normal human being.

When we get married or interviewed for a job or play professional sports or run for president of the United States, we encounter a whole set of standards and expectations. We can be shamed for an outfit that's too slutty, too dowdy, too pricey--take your pick. That's the burden women carry into the fitting room.

There was a time where I knew I was as funny as many dudes, but I had people telling me, 'You have to wear a dress onstage. You need to be more feminine.'

I used to be very interested in the history of women's rights in this country and in other countries. I tried to learn as much as I could about it, and more than anything, I would be called gay. It was phenomenal. But if a boy has something to say, he is appreciated; he's even popular. If a girl says something, it's instantly a threat.

I'm not an ardent feminist - well, maybe I am an ardent feminist. I just roll my eyes at the way women are constantly used and how sensitive men are about photographs of themselves.

You see what happens today. Women act like men and want to be treated like women.

It is not a dirty word, "feminism." I just think that women belong in the human population with the same rights as everybody else... The problem is, "A feminist looks like this, or is like that." We are taught not to like ourselves as women, we are taught what we're supposed to look like, what our measurements are supposed to be. I never hear what measurements men are supposed to be. Just women.

Leaning her silly, beautiful, drunken head on my shoulder, she said, "Oh, Esther, I don't want to be a feminist. I don't enjoy it. It's no fun." "I know," I said. "I don't either." People think you decide to be a "radical," for God's sake, like deciding to be a librarian or a ship's chandler. You "make up your mind," you "commit yourself" (sounds like a mental hospital, doesn't it?). I said Don't worry, we could be buried together and have engraved on our tombstone the awful truth, which some day somebody will understand: WE WUZ PUSHED.

As long as she thinks of a man, nobody objects to a woman thinking.

When a man says he likes a woman in a skirt, I tell him to try one.

I didn't want to be a boy, ever, but I was outraged that his height and intelligence were graces for him and gaucheries for me.

Why were the little girls all frightened To be just what they are The boys were told to ask themselves How high how far The girls were told to reach the shelves While the boys were reaching stars That's why little girls were frightened To be just what they are.

WOMAN, n. An animal usually living in the vicinity of Man, and having a rudimentary susceptibility to domestication.

The notion that somehow women are wildly different infuriates me.

Men are allowed to write songs about people and women are allowed to write songs about women.