Helene Deutsch Quotes

I think I would have died if there hadn't been the women's movement.

Feminism, like Boston, is a state of mind. It is the state of mind of women who realize that their whole position in the social order is antiquated, as a woman cooking over an open fire with heavy iron pots would know that her entire housekeeping was out of date.

Every movement takes a century to make its mark. The women’s movement is only 40 some years old.

I'lI say this: I recall entering Congress in 1971 and being called a 'feminist' by members of my own party as if it was a dirty word. They didn't realize that I wore that label as a badge of honor.

I've been reading The Feminine Mystique by Betty Friedan, which is obviously very dated now but still relevant. It's so interesting to see how far we've come and how far we haven't come with all these myths that people put onto women.

The only thing the women were after was just the chance to help the world on. But some men were so dreadfully afraid of them that they refused to understand, and talked about 'shrieking sisterhoods' and 'disappointed spinsters' and rubbish of that sort.

We don't have a clear path forward, and that's been the case for feminism since the 18th century, when the idea of the rights of women actually began.

I was brought up with a very strong sense of what can happen if your society starts to chip away at the small victories women have won for themselves.

I don't think that the feminist movement has done much for the characters of women.

Our daughters were coming of age during a rising consciousness about gender equality. Throughout their school years - from kindergarten through graduate school, 1972 to 1992 - women were starting to take their places in areas traditionally reserved mostly for men.

I'm thankful for the work that feminists like Gloria Steinem have done. I am a feminist, but the geography for women today is vastly different than it was in the '60s.

Stewardesses were a joke to many of us coming of age in the liberated Sixties. They were no joke in the women's movement that liberated us, however.

It's a little bit late in the day for men to object that women are getting outside their proper sphere.

For a few thousand years, women had no history. Marriage was our calling, and meekness our virtue. Over the last century, in stuttering succession, we have gained a voice, a vote, a room, a playing field of our own. Decorously or defiantly, we now approach what surely qualifies as the final frontier.

I'm not a big fan of Women's Liberation, but maybe it will help women stand up for the respect they're due.

I think there has been a great deal of valuable revisionism in women's history.

The history of men's opposition to women's emancipation is more interesting perhaps than the story of that emancipation itself.

… this mad, wicked folly of women’s rights

I remember when the feminist movement started. I was in Edmonton. There was no feminist movement in Edmonton.

The very same people who 40 years ago were saying that feminism was unnatural and unnecessary are now saying “Well, it used to be necessary, but it’s not any more.”

You may hiss as much as you please, but women will get their rights anyway. You can’t stop us, neither

With each generation, women's ability to live the lives they choose reaches a place their grandmothers never thought possible. But that doesn't mean everything is perfect or that our work is finished.

Feminism doesn't have a particularly constructive image, although I think there was time when it was relevant.

We always had a lot of admiration for feminists who were out there trying to change things for the better for women, who were trying to find equality in the workplace and at home.

Women saying "I'm not a feminist" is my greatest pet peeve. Do you believe that women should be paid the same for doing the same jobs? Do you believe that women should be allowed to leave the house? Do you think that women and men both deserve equal rights? Great, then you're a feminist.