Edmund White Quotes

Feminism was a dirty word for a while.

You could call me a 'card-carrying feminist,' if there were a card to carry.

Feminists don't like me, and I don't like them.

I have always been interested in gender politics, so I'm not that keen on doing things that don't represent a truth about women.

The so-called feminist writers were disgusted with me. I did my thing, and so I guess by feminist standards I'm a feminist. That suits me fine.

A lot of women are turned off by the physical appearance of some of the first feminists.

I don't know why it's still a taboo to be a feminist.

There are so many ridiculous arguments that MMA is somehow anti-woman.

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

For a woman emancipation means corruption.

The social degradation of women was a major objective of the feminist movement…. They tell women that in order to be equal they have to be just as promiscuous as men… The Constitution is a beautiful sex neutral document…. The whole idea of feminism is a fraud. As a matter of fact, it is worse than a fraud.

My life would have gone along perfectly well, politically speaking, if it hadn't been for girls.

We, all of us, are awakening to the reality that how men have behaved toward women for eons is not OK. The rules are changing invisibly underneath our feet. I am playing catch up. Maybe we all are.

Women who can, do. Those who can't become feminists.

People get really turned off by feminism.

Being a feminist means asking for equality. But people take it the other way at times. It is looked down upon is because it is seen as man-hating. But, feminism is a really crazy idea that suggests men and women are equal.

Feminist humor raises consciousness. And the reason it's funny is because it stands something on its head. Goodness knows you've got to have a sense of humor if you do feminism full-time, I tell you.

women used to be elected only when their husbands died and they became widows. The men found this was too hard on them. That's why they've become feminists.

All women are feminists, whether they know it or not.

As all advocates of feminist politics know most people do not understand sexism or if they do they think it is not a problem. Masses of people think that feminism is always and only about women seeking to be equal to men. And a huge majority of these folks think feminism is anti-male. Their misunderstanding of feminist politics reflects the reality that most folks learn about feminism from patriarchal mass media.

I am constantly surprised that the simple word 'feminism' raises more eyebrows and initiates more sad-faced head-shaking than any elaborate stream of invective I have ever leveled at either the I.R.S. or the D.M.V.

Let's admit that feminism came from liberalism and it was very positive. But then it went dark. It went into a bad place. When feminism replaced biology with social construct, they started to say that everything about a human being was created by your environment or by your - by environmental cues as opposed to innate traits... Like you didn't achieve what you could get because it was your fault. They denied traits that are applied across all cultures. And that's where feminism went wrong is it denied biology and makes them look foolish.

Women have two choices: Either she's a feminist or a masochist.

...feminism differs from reform of any kind, even franchise reform. Feminists, I should say, are not reformers at all, but ratherintellectual biologists and psychologists.

Thomas Jefferson once said, "Women shouldn't wrinkle their pretty little foreheads with politics." Now does that mean he was a sexist, or was he just expressing what most males, and maybe most females, felt at that time? Or are both true?