Quotessence
Home / Authors / Gloria Steinem
Gloria Steinem

Gloria Steinem Quotes

Journalist

Filter quotes by topic

AllMenIfsPeopleFeminismThinkingFeministWayHumansChildrenKnowsNeedsWantViolenceIdeasGroupsFeelsMayMeanSelfBelieve

Famous Gloria Steinem Quotes

“I no longer believe the conservative message that children are naturally selfish and destructive creatures who need civilizing by hierarchies or painful controls. On the contrary, I believe that hierarchy and painful controls create destructive people. And I no longer believe the liberal message that children are blank slates on which society can write anything. On the contrary, I believe a unique core self is born into every human being; the result of millennia of environment and heredity combined in an unpredictable way that could never happen before or again.”

PeopleWayNeedsWritingBelieveHumansChildrenSelfHappensI BelieveBornHuman BeingsResultsFamilyEnvironmentCreaturesMessagesUniqueConservativePainfulContrarySelfishCoreDestructiveBlankUnpredictableHierarchySlateHeredityBlank Slates
Author:Gloria Steinem
Create image

“For girls and women, storytelling has a double and triple importance. Because the stories of our lives have been marginalized and ignored by history, and often dismissed and treated as 'gossip' within our own cultures and families, female human beings are more likely to be discouraged from telling our stories and from listening to each other with seriousness.”

HumansHas BeensStoriesCultureGirlHuman BeingsHistoryOur LivesListeningFemaleImportanceTreatedStorytellingGossipIgnoredDiscouragedSeriousnessMarginalized
Author:Gloria Steinem
Create image

“If we were going to address what involves the biggest number of women, reproductive freedom is a fundamental human right - like freedom of speech, the most basic right. Freedom from violence, since women worldwide are still like 70% at least of all victims of violence. Equality in the family, democracy in the family, since the family is the microcosm of everything else, so if you have inequality and violence in the family, it normalizes it in the street, for foreign policy, for every place else.”

IfsHumansStillsNumbersDemocracyViolenceStreetsPolicySpeechVictimFundamentalsInequalityAddressesForeign PolicyFreedom Of SpeechMicrocosm
Author:Gloria Steinem
Create image

“Women well understood how to restrict birth through timing of sexual intercourse, herbs and abortifacients. I suspect the focus on men's control of women as the means of reproduction came later, in the last five percent or so of human history, with the idea of children as property and labor. One needed to have as many as possible, never mind about women's health or mobility or brainpower. Women's freedom was restricted in order to make sure of the paternity and ownership of children.”

MenMindHumansWellsMeanChildrenIdeasLastsOrderFiveFocusBirthNeededPercentUnderstoodLaborPropertySuspectsOwnershipTimingHuman HistoryIntercourseHerbsReproductionMobilityWomen's Health
Author:Gloria Steinem
Create image

“... we've allowed a youth-centered culture to leave us so estranged from our future selves that, when asked about the years beyondfifty, sixty, or seventy--all part of the average human life span providing we can escape hunger, violence, and other epidemics--many people can see only a blank screen, or one on which they project fear of disease and democracy.”

PeopleYearsHumansSelfCultureFearDemocracyViolenceYouthDiseaseProjectsHungerAverageScreensHuman LifeOur FutureProvidingSixtyBlankSeventiesEpidemicsLife SpanFuture Self
Book:Passion, Politics, and Everyday Activism: Collected Essays: Moving Beyond Words; Outrageous Acts and Everyday Rebellions; and Revolution from Within
Create image

“If you consider that the gender roles are just political, then what you come to see is that the full circle of human qualities is divided up so that two-thirds are masculine and one-third is feminine. Women are missing more of their human qualities, so you'll find us on the fore-front of trying to change this.”

IfsTryingHumansTwoPoliticalQualityRolesMissingFrontsThirdsGenderCirclesFeminineDividedMasculineGender RolesTrying To ChangeHuman QualitiesFull Circle
Author:Gloria Steinem
Create image

“Any insistence on equal pay is crucial and any redefinition of work to include caregiving work so that it also has an economic value, at least at replacement level, that's crucial. So change does come from the bottom up, and it will come from girls and women and men who understand that for us all to be human beings instead of being grouped by gender is good for them, too.”

MenHumansDoeValuesGirlHuman BeingsLevelsPayEconomicEqualMen And WomenBottomGenderCrucialReplacementsInsistenceEqual PayCaregivingEconomic Value
Author:Gloria Steinem
Create image

“No wonder male religious leaders so often say that humans were born in sin—because we were born to female creatures. Only by obeying the rules of the patriarchy can we be reborn through men. No wonder priests and ministers in skirts sprinkle imitation birth fluid over our heads, give us new names, and promise rebirth into everlasting life.”

MenGivingHumansNamesBornReligiousSinLeaderWonderBirthPromiseCreaturesFemaleMalesMinistersPriestsImitationPatriarchyEverlastingRebirthFluidSkirtsRebornObeyingReligious LeadersSprinklesEverlasting Life
Author:Gloria Steinem
Create image

“I didn’t hear words that were accurate, much less prideful. For example, I never once heard the word clitoris. It would be years before I learned that females possessed the only organ in the human body with no function than to feel pleasure. (If such an organ were unique to the male body, can you imagine how much we would hear about it—and what it would be used to justify?)”

IfsFeelsYearsHumansBodyWould BeUsedPleasureImagineHeardExampleUniqueFemaleFunctionMalesJustifyPossessedOrgansAccurateHuman Body
Author:Gloria Steinem
Create image

“The family is the basic cell of government: it is where we are trained to believe that we are human beings or that we are chattel, it is where we are trained to see the sex and race divisions and become callous to injustice even if it is done to ourselves, to accept as biological a full system of authoritarian government.”

IfsBelieveHumansDoneGovernmentPoliticalSexHuman BeingsRaceAcceptingFamilyInjusticeCellsDivisionCallousAuthoritarian Government
Author:Gloria Steinem
Create image

“It doesn't matter what word we use, if it has the same content, it will be treated in the same way. There are other words - there's "womanist," there's "mujerista," there's "women's liberationist" - all mean the same thing and they get the same ridicule. I think we just need to choose what word we feel comfortable with that says women are full human beings, and whatever that word is, it will get a lot of opposition. But it will also attract a lot of support. But this is a revolution, not a public relations movement.”

IfsThinkingWayNeedsFeelsHumansMeanMatterUseStrongHuman BeingsSupportMovementRevolutionComfortableRelationTreatedOppositionStrong WomenRidiculePublic Relations
Author:Gloria Steinem
Create image