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Motherhood Quotes

Browse 1829 quotes about Motherhood.

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Motherhood Quotes

“Motherhood, to be sure, receives a great deal of sentimental adulation, but only if it is committed in accordance with rules which have been prescribed by a predominantly masculine society. Per se it is accorded no respect whatever. When it results from a sexual relationship which has been duly sanctioned by organized society, it is holy, no matter how much it may transgress the rules of decency, health, or common sense. Otherwise it is a sin meriting social ostracism for the mother and obloquy for the child - an ostracism and obloquy, significantly enough, in which the father does not share.”

IfsMayChildrenDoeHas BeensMatterEnoughMotherFatherSocialSinResultsDealsCommonShareHolyCommittedMotherhoodCommon SenseOrganizedSentimentalMasculineDecencyNo RespectAdulationOstracismSocial Ostracism
Author:Suzanne La Follette
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“The amazing thing about becoming a parent is that you will never again be your own first priority. The gift of motherhood is the selflessness that it introduces you to, and I think that's really freeing... I think it allows you to put yourself in other people's shoes...the empathy that it slugs you with, being a mother. And I think it makes you a better storyteller.”

PeopleThinkingFirstsMotherParentBecomingEmpathyShoesMotherhoodPrioritiesIntroducingSelflessnessStorytellerAmazing ThingsBeing A MotherSlugsBecoming A Parent
Author:Olivia Wilde
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“Honestly, on so many levels, I feel like motherhood has prepared me even better for directing than film school because all it is is troubleshooting and dealing with different personalities and emotions and trying to make everybody happy and at the end of the day reaching your own personal goals and agendas.”

FeelsTryingDifferentEndsSchoolFilmGoalLevelsEmotionPersonalityPreparedMotherhoodHonestlyReachingThe End Of The DayAgendasFilm SchoolAnd At The End Of The DayPersonal Goal
Author:Christine Swanson
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“Intensive mothering is the ultimate female Olympics: We are all in powerful competition with each other, in constant danger of being trumped by the mom down the street, or in the magazine we're reading. The competition isn't just over who's a good mother--it's over who's the best. We compete with each other; we compete with ourselves. The best mothers always put their kids' needs before their own, period.”

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Author:Susan J. Douglas
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“pacifists lead a lonely life. Not even gathering together can take the place of that vast, warm sun of approval that is shed on motherhood, on law-abiding, on killing, and on making money. Someday will we come into our own? Well, motherhood may move into the shade. Law-abiding is going through a trauma. But killing and making money are good for a long, long time.”

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Author:Josephine Winslow Johnson
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“Motherhood has most definitely changed me and my life. Its so crazy how drastic even the small details change - in such an amazing way. Even silly things, like the fact that all of my pictures on my cell phone used to be of me at photo shoots - conceited, I know! - but now every single picture on my phone is of Mason.”

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Author:Kourtney Kardashian
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“As a child my family's menu consisted of two choices: take it or leave it.”

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Author:Buddy Hackett
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“In much the same way, motherhood has become the essential female experience, valued above all others: giving life is where it's at. Give birth in cities where accommodation is precarious, schools have surrendered the fight and children are subject to the most vicious mental assault through advertising, TV, internet, fizzy drink manufacturers and so on. Without children you will never be fulfilled as a woman, but bringing up kids in decent conditions is almost impossible.”

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Author:Virginie Despentes
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“Motherhood goes back in history to a time when a father had no way of knowing his children. Fatherhood only became known when class patriarchal society had established itself and imposed monogamous marriage on women. Motherhood is like sun and rain and plants, a quality and product of nature which does not require laws or systems in order to exist.”

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Author:Nawal El Saadawi
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“A group of women who valued motherhood, but valued it on their own timetable, began to make a new claim, one that had never surfaced in the abortion debate before this, that abortion was a woman's right. Most significantly, they argued that this right to abortion was essential to their right to equality -- the right to be treated as individuals rather than as potential mothers.”

MotherIndividualGroupsEssentialsClaimsMotherhoodDebateTreatedAbortionTimetables
Book:Abortion and the Politics of Motherhood
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“... woman is frequently praised as the more "creative" sex. She does not need to make poems, it is argued; she has no drive to make poems, because she is privileged to make babies. A pregnancy is as fulfilling as, say, Yeats' Sailing to Byzantium.... To call a child a poem may be a pretty metaphor, but it is a slur on the labor of art.”

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Author:Cynthia Ozick
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“Motherhood is the second oldest profession in the world. It never questions age, height, religious preference, health, political affiliation, citizenship, morality, ethnic background, marital status, economic level, convenience, or previous experience.”

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Book:Motherhood: The Second Oldest Profession
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“It's [motherhood] the biggest on-the-job- training program in existence today.”

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Book:The Erma Bombeck Collection: If Life Is a Bowl of Cherries, What Am I Doing in the Pits?, Motherhood, and The Grass Is Always Greener Over the Septic Tank
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“The world is full of women blindsided by the unceasing demands of motherhood, still flabbergasted by how a job can be terrific andtorturous, involving and utterly tedious, all at the same time. The world is full of women made to feel strange because what everyone assumes comes naturally is so difficult to do--never mind to do well.”

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Author:Anna Quindlen
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“Wherever the State touches the personal life of the infant, the child, the youth, or the aged, helpless, defective in mind, body or moral nature, there the State enters "woman's peculiar sphere," her sphere of motherly succor and training, her sphere of sympathetic and self-sacrificing ministration to individual lives.”

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Author:Anna Garlin Spencer
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“With a generous endowment of motherhood provided by legislation, with all laws against voluntary motherhood and education in its methods repealed, with the feminist ideal of education accepted in home and school, and with all special barriers removed in every field of human activity, there is no reason why woman should not become almost a human thing. It will be time enough then to consider whether she has a soul.”

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Book:Crystal Eastman on women and revolution
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“For boys, the family was the place from which one sprang and to which one returned for comfort and support, but the field of action was the larger world of wilderness, adventure, industry, labor, and politics. For girls, the family was to be the world, their field of action the domestic circle. He was to express himself in his work and, through it and social action, was to help transform his environment; her individual growth and choices were restricted to lead her to express herself through love, wifehood, and motherhood--through the support and nurture of others, who would act for her.”

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Author:Gerda Lerner
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“Not rarely, and this is especially true of wives and mothers, the motive behind assuming a disproportionate share of work and responsibility is completely unselfish. We want to protect, to spare those of whom we are fond. We forget that, regardless of the motive, the results of such action are almost always destructive and unproductive.”

WantActionMotherForgetResultsBehindsResponsibilityWifeShareProtectAssumingMotherhoodMotiveDestructiveSparesUnselfishUnproductiveWives And Mothers
Author:Hortense Odlum
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