Sexuality Quotes

In spite of hopes to the contrary, pornography and mass culture are working to collapse sexuality with rape, reinforcing the patterns of male dominance and female submission so that many young people believe this is simply the way sex it. This means that many of the rapists of the future will believe they are behaving within socially accepted norms.

~ Susan G. Cole

Womanism is feminism's vulgate. It asserts that women are the oppressed or the victims and never the collaborators in the 'bad' things that men do. It entails a double standard around sexuality where women's sexual self-expression is seen as necessary and even desirable, but men's is seen as dangerous or even disgusting. Womanism is by no means confined to a tiny, politically motivated bunch of man-hating feminists, but is a regular feature of mainstream culture.

~ Rosalind Coward

To me, 'sexual freedom' means freedom from having to have sex.

~ Lily Tomlin

Women will only be truly sexually liberated when we arrive at a place where we can see ourselves as having sexual value and agency irrespective of whether of not we are the objects of male desire.

~ Bell Hooks

It became a kind of passion. Discovering the key, unlocking the vagina's mouth, unlocking this voice, this wild song.

~ Eve Ensler

Because when you kiss your first boy or girl, you don't want to be so caught up in your lack of self-worth that you forget to enjoy the kiss, that you forget that you deserve the pleasure of that moment. You don't want to be so caught up in your lack of self-worth that you become an object of his or her desire, a grateful unworthy slave to his or her attention.

~ Jamie Le Fay

If vulgarity is a game that begins by excluding women, but ultimately excludes men from themselves, modesty is the game both can play. It begins as a woman’s game – one, interestingly, where she appears to lose, to be ‘missing out’ – but really she invites a man to relate to her in a way that is both uniquely human and ultimately more erotic. So modesty maysuperficially seem just to be a woman’s game because it is one she must begin, but in playing it she invites men to relate to her in a different way, a way that ultimately means that the men win, too, because they are no longer cut off from adult masculinity.

~ Wendy Shalit

Woman must not accept; she must challenge. She must not be awed by that which hasbeen built up around her; she must reverence that within her which struggles for expression. Hereyes must be less upon what is and more clearly upon what should be. She must listen only witha frankly questioning attitude to the dogmatized opinions of man-made society. When shechooses her new, free course of action, it must be in the light of her own opinion—of her ownintuition. Only so can she give play to the feminine spirit. Only thus can she free her mate fromthe bondage which he wrought for himself when he wrought hers. Only thus can she restore tohim that of which he robbed himself in restricting her. Only thus can she remake the world.The world is, indeed, hers to remake, it is hers to build and to recreate. Even as she haspermitted the suppression of her own feminine element and the consequent impoverishment ofindustry, art, letters, science, morals, religions and social intercourse, so it is hers to enrich allthese

~ Margret Sanger

Women aren't my competition because male attention and sexual objectification are not prizes for me.

~ Miya Yamanouchi

Girls and guys, don't let anyone tell you who and what you should be into.

~ Miya Yamanouchi

At every turn, girls - even the most carefully raised and deeply loved - are surrounded by a popular culture that exhorts them to think of themselves as sexually disposable creatures.

~ Caitlin Flanagan

I quickly found the dating/hookup app to be a dangerous addition to my iPhone. A friend recommended it after shit hit the fan with my boyfriend. With enough breakups under my belt, I knew that the healthiest remedy was a solid rebound fuck or two. Tinder made it easy- too easy. Suddenly, I could sit in traffic, on the toilet, or in line at the DMV and carelessly swipe, swipe, swipe my way to dick-on-delivery. Tinder selections are based on proximity via smart phones, so there are tons of tourists, travelers, and young professionals on business trips swiping through new hunting grounds. Its loose, easy-come-easy-go method made hookups as convenient as picking up lunch. Tinder’s nonchalance went both ways. We had nothing to lose.

~ Maggie Georgiana Young

For me, the times that I dressed provocatively had been empowering. It felt good. It's those times that I felt comfortable in my own skin. Like really, really comfortable. And let's face it, body self-esteem issues are a hurdle many women struggle to overcome.So when a person tears a woman down for how's she's dressed, they are tearing her down at a moment she feels at the top of her game. That's where the real shame is—not in how a woman is dressed, but in the desire to minimise her self-worth and empowerment. That's not kind, or well meaning. It's rude and cruel.

~ Annastacia Dickerson

Dear Men Everywhere,Please don't think that being a feminist means we hate you or don't need you. -We absolutely love you and couldn't live without you! ...We are just on a mission to be treated equally and with respect. No hard feelings. With love, Feminists of the World xoxoox P.S. Yes we do shave our legs!

~ Miya Yamanouchi

In a world where positive expressions of sexual longing connect us we will all be free to choose those sexual practices which affirm and nurture our growth. Those practices may range from choosing promiscuity or celibacy, from embracing one specific sexual identity and preference or choosing a roaming uncharted desire that is kindled only by interaction and engagement with specific individuals with whom we feel the spark of erotic recognition no matter their sex, race, class, or even their sexual preference. Radical feminist dialogues about sexuality must surface so that the movement towards sexual freedom can begin again.

~ Bell Hooks

The real core of the feminist vision, its revolutionary kernel if you will, has to do with the abolition of all sex roles - that is, an absolute transformation of human sexuality and the institutions derived from it. In this work, no part of the male sexual model can possibly apply. Equality within the framework of the male sexual model, however that model is reformed or modified, can only perpetuate the model itself and the injustice and bondage which are its intrinsic consequences. I suggest to you that transformation of the male sexual model under which we now all labor and love begins where there is a congruence, not a separation, a congruence of feeling and erotic interest; that it begins in what we do know about female sexuality as distinct from male - clitoral touch and sensitivity, multiple orgasms, erotic sensitivity all over the body (which needn't - and shouldn't - be localized or contained genitally), in tenderness, in self-respect and in absolute mutual respect. For men I suspect that this transformation begins in the place they most dread - that is, in a limp penis. I think that men will have to give up their precious erections and begin to make love as women do together. I am saying that men will have to renounce their phallocentric personalities, and the privileges and powers given to them at birth as a consequence of their anatomy, that they will have to excise everything in them that they now value as distinctively male. No reform, or matching of orgasms, will accomplish this.

~ Andrea Dworkin

Some writers have even argued that it may be possible to wean sex offenders away from their criminal activities through the use of pornography - with pornography acting as a substitute for sexual acts rather than a stimulant. This ties in with the argument that the pro-censorship lobby fails to distinguish between fantasy and reality, and to recognise that many people - including feminists! - can behave in perfectly decent, moral and non-abusive ways whilst enjoying `politically incorrect’ sexual fantasies. The assumption that fantasy leads to crimes of abuse is both highly contentious and inevitably seems to ‘criminalise’ sexual fantasy. Moreover, the argument that exposure to pornography causes men to act in a violent or abusive way towards women is surely undermined by even a casual look at human history and at the contemporary world.

~ Richard Dunphy

Walter Mignolo terms and articulates _critical cosmopolitanism, juxtaposing it with globalization, which is a process of the homogeneity of the planet from above––economically, politically and culturally. Although _globalization from below_ is to counter _globalization from above_ from the experience and perspective of those who suffer from the consequences of _globalization from above_, cosmopolitanism differs, according to Mignolo, form these two types of globalization. Mignolo defines globalization as 'a set of designs to manage the world,' and cosmopolitanism as 'a set of projects toward planetary conviviality

~ Namsoon Kang

Whenever one comes to the the table for interreligous dialogue, there is what I would call an _ecumenical taboo_ that one has to comply with. The ecumenical taboo_ does not exist in a written document, but people tend to practice it around the dialogue table. One should not raise, for instance, such questions as gender justice, sexual orientation issues, religious constructions of the other, multiple forms of violence in a religious community, or religious cooperation with neo/imperialism. each religion has its own _history of sin_ that has justified and perpetuated oppression and exclusion of certain groups of people through its own religious teaching, doctrine, and practice. In order to be _nice_ and _tolerant_ to one another, interreligious dialogue has not challenged the fundamental issues of injustice that a particular religion has practiced, justified, and perpetuated in various ways. I do not disregard that most ecumenists have based interreligious dialogue on a politics of tolerance, and this has played a significant role in easing the antagonism between religions, at least among the leaders of established religions. However, we should ground an authentic ecumenism and theology of religion in a _politics of affirmation and transformation, rather than a politics of tolerance_.

~ Namsoon Kang

Teaching and learning _religious plurality often ends up privileging religious _texts_ over _practice_ and largely ignoring the social and historical contexts and the lived experience of people who shape, situate, and structure these religious texts. Furthermore, adopting the politics of recognition as a pedagogical principle in teaching can lead to an _uncritical silence_ about the various forms of oppression and domination of certain religious groups. Here people often use _religious difference_ as a _religious alibi_ for the oppression or violation of human rights of certain groups of people, such as women or LGBT people.

~ Namsoon Kang

Cosmopolitanism seeks a _we_ that does not rely on the exclusion of _others_ but, instead, recognizes and confirms each other as part of the planetary _we_. The cosmopolitan _we_ is not grounded in a monolithic sameness but in a constant alterity and _ethical singularity_ of each individual human person regardless of one's national origin and belonging, religious affiliation, gender, race and ethnicity, class ability, or sexuality.

~ Namsoon Kang

A text by a minority writer is effective only if it succeeds in making the minority point of view universal. ('The Universal and the Particular') ... In claiming the lesbian point of view as universal, she overturns the concepts to which we are accustomed. For up to this point, minority writers had to add the universal to their points of view if they wished to attain the unquestioned universality of the dominant class. Gay men, for example, have always defined themselves as a minority and never questioned, despite their transgression, the dominant choice. This is why gay culture has always had a fairly wide audience. [From the Foreword Changing the Point of View by Louise Turcotte]

~ Monique Wittig

In our culture it is a woman's body which is considered important while it is a man's mind or his activities which are valued. A woman is sexy. A man is successful.

~ Alleen Pace Nilsen

The woman who refuses to see her sexual organs as mere wood chips, designed to make the man's life more comfortable, is in danger of becoming a lesbian--an active, phallic woman, an intellectual virago with a fire of her own .... The lesbian body is a particularly pernicious and depraved version of the female body in general; it is susceptible to auto-eroticism, clitoral pleasure and self-actualization.

~ Sigmund Freud

Health makes good propaganda.

~ Naomi Wolf

To ask women to become unnaturally thin is to ask them to relinquish their sexuality.

~ Naomi Wolf

Trying to take away someone’s language is usually the first step in trying to change them.

~ C. N. Lester

The basic religious idea in all patriarchal religions is the negation of the sexual needs. Only in very primitive religions were religiosity and sexuality identical. When social organization passed from matriarchy to patriarchy and class society, the unity of religious and sexual cult underwent a split; the religious cult became the antithesis of the sexual. With that, the cult of sexuality went out of existence. It was replaced by the brothel, pornography and backstairs-sexuality. It goes without saying that when sexual experiences ceased to be one with the religious cults, when, instead, they became antithetical to them, religious excitation assumed a new function: that of being a substitute for the lost sexual pleasure, now no longer affirmed by society. Only this contradiction inherent in religious excitation makes the strength and the tenacity of the religions understandable: the contradiction of its being at one and the same time antisexual and a substitute for sexuality.

~ Wilhelm Reich

When a stranger on the street makes a sexual comment, he is making a private assessment of me public. And though I’ve never been seriously worried that I would be attacked, it does make me feel unguarded, unprotected. Regardless of his motive, the stranger on the street makes an assumption based on my physique: He presumes I might be receptive to his unpoetic, unsolicited comments. (Would he allow a friend to say “Nice tits” to his mother? His sister? His daughter?) And although I should know better, I, too, equate my body with my soul and the result, at least sometimes, is a deep shame of both. Rape is a thousand times worse: The ultimate theft of self-control, it often leads to a breakdown in the victim’s sense of self-worth. Girls who are molested, for instance, often go on to engage in risky behavior—having intercourse at an early age, not using contraception, smoking, drinking, and doing drugs. This behavior, it seems to me, is at least in part because their self-perception as autonomous, worthy human beings in control of their environment has been taken from them.

~ Leora Tanenbaum

The abnegation of empathy in the case of something as complex and variable as sexual taste is a dangerous thing. The particular misfortune of the paedophile is not that he is a walking manifestation of evil but that his or her sexual development (as much subject to nature, nurture and questions of identity as any of ours) has resulted in a potentially very harmful and unacceptable attraction. We rightly call it a disorder because of these damaging effects, but merely reacting with horror will do little towards solving a complex and difficult issue stemming from a sexual drive as real and compulsive as any of us are used to.

~ Derren Brown

For a man, the optimal evolutionary strategy is to disseminate his genes as widely as possible, given his few minutes (or, alas, seconds) of investment in each encounter. It all makes simple evolutionary sense, since a woman invests a good deal of time and effort -a nine month long, risky, strenuous pregnancy, in each offspring. Naturally she has to be very discerning in her choice of sexual partners.

~ Abhijit Naskar

All men are troublesome but some are more troublesome than others.All women are troubles although, some are more of a trouble than others.

~ Prinx Maurice

Jealousy is the opposite of maintaining and growing in a relationship. Jealousy includes elements of fear, anger, suspicion, and control that have no place in a mature relationship.

~ Darrel Ray

Regardless the options you have, the most important thing is to choose consciously. Don't let ancient religious programming dictate your emotional and intellectual responses. You are a biological and social creature living in a biological and social world. Recognizing this gives you the power to make more rational decisions about how you want to enjoy the only life you have.

~ Darrel Ray

Religious persons are generally very interested in sex just like any normal person - and have an imagination and the energy for it. When constrained by the guilt cycle, however, they keep it under wraps. When guilt is temporarily removed, they can go to the other extreme. Many can remain in the uninhibited phase for weeks - months at most - then a wave of guilt overtakes them.

~ Darrel Ray

Treating depression often requires that a patient identifies and changes self-defeating thinking. Identifying religion as the problem is especially difficult, since people often retreat to religion to deal with their depression. In reality, however, while religion promises peace and fulfillment, it often creates more of what caused the depression in the first place.

~ Darrel Ray

Any relationship involves a power exchange. A free flow of power allows everybody involved to contribute and get their respective needs met. In a patriarchal religious marriage, power is hierarchical: men are dominant, and women are subservient, causing a serious disruption in the natural flow of power between the mates.

~ Darrel Ray

Normal people redirect their sexual energy all the time, but religion takes that skill and hijacks it. Religion says, No, you cannot do that, that is sinful. Direct energy toward god.Sexual desire does not disappear with increased religiosity and activity. Instead, it gets redirected but the thoughts and incoming stimulation continue.

~ Darrel Ray

[U]sing religion to treat depression often makes the problem worse. It's like treating the disease with more of the disease. It is effective in getting people to give time and money to the church, but it does not help the victim.

~ Darrel Ray

Taking guilt out of the equation allows a person to see how he is hurting himself and others and what he can do about it. Eliminating guilt about sex allows a person to talk about needs and desires more honestly and negotiate with possible partners. If a person feels shame about his desires, he is unlikely to talk about it with anyone. As long as the cycle of guilt persists, harmful behavior will likely continue.

~ Darrel Ray