1,066 Quotes by Gloria Steinem

We need to unlearn our respect for education, since it has undermined our respect for ourselves. It's worth taking time to demistify it. [...] All the things an adolescent can be [...] are reduced to a three digit number. [...] We too can decide how to value our education instead of letting them value us.

Citizens who refuse to obey anything but their own conscience can transform countries, it is the basis of any real democracy.

Never having seen women play chess, they assumed this game wasn't for them and without even a female teacher as role model, they dropped out.

As always, self-esteem had created an ability to be generous.

I've noticed that great political leaders are energized by conflict. I'm energized by listening to people's stories and trying to figure out shared solutions. That's the work of an organizer.

I think that we have successfully said that rape is not sex, it’s violence. But what we have not successfully said is that pornography is not erotica. Porne means female slaves. Eros has an idea of love and mutual pleasure and free choice. I fear that pornography is taking over sex when in fact it’s way more about domination.

For women, the only alternative to being a feminist is being a masochist.

Our grief is not a cry for war."That's how New Yorkers feel," the driver said. "They know what bombing looks like, and they know the hell it is. But outside New York, people will feel guilty because they weren't here. They'll be yelling for revenge out of guilt and ignorance. Sure, we all want to catch the criminals, but only people who weren't in New York will want to bomb another country and repeat what happened here.

Laughter is the only free emotion - the only one that can't be compelled. We can be made to fear. We can even be made to believe we're in love because, if we're kept dependent and isolated for long enough, we bond in order to survive. But laughter explodes like an aha! It comes when the punch line changes everything that has gone before, when two opposites collide and make a third and when we suddenly see a new reality...laughter is an orgasm of the mind.