bell hooks
73 quotes
Biography
"Once you do away with the idea of people as fixed, static entities, then you see that people can change, and there is hope."
"There is no life to be found in violence. Every act of violence brings us closer to death. Whether it's the mundane violence we do to our bodies by overeating toxic food or drink or the extreme violence of child abuse, domestic warfare, life-threatening poverty, addiction, or state terrorism."
"The greatest movement for social justice our country has ever known is the civil rights movement and it was totally rooted in a love ethic."
"When we face pain in relationships our first response is often to sever bonds rather than to maintain commitment."
"Living simply makes loving simple."
"Love is a combination of care, commitment, knowledge, responsibility, respect and trust."
"To return to love, to get the love we always wanted but never had, to have the love we want but are not prepared to give, we seek romantic relationships. We believe these relationships, more than any other, will rescue and redeem us. True love does have the power to redeem but only if we are ready for redemption. Love saves us only if we want to be saved."
"No black woman writer in this culture can write "too much". Indeed, no woman writer can write "too much"...No woman has ever written enough."
"Knowing how to be solitary is central to the art of loving. When we can be alone, we can be with others without using them as a means of escape."
"Individuals who want to believe that there is no fulfillment in love, that true love does not exist, cling to these assumptions because this despair is actually easier to face than the reality that love is a real fact of life but is absent from their lives."
"Contrary to what we may have been taught to think, unnecessary and unchosen suffering wounds us but need not scar us for life. It does mark us. What we allow the mark of our suffering to become is in our own hands."
"feminism is for everybody"
"Relationships are treated like Dixie cups. They are the same. They are disposable. If it does not work, drop it, throw it away, get another.Committed bonds (including marriage) cannot last when this is the prevailing logic. Most of us are unclear about what to do to protect and strengthen caring bonds when our self-centered needs are not being met."
"Giving generously in romantic relationships, and in all other bonds, means recognizing when the other person needs our attention. Attention is an important resource."
"There will be no mass-based feminist movement as long as feminist ideas are understood only by a well-educated few."
"I believe that it is impossible for two individuals not committed to their own and each other’s well being to sustain a healthy and enduring relationship."
"To be changed by ideas was pure pleasure. But to learn ideas that ran counter to values and beliefs learned at home was to place oneself at risk, to enter the danger zone. Home was the place where I was forced to conform to someone else’s image of who and what I should be. School was the place where I could forget that self and, through ideas, reinvent myself."
"When we only name the problem, when we state complaint without a constructive focus or resolution, we take hope away. In this way critique can become merely an expression of profound cynicism, which then works to sustain dominator culture."
"While it is positive for young black males and females to learn discipline and self-responsibility, those attitudes, values, and habits of being can be taught with pedagogical strategies that are liberatory, that do not rely on coercive control and punishment to reinforce positive behavior."
"The message received from the mass media is that knowledge makes love less compelling; that it is ignorance that gives love its erotic and transgressive edge."
"I have wanted them to have this simple definition to read again and again so they know: Feminism is a movement to end sexism, sexist exploitation, and oppression."
"Today’s fashion magazines may carry an article about the dangers of anorexia while bombarding its readers with images of emaciated young bodies representing the height of beauty and desirability."
"Creation spirituality replaced a patriarchal spirituality rooted in notions of fall and redemption."
"Open, honest, truth-telling individuals value privacy. We all need spaces where we can be alone with thoughts and feelings - where we can experience healthy psychological autonomy and can choose to share when we want to."
"Black women control the world. We are through being discriminated against."