Hypothetical Dystopia

The girl really worth having won’t wait for anybody.

—

 F. Scott Fitzgerald, This Side of Paradise

I lived by this quote for the past year, but I just realized that I don’t want anyone to have me. I don’t want to be a girl that someone has. I am not to be had. 

And though she be but little, she is fierce.

— Shakespeare

Whenever I have to choose between two evils, I always like to try the one I haven’t tried before.

— Mae West (via jaxynnlee)

Responsibility to yourself means refusing to let others do your thinking, talking, and naming for you; it means learning to respect and use your own brains and instincts, hence, grappling with hard work. It means that you do not treat your body as a commodity with which to purchase superficial intimacy or economic security; for our bodies and minds are inseparable in this life, and when we allow our bodies to be treated as objects, our minds are in mortal danger. It means insisting that those to whom you give your friendship and love are able to respect your mind.

— Adrienne Rich, Claiming an Education (via muchwillbedemanded)

This is a world where women, girls are constantly reminded that they don’t belong to themselves; that their bodies are not their own, nor their power or self determination. I made a promise to endow my little girl with the power to always know that her body, spirit and her mind are HER domain.

— Jada Pinkett Smith (via nezua)

(Source: coffeebrat)

Pain is important: how we evade it, how we succumb to it, how we deal with it, how we transcend it.

— Audre Lorde (via thechocolatebrigade)

Mother, loosen my tongue or adorn me with a lighter burden.

— Audre Lorde  (via thirdeyeblinking)

So here’s the real reason that rape jokes are troubled territory -

Because rape victims say so.

They get to say that. They get to feel that way. On this, they get to set the cultural rules.

It’s not about right or wrong, or logic versus emotion, or arguments of over sensitivity or hypocrisy - you have the free speech to make whatever jokes you want or talk about rape in whatever way you feel is illuminating. But they get to be upset about it. And call you on it. And be hurt by it.

But consider this:

You get to not be a rape victim.

They, however, are not afforded that luxury. Ever again.

— Chuck Wendig  (via thenewwomensmovement)

(Source: vickiexz)

You’re not supposed to be so blind with patriotism that you can’t face reality. Wrong is wrong, no matter who says it.

— Malcolm X (via complicated-at-best)

(Source: establishedin81)

You may shoot me with your words, you may cut me with your eyes, you may kill me with your hatefulness, but still, like air, I’ll rise.

— Maya Angelou (via womenorgnow)

[TW: rape]

What you say about rape — any rape, alleged or fictional or otherwise — matters. What you say, what I say, what journalists say, what your hairdresser says, what teachers say, what doctors say, what police say, what Julian Assange says, what your kid repeats at school: all of these utterances contribute to our cultural understanding of rape. And when what we hear time and time again is some version of apologism or some perpetuation of a rape myth like sluts can’t be raped or women always cry rape or nice men aren’t rapists then all we do is make the noise of rape culture louder and the voices of victims and survivors ever more silent.

You have a choice, when you speak about rape, any rape.

You can make victims and survivors hurt more. You can take justice further out of reach. You can encourage the disrespect and objectification of women. You can further silence marginalised victims, like children (and sex-workers and prisoners and trans* people for that matter) and make it ever harder for those who can face the greatest resistance to telling their stories, like male victims, or those raped by celebrities and ‘heroes’.

Or, you can not.

Think about it.

—

http://mymilkspilt.wordpress.com/2010/12/09/who-hears-you-when-you-speak-about-rape/

(via sarahgraham7)