Roxane Gay Quotes

A woman who cleaned their homes had such a naturally fine body while they stretched themselves taut with the finest surgeons in South Florida and didn't look half as good. It wasn't fair. Money was supposed to make things fair.

You don't necessarily have to do anything once you acknowledge your privilege. You don't have to apologize for it. You need to understand the extent of your privilege, the consequences of your privilege, and remain aware that people who are different from you move through and experience the world in ways you might never know anything about. They might endure situations you can never know anything about. You could, however, use that privilege for the greater good-to try to level the playing field for everyone, to work for social justice, to bring attention to how those without certain privileges are disenfranchised. We've ween what the hoarding of privilege has done, and the results are shameful.

The medical community is not particularly interested in taking the pain of women seriously.

"Anger is always reserved for someone else. And yet, I've been in a room with a woman who escaped a war, who lost her father in ethnic cleansing, whose mother burned her hair, whose cousin raped her. "What right do I have to be angry, when I'm alive? she said.

Anger is a privilege of the truly broken, and yet I've never met a woman who was broken enough that she allowed herself to be angry. An angry woman must answer for herself. The reasons for her anger must be picked over, examined, and debated. My anger must stand the scrutiny of the court of law, of evidentiary procedures. I must prove it comes from somewhere justified and not just because one time some man touched my sister. Or because one time some man touched some woman and will continue on and on.

It's okay if most of your friends are guys, but if you champion this as a commentary on the nature of female friendships, soul search a little.

When I was called a feminist, during those days, my first thought was, But I willingly give blow jobs. I had it in my head that I could not both be a feminist and be sexually open.

What I know and what I feel are two very different things.

Once upon a time, my life was a fairy tale and then I was stolen from everything I’ve ever loved. There was no happily ever after. After days of dying, I was dead.

My favorite definition of “feminist” is one offered by Su, an Australian woman who, when interviewed for Kathy Bail’s 1996 anthology DIY Feminism, said feminists are “just women who don’t want to be treated like shit.

To read narrowly and shallowly is to read from a place of ignorance.

Black woman are rarely allowed their femininity.

If I must share my story, I want to do so on my terms, without the attention that inevitably follows. I do not want pity or appreciation or advice. I am not brave or heroic. I am not strong. I am not special. I am one woman who has experienced something countless women have experienced. I am a victim who survived. It could have been worse, so much worse. That’s

People do terrible things all the time, but we don’t regularly disown our humanity. We disavow the terrible things.

He has told me, “I am only telling you what no one else will,” but of course, he is telling me what the world is always telling me, everywhere I go.

Feeling comfortable in my body isn't entirely about beauty standards. It is not entirely about ideals. It's about how I feel in my skin and bones, from one day to the next.