Dismissing the whole thing as the world’s aberration and not mine, I went back to bed. - Joanna Russ

much of our mass literature, television, and movies encourages violence against women even more subtly and pervasively than pornography...If pornography is bad because it tells lies about women, is it any worse-or even any different-from the rest of the culture? Patriarchal ideology and culture are nothing but lies about women. I think we often forget this simply because it's so absolutely pervasive in everything from clothing to the design of houses to the structure of cities (anti-children and anti-women).

I told him to open his eyes, that I didn’t want to kill him with his eyes shut, for God’s sake.

One thing I have tried to do when I write...was take the sex in my stories and simply make it part of the whole fabric. It’s not special, it’s not sacred, it’s not demonic, it just happens. It’s as much an ordinary part of life as heating your dinner up, or something, and I always worked very hard to get that over.