Gender Discrimination Quotes

Tears don't make you a girl, but they sure make you human. ~ Mansi Tejpal

Issues such as gender discrimination, racism, and national chauvinism must be recast not only as cultural and social regressions but as evidence of the ills produced by hierarchy. A growing public awareness must be fostered in order to recognize that oppression includes not only exploitation but also domination, and that it is based not only on economic causes but on cultural particularisms that divide people according to sexual, ethnic, and similar traits. ~ Murray Bookchin

A womanly occupation means, practically, an occupation that a man disdains. ~ George Gissing

( ... ) once a woman achieves success, particularly in a gender-biased context, her capacity to see gender discrimination is reduced. ~ Sheryl Sandberg

On the most recent battles on health insurance reform, the women led the battle to end gender discrimination by the insurance companies [where] women paid more and got less of a benefit, and also the whole issue of prevention. ~ Barbara Mikulski

Defining freedom cannot amount to simply substituting it with inclusion. Countering the criminalization of Black girls requires fundamentally altering the relationship between Black girls and the institutions of power that have worked to reinforce their subjugation. History has taught us that civil rights are but one component of a larger movement for this type of social transformation. Civil rights may be at the core of equal justice movements, and they may elevate an equity agenda that protects our children from racial and gender discrimination, but they do not have the capacity to fully redistribute power and eradicate racial inequity. There is only one practice that can do that. Love. ~ Monique Morris

The enormous difference between fighting gender discrimination as opposed to race discrimination is good people immediately perceive race discrimination as evil and intolerable. But when I talked about sex-based discrimination, I got the response, 'What are you talking about? Women are treated ever so much better than men! ~ Ruth Bader Ginsburg

To Learn is to create. Learning- whether it is programming, mathematics, art, music, poetry, biology, or chemistry- is all about breaking down walls and freeing the one thing that kept us alive: knowledge.

Knowledge expands freedom in all its forms. Knowledge breaks down walls. It liberates the oppressed. We are committed to knowledge. Knowledge as a hammer against classism, against sexism, against racism, against gender discrimination, against slavery, against bigotry, against war, against hatred. If there is darkness in the world, we will light it up. ~ Leopoldo Gout

The implication of the sex ratios, Professor Sen found, is that about 107 million females are missing from the globe today. Follow-up studies have calculated the number slightly differently, deriving alternative figures for 'missing women' of between 60 million and 101 million. Every year, at least another 2 million girls worldwide disappear because of gender discrimination. ~ Nicholas D. Kristof

I have always firmly believed that every director should be judged solely by their work, and not by their work based on their gender. Hollywood is supposedly a community of forward-thinking and progressive people, yet this horrific situation for women directors persists. Gender discrimination stigmatizes our entire industry. Change is essential. Gender neutral hiring is essential. ~ Kathryn Bigelow

It is my vision that we all will dedicate the next decade to achieve universal literacy and education for all children, especially for girls. More than 145 million of the world's children are deprived of education due to poverty, exploitation, slavery, gender discrimination, religious extremism, and corrupt governments. May Three Cups of Tea be a catalyst to bring the gift of literacy to each of those children who deserves a chance to go to school. ~ Greg Mortenson

It is "humanism" that should run in the veins of the thinking humanity, not a certain gender-oriented "ism". This entire book is a treatise on gender equality, and as such, it may be hailed as a work of feminism, but it is not - it is a work of humanism. ~ Abhijit Naskar

Who is a man without a woman? Giving surnames after one's fathers, as if those fathers can bear children without mothers! Without Yin, there is no Yang! Without Yang, there is no Yin! Both of us are needed to make the world run! How come they think they are superior?! ~ Tamuna Tsertsvadze

The accession of not one but three illegal drug users in a row to the US presidency constitutes an existential challenge to the prohibitionist regime. The fact that some of the most successful people of our time, be it in business, finances, politics, entertainment or the arts, are current or former substance users is a fundamental refutation of its premises and a stinging rebuttal of its rationale. A criminal law that is broken at least once by 50% of the adult population and that is broken on a regular basis by 20% of the same adult population is a broken law, a fatally flawed law. How can a democratic government justify a law that is consistently broken by a substantial minority of the population? What we are witnessing here is a massive case of civil disobedience not seen since alcohol prohibition in the 1930 in the US. On what basis can a democratic system justify the stigmatization and discrimination of a strong minority of as much as 20% of its population? ~ Jeffrey Dhywood

I've had librarians say to me, "People in my school don't agree with homosexuality, so it's difficult to have your book on the shelves." Here's the thing: Being gay is not an issue, it is an identity. It is not something that you can agree or disagree with. It is a fact, and must be defended and represented as a fact.
To use another part of my identity as an example: if someone said to me, "I'm sorry, but we can't carry that book because it's so Jewish and some people in my school don't agree with Jewish culture," I would protest until I reached my last gasp. Prohibiting gay books is just as abhorrent ...
Discrimination is not a legitimate point of view. Silencing books silences the readers who need them most. And silencing these readers can have dire, tragic consequences. Never forget who these readers are. They are just as curious and anxious about life as any other teenager. ~ David Levithan

The stigma of mental illness is first and foremost a social justice issue! ~ Patrick W. Corrigan

You're supposed to be the big boss."
Sam said nothing. The crowd hushed, ready to watch this one-on-one confrontation.
"You're the big boss of the freaks," Zil yelled. "But you can't do anything. You can shoot laser beams out of your hands, but you can't get enough food, and you can't keep the power on, and you won't do anything about that murderer Hunter, who killed my best friend." He paused to fill his lungs for a final, furious cry. "You shouldn't be in charge."
"You want to be in charge, Zil? Last night you were running around trying to get a lynch mob together. And let's not even pretend that wasn't you responsible for graffiti I saw driving into town just now."
"So what?" Zil demanded. "So what? So I said what everyone who isn't a freak is thinking."
He spit the word "freak," making it an insult, making it an accusation.
"You really think what we need right now is to divide up between freaks and normals?" Sam asked. "You figure that will get the lights turned back on? That will put food on people's tables? ~ Michael Grant

In the classroom, it was almost certainly the case that the women were managing a double bind that we face constantly: conform to traditional gender expectations, stay quiet and be liked, or violate those expectations and risk the penalties, including the penalty of being called puritanical, aggressive, and"humorless. ~ Soraya Chemaly

Good men are a bit like border collies: we're happiest when we're useful. That's why the life of a good man involves constant striving for direction and meaning. ~ Shawn T. Smith

If you believe in democracy, are you not thereby obliged to accept, without discrimination, the fall-outs that come with a democratic choice, even if this means the termination of the democratic process itself? ~ Wole Soyinka

The biggest deficit in terms of gender equality at Ozon lay in our IT department. So we made a decision, along with our key IT leaders, to remove all filters and systemically interview all the women who apply. ~ Maelle Gavet

I didn't read much SF as a kid - I was a total Tolkien geek - but I started reading Samuel Delany and Angela Carter and Ursula LeGuin in high school, and I was definitely taken with the notion that here was a literature that could explore various notions of gender identity and how it affects the culture at large. ~ Elizabeth Hand

When migraines briefly became a campaign issue for me, it appeared that political foes were maybe playing the gender card. ~ Michele Bachmann

Judgements prevent us from seeing the good that lies beyond appearances. ~ Wayne W. Dyer

It is estimated that every three minutes somewhere in the world a Christian faces serious violations ranging from severe discrimination to outright persecution of their basic right to freedom of religion. Each year about 165,000 people are murdered simply because they are Christians. In total, between 200 million and 300 million Christians worldwide live with the constant threat of persecution because of their faith. ~ Majed El Shafie

Ignorance as a deliberate choice, can be used to reinforce prejudice and discrimination. ~ Ian Leslie

How is love between two people a sin? Love isn't about gender; it's about two souls uniting. ~ Alex Sanchez

For centuries, no one was concerned that books weren't girl-friendly, because no one really cared if girls read; but even so, we persisted for long enough that literature has slowly come to accommodate us. Modern boys, by contrast, are not trying to read in a culture of opposition. Nobody is telling them reading doesn't matter, that boys don't need to read and that actually, no prospective wife looks for literacy in a husband. Quite the opposite! Male literary culture thrives, both teachers and parents are throwing books at their sons, and the fact that the books aren't sticking isn't, as the nature of the complaint makes clear, because boys don't like reading – no. The accusation is that boys don't like reading about girls, which is a totally different matter.

Because constantly, consistently, our supposedly equal society penalises boys who express an interest in anything feminine. The only time boys are discouraged from books all together is in contexts where, for whatever reason, they've been given the message that reading itself is girly – which is a wider extrapolation of the same problem. ~ Foz Meadows

Regarding race or gender or sexuality, one of the great things about art and music is that they can provide people with very little else in common with a similar entry point for discussion, but the discussions still need to happen for life to get more interesting. ~ Tunde Adebimpe

The outcast lepers would like to drag everything down in their ruin. And they become all the more evil, the more you cast them out; and the more you depict them as a court of lemurs who want your ruin, the more they will be outcast. ~ Umberto Eco

It was fun to see him becoming sententious again, glorying in a science he had invented, and as positive as a village soothsayer.

'So one should neither give nor receive?' I laughed. 'And if the lover is poor, his mistress indigent, then both she and he must tactfully let themselves and each other die?'

'Let them die,' he repeated.

I had accompanied him as far as the revolving glass door of the lobby.

'Let them die,' he said again. 'It's less dangerous. I can swear on my word of honor that I never gave a present or made a loan or an exchange of anything except . . . this . . .'

He waved both hands in a complicated gesture which fleetingly indicated his chest, his mouth, his genitals, his thighs. Thanks no doubt to my fatigue, I was reminded of an animal standing on its hind legs and unwinding the invisible. Then he resumed his strictly human significance, opened the door, and easily mingled with the night outside, where the sea was already a little paler than the sky. ~ Colette

My own take on the word "transgender" is that it's an umbrella term for anyone who breaks any rules, laws, guidelines or protocol of gender. So, to really be an ally, it's important that you recognize and embrace your own transgender nature. Really, I haven't met a single person who doesn't break some rule of gender. In other words, we will assimilate you. Resistance is futile. ~ Kate Bornstein

The Christian versions of the household codes were clearly progressive for their time, but does that mean they have the last word, that Christians in changing places and times cannot progress further? ~ Rachel Held Evans

Besides, what's in a name? Actually, a lot. Whether taken from a parent or grandparent, some saint, or even the late great Elvis, your name insists another person's dream of what you should have been. The portrait of some ancestral ideal lingers through heirloom names. Gender specific names imply all sorts of expectations. More than just a signifier used to summon, instruct, address, accuse, sometimes praise us, our names define and thereby limit us. They put us in a cage. ~ Brien Piechos

What is the bedrock on which all of our diverse trans populations can build solidarity? The commitment to be the best fighters against each other's oppression. As our activist network grows into marches and rallies of hundreds of thousands, we will hammer out language that demonstrates the sum total of our movement as well as its component communities.

Unity depends on respect for diversity, no matter what tools of language are ultimately used. This is a very early stage for trans peoples with such diverse histories and blends of cultures to form community. Perhaps we don't have to strive to be one community. In reality, there isn't one women's, or lesbian, gay, bi community. What is realistic is the goal to build a coalition between our many strong communities in order to form a movement capable of defending all our lives. ~ Leslie Feinberg

I've run into more discrimination as a woman than as an Indian. ~ Wilma Mankiller

I guess professionally I've left my gender open to artistic interpretation. ~ Andrej Pejic

Sex is a matter of biology, while gender is a matter of grammar, and there is no earthly reason why sex should be involved in gender distinctions. ~ R.L. Trask

The manager
thunks down a couple of steps, glares at her, glares at her for rather a long
time. The manager, clearly, is tempted. That momentary glimpse of flesh has
been ricocheting around in his brain for half an hour. He is wracking his mind
with vast cosmological dilemmas. Y.T., hopes that he does not try anything,
because the dentata's effects can be unpredictable.
"Make up your fucking mind," she says.
It works. This fresh burst of culture shock rattles the jeek out of his ethical
conundrum. He gives Y.T. a disapproving glower -- she, after all, forced him to
be attracted to her, forced him to get horny, made his head swim -- she didn't
have to get arrested, did she? -- and so on top of everything else he's angry
with her. As if he has a right to be.
This is the gender that invented the polio vaccine? ~ Neal Stephenson

Liberals say we should end employment discrimination. I say we should end employment. ~ Bob Black

Discrimination and prejudice of any kind have no place in sports or in our society. ~ Jerry Reinsdorf

Decolonial feminism arrives at a similar conclusion that gender is not an innocent concept. This school of thought points to gender as a colonial introduction. As a concept gender did not exist among indigenous and black people; more fluid categorisations prevailed ~ Gloria Wekker

It should be clear by now that whatever Americans say about diversity, it is not a strength. If it were a strength, Americans would practice it spontaneously. It would not require "diversity management" or anti-discrimination laws. Nor would it require constant reminders of how wonderful it is. It takes no exhortations for us to appreciate things that are truly desirable: indoor plumbing, vacations, modern medicine, friendship, or cheaper gasoline.
[W]hen they are free to do so, most people avoid diversity. The scientific evidence suggests why: Human beings appear to have deeply-rooted tribal instincts. They seem to prefer to live in homogeneous communities rather than endure the tension and conflict that arise from differences. If the goal of building a diverse society conflicts with some aspect of our nature, it will be very difficult to achieve. As Horace wrote in the Epistles, "Though you drive Nature out with a pitchfork, she will ever find her way back." Some intellectuals and bohemians profess to enjoy diversity, but they appear to be a minority. Why do we insist that diversity is a strength when it is not?
In the 1950s and 1960s, when segregation was being dismantled, many people believed full integration would be achieved within a generation. At that time, there were few Hispanics or Asians but with a population of blacks and whites, the United States could be described as "diverse." It seemed vastly more forward-looking to think of this as an advantage to ~ Jared Taylor

Segregation in the American South was bankrolled by the wealthy eugenicist from the Northeast, Wickliffe Draper. ~ A.E. Samaan

I am no bird; and no net ensnares me: I am a free human being with an independent will. ~ Charlotte Bronte

We live in a world where there are a hell of a lot of new inputs that need to be factored in to your business. It used to be just about your employees and your customers. Now there are all the issues about global warming, about sustainability, about ethics and now about gender and the distribution of wealth. ~ Stuart Rose

Most of us think the word racism is synonymous with the word prejudice. But racism is more than just discrimination based on skin color. It's also about who has institutional power. Just as racism creates disadvantages for people of color that makes success harder to achieve, it also gives advantages to white people that make success easier to achieve. It's hard to see those advantages, much less own up to them. ~ Jodi Picoult

Normally we divide the external world into that which we consider to be good or valuable, bad or worthless, or neither. Most of the time these discriminations are incorrect or have little meaning. For example, our habitual way of categorizing people as friends, enemies, and strangers depending on how they make us feel is both incorrect and a great obstacle to developing impartial love for all living beings. Rather than holding so tightly to our discriminations of the external world, it would be much more beneficial if we learned to discriminate between valuable and worthless states of mind. ~ Kelsang Gyatso

My mother said the bizarre name Raccoona had surely been inspired, at least on a subliminal level, by the masks raccoons don't wear but simply have - the ones given them by nature ... [S]he pointed out that Le Guin had suspected all along that Raccoona and Tiptree were two authors that came from the same source, but in a letter to Alice she wrote that she preferred Tiptree to Raccoona: 'Raccoona, I think, has less control, thus less wit and power.'
Le Guin, Mother said, had understood something deep. 'When you take on a male persona, something happens.'
When I asked her what that was, she sat back in her chair, waved her arm, and smiled. 'You get to be the father. ~ Siri Hustvedt

Although the pictures shown here cannot be taken as representative of gender behavior in real life... one can probably make a significant negative statement about them, namely, that as pictures they are not perceived as peculiar and unnatural. ~ Erving Goffman

Unfortunately a religious group defines itself foremost by its creation story, the supernatural narrative that explains how humans came into existence. And this story is also the heart of tribalism. No matter how gentle and high-minded, or subtly explained, the core belief assures its members that God favors them above all others. It teaches that members of other religions worship the wrong gods, use wrong rituals, follow false prophets, and believe fantastic creation stories. There is no way around the soul-satisfying but cruel discrimination that organized religions by definition must practice among themselves. I doubt there ever has been an imam who suggested that his followers try Roman Catholicism or a priest who urged the reverse. ~ Edward O. Wilson

Right now, if there's a gender gap problem, it's not Ronald Reagan with women; it's with Walter Mondale with men. ~ Patrick Caddell

No, rebellion is what the Duke of Monmouth did, it is a petty disturbance, an aberration, predestined to fail. Revolution is like the wheeling of stars round the pole. It is driven by unseen powers, it is inexorable, it moves all things at once, and men of discrimination may understand it, predict it, benefit from it. ~ Neal Stephenson

I wasn't thinking about history. I was thinking about how we were going to end segregation at lunch counters in Atlanta, Georgia.We would have never thought about making history, we just thought: Here is our chance to get out our sense of rejection at this kind of racial discrimination. I don't know that there was a time that anybody growing up in the South wasn't enraged about being segregated and being discriminated against. ~ Marian Wright Edelman

I would never put the words 'rape ' and 'play ' in the same sentence. I there's rape, there's no play, " he says. ~ Mya Robarts

Men and women should own the world as a mutual possession. ~ Pearl S. Buck

Males have been groomed since birth, according to the specifications of a sick and perverse society, to become instruments of war. ~ Bryant McGill

A man may welcome his beloved with circumstance, but a woman's love and her concern for his well-being are discreet. ~ Franz Grillparzer

I'm not sure how we got to this place, where a girl's only value is in what kind of marriage she has, how capable she is of keeping a man happy. ~ Amy Engel

It is odd, when you think about it, that we accuse racists of "discrimination." This is the very thing of which they are by definition incapable: They think all members of certain groups are the same. ~ Christopher Hitchens