A Quote by bell hooks
Any woman who wishes to be an intellectual, to write non-fiction, to deal with theory, faces a lot of discrimination coming her way and perhaps even self-doubt because there aren't that many who've gone before you. And I think that the most powerful tool we can have is to be clear about our intent. To know what it is we want to do rather than going into institutions thinking that the institution is going to frame for us.
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All fiction, if it's successful, is going to appeal to the emotions. Emotion is really what fiction is all about. That's not to say fiction can't be thoughtful, or present some interesting or provocative ideas to make us think. But if you want to present an intellectual argument, nonfiction is a better tool. You can drive a nail with a shoe but a hammer is a better tool for that. But fiction is about emotional resonance, about making us feel things on a primal and visceral level.
It's going to become clear that the impact of our policies rather than our way of life is what's attracting animosity and warfare on us. And I think there is going to be a surge from the bottom up that will begin to straighten things out. Because Americans, in the long run, are not going to want their daughters and their sons to die overseas so the al Saud family can continue raping Saudi Arabia's revenue.
I don't want to write poems that are just really clear about how I'm aware of all the traps involved in writing poetry; I don't want to write fiction that's about the irresponsibility of writing fiction and I've thrown out a lot of writing that I think was ultimately tainted by that kind of self-awareness.
A woman should keep her separateness, should save all her feminine qualities and purify them. In this way she is going, according to her nature, towards enlightenment. Of course once you are enlightened, you have gone beyond the discrimination of sexes. Beyond enlightenment, you are simply human beings. But before that... Be proud of your qualities. Increase them, refine them because they are the path towards godliness. Man is not in a better position than woman as far as religious experience is concerned.
Fundamentally, as human beings, we're very, very alike and a lot more alike than we think, but we have a tendency to divide the world into them and us. In prison, when people commit a crime and we put them away, they definitely become "them." We don't want to deal with it because they have chosen to step out of society, so we're going to keep them out. Even if they serve their time, we're going to make sure that, for the rest of their lives, they're going to be branded. I don't know how to do it in a different way, but I think it clearly doesn't work.
I guess most of us would rather not discuss cancer because we are all afraid we might be told we have it. It's hard for people to even say the word, and that's the first obstacle you have to overcome when you are diagnosed with the disease. I think once you understand a little more about it ... I don't mean it gets any easier ... but I think you give it more in-depth thought about how you're going to deal with it.
There are certain kinds of people who write science fiction. I think a lot of us married late. A lot of us are mama's boys. I lived at home until I was 27. But most of the writers I know in any field, especially science fiction, grew up late. They're so interested in doing what they do and in their science, they don't think about other things.
The most powerful thing we have is our psyche. And to use our minds, we must be clear, vulnerable and open, which will take us to places we didn't even know were there or couldn't imagine ourselves going.
Since the governments are in the pockets of businesses, who's going to control this most powerful institution? Business is more powerful than politics, and it's more powerful than religion. So it's going to have to be the vigilante consumer.
You grow. You don't want to stay the same. The thing that was great for you before isn't going to be great for you now. A woman should have many faces through her life, not just one face, not just one hairdo, not just one way. You want to keep rediscovering what's fun for you.
Doubt is most often the source of our powerlessness. To doubt is to be faithless, to be without hope or belief. When we doubt, our self-talk sounds like this: 'I don't think I can. I don't think I will.'... To doubt is to have faith in the worst possible outcome. It is to believe in the perverseness of the universe, that even if I do well, something I don't know about will get in the way, sabotage me, or get me in the end.
We kind of reduce our responsibility to not saying the N-word and to condemning the Klansmen, rather than saying many of our celebrated institutions are systemically racist. Many of our institutions that deal with law enforcement or controlling the bodies of Black people are systemically racist. Many of our educational institutions are systemically racist. Many of our corporate institutions are systemically racist. We don't have those conversations, so things don't change.
The coming and going of the seasons give us more than the springtimes, summers, autumns, and winters of our lives. It reflects the coming and going of the circumstances of our lives like the glassy surface of a pond that shows our faces radiant with joy or contorted with pain.
I know as a writer how valuable a tool is the wastebasket. Perhaps God throws away many experiments before He finds the right expression. Perhaps we are the discards - or we could be the part He keeps. This mystery is what keeps us all going, to see what happens in the next chapter.
If someone's intimidated by me, that's something they have to deal with. When I walk down the streets of New York and an old woman grabs her purse when I pass by, I'm not going to give it a whole lot of energy because I'm not in the wrong. I'm a millionaire, and I'm not thinking about grabbing an old woman's purse.
The coming and going of the seasons give us more than the spring times, summers, autumns, and winters of our lives. It reflects the coming and going of the circumstances of our lives like the glassy surface of a pond that shows our faces radiant with joy or contorted with pain.
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