Quotes from bell hooks

All over the world, young males and females, schooled in the art of patriarchal thinking, are building an identity on a foundation that sees the will to do violence as the essential way to assert being.

Using pseudonyms was such a part of the early feminist movement. We didn't want to have this star system. We wanted attention on the ideas, not the persona of the writer.

I think Black people need to take self-esteem seriously.

The ethic of liberal individualism has so deeply permeated the psyches of blacks... of all classes that we have little support for a political ethic of communalism that promotes the sharing of resources.

When we drop fear, we can draw nearer to people, we can draw nearer to the earth, we can draw nearer to all the heavenly creatures that surround us.

White women and black men have it both ways. They can act as oppressor or ... and oppression of others.

I get so tired of people acting like, you know, black men and women never help each other, never support each other.

Assumptions that racism is more oppressive to black men than black women, then and now ... based on acceptance of patriarchal notions of masculinity.

Class is more than money. Class is also about knowledge.

I have always been a flirt. My mother says whe I was a child, I used to stand outside the house and just smile at everyone who walked by. Like, 'Please take me with you!'

I began writing a book on love because I felt that the United States is moving away from love.

The world would be a paradise of peace and justice if global citizens shared a common definition of love which would guide our thoughts and action.

The practice of love is the most powerful antidote to the politics of domination.

Feminist politics aims to end domination, to free us to be who we are - to live lives where we love justice, where we can live in peace. Feminism is for everybody.

The soul of our politics is the commitment to ending domination.

Because we have learned to believe negativity is more realistic, it appears more real than any positive voice.

I think our culture doesn't recognize passion, because real passion has the power to disrupt boundaries.

A good teacher is someone who can help you to get back to a teacher within.

Honesty and openness is always the foundation of insightful dialogue.

To be truly visionary we have to root our imagination in our concrete reality while simultaneously imagining possibilities beyond that reality.

feminism is for everybody

All the men I fall for seem to have a commitment problem.

The people I love, I'm committed to loving for the rest of my life.

Since loving is about knowing, we have more meaningful love relationships when we know each other and it takes time to know each other.