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If you don't identify as a feminist, you're missing out on this whole community that's out there that could really help you with your work, help you with your personal life, and just give you support.

Jessica Valenti

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Jessica Valenti
Age: 46
Born: 1978
Born: November 1
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New York City
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More quotes by Jessica Valenti

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Making women the sexual gatekeepers and telling men they just can't help themselves not only drives home the point that women's sexuality is unnatural, but also sets up a disturbing dynamic in which women are expected to be responsible for men's sexual behavior.
Jessica Valenti
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Sex for pleasure, for fun, or even for building relationships is completely absent from our national conversation. Yet taking the joy out of sexuality is a surefire way to ensure not that young women won't have sex, but rather that they'll have it without pleasure.
Jessica Valenti
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There's going to be biological differences between the genders. There's going to be biological differences between two women or two men. There's biological differences between all of us. My concern is, why are we so concerned about it?
Jessica Valenti
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When are we going to realize that hating other women - no matter how much money they have or how far they've fallen - is just as bad for ourselves as it is for anyone else?
Jessica Valenti
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When I did get married, and specifically after I got married and the New York Times style section featured my wedding in the vows column, which is really traditionally kind of seen as an elitist column, and it is, but I was happy to be in it. I thought it was good that they were covering a feminist wedding.
Jessica Valenti
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[Virginity is] a cultural ideology that conflates passivity - the act of not having sex - with superior morality.
Jessica Valenti
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I've been thinking a lot about Lady Gaga and what she means for feminism. I think - I find her completely fascinating, and I really like what she has to say.
Jessica Valenti
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At the end of the day, though, the entire basis for consent laws doesn't make sense. We're not old enough to decide if we don't want a baby, but we are old enough to have one?
Jessica Valenti
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It used to be, if you wanted to have a strong, influential voice in the feminist movement, you really needed to be part of this New York/D.C. elite group of feminists, or part of a mainstream feminist organization. And now it's kind of an amazing thing that you can just start a blog and put your voice out there and build your readership.
Jessica Valenti
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Present-day American society-whether through pop culture, religion, or institutions-conflates sexuality and morality constantly. Idolizing virginity as a stand-in for women’s morality means that nothing else matters-not what we accomplish, not what we think, not what we care about and work for. Just if/how/whom we have sex with. That’s all.
Jessica Valenti
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I'm glad that we have a history at all and that we can talk about feminist history. But I do think that it doesn't really pay attention to the complexity and the nuance that is feminist thought.
Jessica Valenti
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You're not too fat. You're not too loud. You're not too smart. You're not unladylike. There is nothing wrong with you.
Jessica Valenti
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Women do not get raped because they weren’t careful enough. Women get raped because someone raped them.
Jessica Valenti
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If you go to places like YouTube, it's a cesspool, and a lot of the comments are really horrifying and misogynist and harassing.
Jessica Valenti
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There's something really terrible about having your BlackBerry next to your bed or having your laptop in the living room when you're talking to someone. The biggest source of stress in my life is the screen, the blogging.
Jessica Valenti
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It's become impossible to enjoy most quality television shows because the hurt or endangered women device is so frequently used.
Jessica Valenti
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I think it is effective when activists work from the margins, and I think that's the best way to go about it. And I do think that it's increasingly being more effective with the work that's being done online, that it is a bit more democratized, that whatever kind of activism is being done, it's not necessarily coming from one centralized place.
Jessica Valenti
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Yes, the more successful you are—or the stronger, the more opinionated—the less you will be generally liked. All of a sudden people will think you’re too braggy, too loud, too something. But the trade-off is undoubtedly worth it. Power and authenticity are worth it.
Jessica Valenti
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Life is messy, and it's okay if you are too! We all screw up, that doesn't have to define us.
Jessica Valenti
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I grew up definitely a feminist, but I didn't call myself a feminist until I took my first women's studies class in college.
Jessica Valenti