Eve Ensler Quotes
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We have to bridge and join our struggles and understand how we can't fight violence against women without looking at racism, we can't fight violence against women without looking at economic deprivation or climate change. All these struggles are interconnected.
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One of the most radical things women can do is to love their body.
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Why aren't we looking at the causes of breast cancer? Why aren't we spending our energy on looking at what we're doing to the earth? On the pollutants we're putting into the earth? And the pesticides we're putting into the earth? What we're releasing into the air? Instead, we just cut off more organs! That's where metaphor comes into it - not even metaphor as much as reality.
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Geography does not define you - love does.
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We can't walk where we want to walk or be who we want to be or dress the way we want to dress or go anywhere any time of day. I am talking about the freedom that comes with just knowing that you're okay, and that you have value and you have identity, and you don't have to keep proving yourself.
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What happened with cancer was that I just became a body. There was nothing else but body for a month. I was chemo'd and operated on and cut and poked. At first it was really horrifying and scary, and then it was just,Wow. You're in your body. This is body!
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Good is towing the line, being behaved, being quiet, being passive, fitting in, being liked, and great is being messy, having a belly, speaking your mind, standing up for what you believe in, fighting for another paradigm, not letting people talk you out of what you know to be true.
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Real security is contemplating death, not pretending it doesn't exist.
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I despise charity. It gives crumbs to a few and silences the others.
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Between the combination of Judeo-Christian religious 'be good be good be good' and Capitalist 'something's wrong with you, buy this' and the parental upbringing, which is 'you're wrong, you're not thin enough, you're not smart enough' I mean, hello! We don't have a shot.
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The fact that women have been moving forward, that a woman was running for president, that we had a black president - I think there was, without a doubt, a whitelash and a complete backlash against the liberation of women, against the power of people of color.
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Why don't we teach sex the way we teach math or history? It is such a deeply crucial and healing part of life and we offer no road map. I think it is core to ending violence.
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I live with that contradiction daily. It is a constant struggle. I struggle very deeply. I don't think I've said this to anyone, but I've wondered if I just want to give up this world and live in the Congo and just be there. But I don't think that's what they need from me.
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I am worried about this word, this notion - security. I see this word, hear this word, feel this word everywhere. Security check. Security watch. Security clearance. Why has all this focus on security made me feel so much more insecure? ... Why are we suddenly a nation and a people who strive for security above all else?
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Money doesn't make you special, it makes you lucky. Be generous, be crazy, be outrageous.
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Why are women immobile? Because so many feel like they’re waiting for someone to say, "You’re good, you’re pretty, I give you permission."
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I'm in good shape. My cancer means I have lost a lot of organs and I'm a lot lighter. I have devoted myself to yoga and I'm doing handstands.
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I think when people begin to tell their stories, everything changes, because not only are you legitimized in the telling of your story and are you found, literally, like you matter, you exist in the telling of your story, but when you hear your story be told, you suddenly exist in community and with others.
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Our bodies are critical. If I learned anything from getting really bad cancer seven years ago, it's that your body is what you've got. If you don't take care of it, you're not going to be here.
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With the Gulf spill, I absolutely merged in the time when I had that infection. I couldn't get out of the Gulf spill. There were so many similarities: the drains and the siphoning and the tubes. And also in the way the earth was hurt, the ocean was bleeding. Remember the video cams of the oil gushing? I couldn't stop watching that.
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I have been struggling to find my way back into my body my whole life.
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The cancer in me became an awareness of the cancer that is everywhere. The cancer of cruelty, the cancer of carelessness, the cancer of greed.
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I think that anytime you get clear about what your mission is or what your focus wants to be, things start to come together in your life.
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The mechanism of violence is what destroys women, controls women, diminishes women and keeps women in their so-called place.