When women can support themselves, have entry to all the trades and professions, with a house of their own over their heads and a bank account, they will own their bodies and be dictators in the social realm.
Elizabeth Cady StantonRead
The more I think on the present condition of woman, the more am I oppressed with the reality of their degradation.
Interpretation
This quote reflects on the unfortunate state of women and highlights the feelings of distress regarding their treatment in society.
Elizabeth Cady Stanton emphasizes the sorrow and concern she feels about the societal conditions affecting women. Her words express a deep awareness of the degradation women face, calling for recognition and action against their oppression. The quote serves as a powerful critique of gender inequality and resonates with advocates for women's rights.
In practice
In a speech advocating for women's rights, one might quote this to highlight the ongoing struggles faced by women.
When women can support themselves, have entry to all the trades and professions, with a house of their own over their heads and a bank account, they will own their bodies and be dictators in the social realm.
To live for a principle, for the triumph of some reform by which all mankind are to be lifted up to be wedded to an idea may be, after all, the holiest and happiest of marriages.
The strongest reason for giving woman all the opportunities for higher education, for the full development of her faculties, her forces of mind and body... is the solitude and personal responsibility of her own individual life.
Only those who have lived all their lives under the dark clouds of vague, undefined fears can appreciate the joy of a doubting soul suddenly born into the kingdom of reason and free thought.
We demand in the Reconstruction suffrage for all the citizens of the Republic. I would not talk of Negroes or women, but of citizens.
Come, come, my conservative friend, wipe the dew off your spectacles, and see that the world is moving.
It is accepted the world over that women are an essential part of what makes a society successful, and only through supporting and empowering women can a country truly be strong.
For throughout history, you can read the stories of women who - against all the odds - got being a woman right, but ended up being compromised, unhappy, hobbled or ruined, because all around them, society was still wrong. Show a girl a pioneering hero - Sylvia Plath, Dorothy Parker, Frida Kahlo, Cleopatra, Boudicca, Joan of Arc - and you also, more often than not, show a girl a woman who was eventually crushed.
For any of us in this room today, let's start out by admitting we're lucky. We don't live in the world our mothers lived in, our grandmothers lived in, where career choices for women were so limited.
When God created man and woman, he was thinking, 'Who shall I give the power to, to give birth to the next human being?' And God chose woman. And this is the big evidence that women are powerful.
People say to me, 'Has being a woman helped or hindered your career?' And the answer is yes.
If women who don't help women get a special circle in hell, I think women who do help women should get a special cloud in heaven.
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