Raised the Alarm, Bill, Women Voters, Reps. Teresa Leger Fernandez (D-N.M.), Hillary Scholeten (D-Mich.), Emilia Sykes (D-Ohio)

“We’ve raised the alarm about how this bill harms women voters over and over. … It is clear Republicans aren’t interested in fixing this bill and this decision will haunt them in the voting booth.” - Reps. Teresa Leger Fernandez (D-N.M.), Hillary Scholeten (D-Mich.) and Emilia Sykes (D-Ohio), speaking out after House passed the Save Act, which would create extremely strict voter ID requirements, adding significant barriers to voting for the estimated 69 million women who changed their last name, primarily due to marriage.

Found in the Summer 2025 issue of Ms. Magazine, page 6.

Never to be Silent, Take Sides, Neutrality, Silence, Elie Wiesel

"I swore never to be silent whenever and wherever human beings endure suffering and humiliation. We must always take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented." - Elie Wiesel

Found on Wisdom Quotes at http://www.wisdomquotes.com/authors/elie-wiesel/.

Risk, Old, Alice Walker

“Take a risk – grow old.” - Alice Walker

Found in The Truth Will Set You Free, But First It Will Piss You Off: Thoughts on Life, Love, and Rebellion, by Gloria Steinem, page 53.

Women, Only Group, More Radical with Age, Gloria Steinem

“Women may be the only group that grows more radical with age.” - Gloria Steinem

Found in The Truth Will Set You Free, But First It Will Piss You Off: Thoughts on Life, Love, and Rebellion, by Gloria Steinem, page 44.

Throw Up Our Hands, Roll Up Our Sleeves, Kamala Harris

“This is not a time to throw up our hands. This is a time to roll up our sleeves. This is a time to organize, mobilize and stay engaged for the sake of freedom, justice and the future that we all know we can build together.” - Former Vice President Kamala Harris, Nov. 6, 2024

Found in Ms. Magazine, Winter 2025, page 1.

When We Speak, When We Are Silent, Audre Lorde

"When we speak we are afraid our words will not be heard or welcomed. But when we are silent, we are still afraid. So it is better to speak." - Audre Lorde

This is from Brainy Quote. Read more at: https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/a/audrelorde392663.html.

Emotional, Stereotyping, Females, Shirley Chisolm

"The emotional, sexual, and psychological stereotyping of females begins when the doctor says, 'It's a girl.'" - Shirley Chisholm

Found on BrainyQuote at https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/s/shirleychi101403.html.

To Be Alive, Scars, John Steinbeck

“To be alive at all is to have scars.” ― John Steinbeck, The Winter of Our Discontent

Found on Goodreads at https://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/585.John_Steinbeck.

Blind with Patriotism, Wrong is Wrong, Malcolm X

"You're not supposed to be so blind with patriotism that you can't face reality. Wrong is wrong, no matter who says it." - Malcolm X

Found on Brainy Quote. Read more at: https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/malcolm_x_390503.

Older I Get, Greater Power, Snowball, Susan B. Anthony

“The older I get, the greater power I seem to have to help the world; I am like a snowball – the further I am rolled the more I gain.” - Susan B. Anthony, the formidable founding mother of 19th-century American feminism.

Found in Loose Cannons: Devastating Dish from the World's Wildest Women, complied by Autumn Stephens, page 66.

Time, Sidelines, Call to Action, Eleanor Smeal, Kathy Spillar

"This is not the time for feminists to sit on the sidelines. We must fight on. We have come too far and worked too hard to go back now.

"This is a call to action. If you have the ability, desire and drive to volunteer for your favorite feminist cause or organization, the time to do so is now. Clinics need escorts; nonprofits need volunteer researchers, event organizers, administrators, lawyers, artists, designers, computer techies and fundraisers. Everyone and every skill count. We all need your passion, encouragement, skills, commitment, financial support—big or small." Eleanor Smeal, Kathy Spillar, Ms. Magazine, from the special election issue's and blog's "This is a Call to Action".

Voting, Most, Least, Gloria Steinem

“Voting isn't the most we can do, but it's the least.” - Gloria Steinem

Found in The Truth Will Set You Free, But First It Will Piss You Off: Thoughts on Life, Love, and Rebellion, by Gloria Steinem, page 21.

Oppressors, Oppressed, Understanding, Audre Lorde

“Oppressors always expect the oppressed to extend to them the understanding so lacking in themselves.” - Audre Lorde, Black Scholar, May – June 1979.

Found in Contemporary Quotations in Black, compiled and edited by Anita King, page 141.

Want to Write, Create, Most Sublime Fool, Ray Bradbury

“If you want to write, if you want to create, you must be the most sublime fool that God ever turned out and sent rambling. You must write every single day of your life. You must read dreadful dumb books and glorious books, and let them wrestle in beautiful fights inside your head, vulgar one moment, brilliant the next. You must lurk in libraries and climb the stacks like ladders to sniff books like perfumes and wear books like hats upon your crazy heads. I wish you a wrestling match with your Creative Muse that will last a lifetime. I wish craziness and foolishness and madness upon you. May you live with hysteria, and out of it make fine stories — science fiction or otherwise. Which finally means, may you be in love every day for the next 20,000 days. And out of that love, remake a world.” ― Ray Bradbury

Found on Goodreads at https://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/1630.Ray_Bradbury.

All Else Fails, Library, Stephen King

“When all else fails, give up and go to the library.” ― Stephen King, 11/22/63

Female, Validate Her Existence, Power, Bell Hooks

“If any female feels she needs anything beyond herself to legitimate and validate her existence, she is already giving away her power.” - Bell Hooks

Found in The Truth Will Set You Free, But First It Will Piss You Off: Thoughts on Life, Love, and Rebellion, by Gloria Steinem, page 156.

Strong Woman, Stronger, Man, Indestructible, John Steinbeck

“I believe a strong woman may be stronger than a man, particularly if she happens to have love in her heart. I guess a loving woman is indestructible.” ― John Steinbeck, East of Eden

Found on Goodreads at https://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/585.John_Steinbeck.

Words of our Enemies, Silence of our Friends, Martin Luther King, Jr.

"In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends." - Martin Luther King, Jr.

From http://www.inc.com/marla-tabaka/31-martin-luther-king-jr-quotes-to-inspire-greatness-in-you.html.

Write, Inner Voice, Outer World, Gloria Steinem

“To write is to bring an inner voice into the outer world, to believe that our thoughts are worth entering the thinking of others, and to make real what has never existed in quite the same way before. What could be a better path to self-value that that?” - Gloria Steinem

Found in The Truth Will Set You Free, But First It Will Piss You Off: Thoughts on Life, Love, and Rebellion, by Gloria Steinem, page 20.

Because Women's Work, Never Done, Underpaid, Unpaid, Women's Liberation Movement, Brigit Books, Joyce Stevens

"Because women's work is never done and is underpaid or unpaid or boring or repetitious and we're the first to get fired and what we look like is more important than what we do and if we get raped it's our fault and if we get beaten we must have provoked it and if we raise our voices we're nagging bitches and if we enjoy sex we're nymphos and if we don't we're frigid and if we love women it's because we can't get a "real" man and if we ask our doctor too many questions we're neurotic and/or pushy and if we expect childcare we're selfish and if we stand up for our rights we're aggressive and "unfeminine" and if we don't we're typical weak females and if we want to get married we're out to trap a man and if we don't we're unnatural and because we still can't get an adequate safe contraceptive but men can walk on the moon and if we can't cope or don't want a pregnancy we're made to feel guilty about abortion and...for lots of other reasons we are part of the women's liberation movement." - Author unknown, quoted in The Torch, 14 September 1987

I first read these words on a poster at Brigit Books in St. Petersburg, Florida. Brigit Books has long since closed (darn!). But I was able to find out that Joyce Stevens wrote the above quote as a Union Song for Women's Liberation Broadsheet, International Woman's Day, 1975.

Numerous links had this listed as "Author unknown, quoted in The Torch." While I was able to find links to several magazines and newsletters listed as The Torch, none of them were ones that had listed this quote. However, we now know who wrote these words.

Little Place, Political Scheme, Independent, Creative Personality, Shirley Chisholm

“There is little place in the political scheme of things for an independent, creative personality, for a fighter. Anyone who takes that role must pay a price.” - Shirley Chisholm, professor and practitioner of political sciens, and the first black woman to battle her way into Congress.

Found in Wild Words from Wild Women: An Unbridled Collection of Candid Observations & Extremely Opinionated Bon Mots, Compiled by Autumn Stephens, page 52.

Walking, Right Path, Make Progress, Barack Obama

“If you're walking down the right path and you're willing to keep walking, eventually you'll make progress.” ― Barack Obama

Found on Goodreads at https://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/6356.Barack_Obama.

Master's Tools, Dismantle, Master's House, Audre Lorde

"The master's tools will never dismantle the master's house." - Audre Lorde

Found on Brainy Quote. Read more at: https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/a/audrelorde357280.html

Authentic Work of Art, Argument, Dame Rebecca West

“Any authentic work of art must start an argument between the artist and his audience.” - Dame Rebecca West

Found in The Last Word: A Treasury of Women's Quotes, by Carolyn Warner, page 33.

Diary, Keep You, Mae West

“Keep a diary and one day it'll keep you.” - Mae West

Found in Women's Lip: Outrageous, Irreverent and Just Plain Hilarious Quotes, edited by Roz Warren, page 33.

No Person, Friend, Silence, Alice Walker

“No person is your friend who demands your silence, or denies your right to grow.” - Alice Walker

Found in Quotes for Nasty Women: Empowering Wisdom from Women Who Break the Rules, by Linda Picone, page 89.

Fly, Run, Walk, Crawl, Moving Forward, Martin Luther King, Jr.

"If you can't fly then run, if you can't run then walk, if you can't walk then crawl, but whatever you do you have to keep moving forward." - Martin Luther King, Jr.

From http://www.inc.com/marla-tabaka/31-martin-luther-king-jr-quotes-to-inspire-greatness-in-you.html

Mourn, Organize, Gloria Steinem

“We will not mourn. We will organize.” - Gloria Steinem, in the Special Elections 2016 issue of Ms. Magazine, page 11.

Agonize, Organize, Florynce Kennedy

“Don't agonize. Organize.” - Fleet-tongued Florynce Kennedy. Fortunately, the Ur-activist of the Sixties and Seventies seldom stayed down in the dumps for long.

Found in Loose Cannons: Devastating Dish from the World's Wildest Women, complied by Autumn Stephens, page 70.

Lipstick, Pig, Barack Obama

“You can put lipstick on a pig. It's still a pig.” ― Barack Obama

Found on Goodreads at https://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/6356.Barack_Obama.

Cheap Labor, Never Cheap, Audre Lorde

“Cheap labor is never cheap for the person who performs it.” - Audre Lorde, Commencement address, Oberlin College, May 29, 1989

Found in Contemporary Quotations in Black, compiled and edited by Anita King, page 142.