Bell hooks quotes - page 2

Usually, when people talk about the strength of black women . . . . they ignore the reality that to be strong in the face of oppression is not the same as overcoming oppression, that endurance is not to be confused with transformation. (Bell hooks)
One of the most subversive institutions in the United States is the public library. View quote
Bell hooks
Sometimes people try to destroy you, precisely because they recognize your power - not because they don't see it, but because they see it and they don't want it to exist. View quote
Bell hooks
Choosing to be honest is the first step in the process of love. There is no practitioner of love who deceives. Once the choice has been made to be honest, then the next step on love's path is communication. View quote
Bell hooks
Only love can heal the wounds of the past. However, the intensity of our woundedness often leads to a closing of the heart, making it impossible for us to give or receive the love that is given to us. View quote
Bell hooks
While it is in no way racist for any author to write a book exclusively about white women, it is fundamentally racist for books to be published that focus solely on the American white woman's experience in which that experience is assumed to be the American woman's experience. View quote
Bell hooks
As a black woman interested in feminist movement, I am often asked whether being black is more important than being a woman; whether feminist struggle to end sexist oppression is more important than the struggle to racism or vice versa. All such questions are rooted in competitive either/or thinking, the belief that the self is formed in opposition to an other. ... Most people are socialized to think in terms of opposition rather than compatibility. Rather than seeing anti-racist work as totally compatible with working to end sexist oppression, they often see them as two movements competing for first place. View quote
Bell hooks
Beloved community is formed not by the eradication of difference but by its affirmation, by each of us claiming the identities and cultural legacies that shape who we are and how we live in the world. View quote
Bell hooks
Love is an action, never simply a feeling. View quote
Bell hooks
Hope is essential to any political struggle for radical change when the overall social climate promotes disillusionment and despair. View quote
Bell hooks
Love is a combination of care, commitment, knowledge, responsibility, respect and trust. (Bell hooks)
To build community requires vigilant awareness of the work we must continually do to undermine all the socialization that leads us to behave in ways that perpetuate domination. View quote
Bell hooks
Knowing how to be solitary is central to the art of loving. When we can be alone, we can be with others without using them as a means of escape. View quote
Bell hooks
There is light in darkness, you just have to find it. View quote
Bell hooks
A generous heart is always open, always ready to receive our going and coming. In the midst of such love we need never fear abandonment. This is the most precious gift true love offers - the experience of knowing we always belong. View quote
Bell hooks
Honesty and openness is always the foundation of insightful dialogue. View quote
Bell hooks
We have to constantly critique imperialist white supremacist patriarchal culture because it is normalized by mass media and rendered unproblematic. View quote
Bell hooks
Without justice there can be no love. View quote
Bell hooks
Living simply makes loving simple. View quote
Bell hooks
To truly love we must learn to mix various ingredients - care, affection, recognition, respect, commitment, and trust, as well as honest and open communication. View quote
Bell hooks
The practice of love offers no place of safety. We risk loss, hurt, pain. We risk being acted upon by forces outside our control. (Bell hooks)
As more people of color raise our consciousness and refuse to be pitted against one another, the forces of neo-colonial white supremacist domination must work harder to divide and conquer. View quote
Bell hooks
The greatest movement for social justice our country has ever known is the civil rights movement and it was totally rooted in a love ethic. View quote
Bell hooks
The transformative power of love is not fully embraced in our society because we often wrongly believe that torment and anguish are our ‘natural' condition. View quote
Bell hooks
There must exist a paradigm, a practical model for social change that includes an understanding of ways to transform consciousness that are linked to efforts to transform structures. View quote
Bell hooks