My Self-Respect Is Not The Clothes I Wear

“We’ve been taught a woman’s body will cause men to sin. We’re told that if a woman shows too much of her body men will do stupid things. Let’s be clear: a woman’s body is not dangerous to you. Her body will not cause you harm. It will not make you do stupid things. If you do stupid things it is beca…”

— Nate Pyle, huffingtonpost.com

“Why should a woman have to be modest in order to be respected?”

— Unknown, letitcome--letitbe.tumblr.com

“Beauty or brains? Fuck that, it’s not a dichotomy. Let’s not act like mascara glues girls eyes so shut that they can’t read a word of Dickens or solve a trig problem. Let’s talk about how no boy has ever been asked if he’d rather get his Bachelor’s or get married; no boy has ever been told that he’s…”

— uglyboyband, uglyboyband.tumblr.com

“A woman should've have to be clothed from head to toe in order for you to respect her. If your respect for women is conditional, keep it.”

— @delafro_, mysharona1987.tumblr.com

“Nudity empowers some. Modesty empowers some. Different things empower different women and its not your place to tell her which one it is”

— kennabbby, twitter.com

“‘Have some self respect’ literally has nothing to do with me. It’s about you rating and weighing my behaviour against a 2 dimensional caricature of a women that you think deserves basic decency. I respect myself. What you mean is ‘please conform to my personal, rigid beliefs of what I deem acceptabl…”

— iamatinyowl, iamatinyowl.tumblr.com

“Expressing sexuality in art is not an invitation for disrespect. Just like wearing a short skirt is not asking for assault. Women's choice... Our bodies, our clothing, our music, our personalities... sexy, flirty, fun. It is not. an open. invitation. You are literally saying that if we look a certai…”

— Ariana Grande, rollingstone.com

“These women talk about feminism, but I feel Rihanna lives it. She doesn’t tend to speak up about gender equality and other major issues, but she embodies one of the most important acts of feminist: to be yourself and not feel you have to apologise for it. This is evident in everything she does... Wh…”

— Radhika Sanghani, telegraph.co.uk

“We will not change the way we dress because it's more convenient for your lack of self control.”

— Unknown, thesociologicalcinema.tumblr.com

“So we need to break through these limitations. We need to keep changing the attitude that raises our girls to be demure and our boys to be assertive, that criticizes our daughters for speaking out and our sons for shedding a tear. We need to keep changing the attitude that punishes women for their s…”

— Barack Obama, glamour.com

“There are sexual things that I do that aren’t for a man. I feel empowered sometimes by being sexy and being comfortable enough to be sexy on camera—a lot of woman struggle with that. But there are some days that I don’t want anyone to see me. I’m just a regular girl. Some days I’m super strong; some…”

— Nicki Minaj, vogue.com

“Astonishingly, not all girls get dressed just to please men.”

— Jojo Moyes, saxo.com

“Imagine donating 8.5 million dollars to charity every year and having people rejoice that you were held at gunpoint because you had your sexual consent violated several years ago and the world still blames you for it. Kim Kardashian doesn't have to imagine.”

— Anonymous, cactus-queeen.tumblr.com

“Self-respect has nothing to do with sex or nudity. Self-respect means making choices that make you happy.”

— Unknown, femalecollective.tumblr.com

“We teach girls shame. Close your legs; cover yourself. We make them feel as though being born female, they're already guilty of something. And so, girls grow up to be women who silence themselves. They grow up to be women who cannot say what they truly think. And they grow up--and this is the worst…”

— Chimamamda Ngozi Adichie, thoughtcatalog.com

“Better sexy and racy than sexist and racist.”

— Stephen Fry, books.google.com

“No matter how I present myself, I’m confident and I’m comfortable. My self-respect is doing what makes me happy. When I’m hungry, I eat, when I’m thirsty I drink, I have self-respect, I look after myself. You can't tell me what ladylike is because we don't live in the '50s any more. I am looking for…”

— Faith Sobotker, news.com.au

“We've been taught having self respect means keeping ourselves covered, not showing too much skin, not too much cleavage... we've been told wearing booty shorts make us cheap and nasty. We've been told we have to act, dress, and do certain things in order to have self respect - but we are not the one…”

— hannah-ruth-x, hannah-ruth-x.tumblr.com

“Modesty lost its appeal when I decided I no longer wanted to be moderate at anything, but excel exceptionally at everything. I began to see the beauty in my indecency exposed.”

— amiiiritafari, amiiiritafari.tumblr.com

“The whole "good girl vs. hoes" mentality is nothing but misogynistic. It's denying a woman simple respect just (because) she's not "modest." If you only respect a woman when she's "modest", you don't actually respect women. That's not how this works. You respect a woman regardless of how she present…”

— @delafro_, mysharona1987.tumblr.com

“A few months ago I heard Kathleen Cleaver, a former Black Panther, speak at a local museum and as she spewed her feelings about ‘Formation’, calling it pornography, I recall feeling a disappointment so strong it nearly felt like grief. I felt similarly reading bell hooks’ criticisms of Beyoncé. I fe…”

— Emerald Shaw, dopenmind.tumblr.com

“The day that women can casually be topless and not be raped or degraded will be the day that women will be equal in society.”

— Willow Smith, twitter.com