Quotable: Unfinished Business by Anne-Marie Slaughter

" ... If we want to move forward — for women and men, for our workplaces, and for our society as a whole — we must first step back and take a hard look at what we reflexively believe to be true. We must question the conventional wisdom, aphorisms, memes, and stories that inform or justify our choices and shape our worlds. We have to ask ourselves why we are so certain of our often-buried assumptions about the way things are, both for ourselves and for millions of others whose lives we can only try to imagine.

"We can only change and bring about change if we can genuinely open our minds to new thoughts and possibilities, for everyone."

— Unfinished Business by Anne-Marie Slaughter, a passage that feels especially important after finishing two days of anti-racism and anti-oppression training at work

Happy International Women's Day!

In honour of International Women’s Day I’ve resurrected (and added to) my list of the kick ass books I wish were available to me in high school, but luckily found in my twenties. These are books that need to be read by anyone who has ever thought that the fight for women's rights is over.

“... The hope I have for women: that we can start to see ourselves — and encourage men to see us — as more than just the sum of our sexual parts: not as virgins or whores, as mothers or girlfriends, or as existing only in relation to men, but as people with independent desires, hopes and abilities. But I know that this can't happen as long as American culture continues to inundate us with gender-role messages that place everyone-men and women-in an unnatural hierarchical order that's impossible to maintain without strife. For women to move forward, and for men to break free, we need to overcome the masculinity status quo-together.” — Jessica Valenti, The Purity Myth

Perfect Girls, Starving Daughters: The Frightening New Normalcy of Hating Your Body, by Courtney E. Martin


Full Frontal Feminism: A Young Woman’s Guide to Why Feminism Matters, by Jessica Valenti


He’s a Stud, She’s a Slut and 49 Other Double Standards Everyone Should Know, by Jessica Valenti

Yes Means Yes: Visions of Female Sexual Power and A World Without Rape, by Jessica Valenti


The Purity Myth: How America’s Obsession with Virginity Is Hurting Young Women, by Jessica Valenti


She’s Shameless: Women Write about Growing Up, Rocking Out and Fighting Back, edited by Megan Griffith-Greene and Stacey May Fowles


Girldrive — Criss-crossing America, Redefining Feminism, by Nona Willis Aronowitz, Emma Bee Bernstein

Why Have Kids? by Jessica Valenti

Feminism for Real, by Jessica Yee

What You Really Really Want: The Smart Girl's Shame-Free Guide to Sex and Safety by Jaclyn Friedman (Full disclosure: I just started reading this one last night, but so far it’s fantastic! And it has quizzes. Who doesn’t love a book with quizzes?