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Joan Smith
12 quotes
“We live in circumstances which not only restrict our freedom but physically threaten us if we step out of line: in this culture, the penalty for being a woman is sometimes death. Yet it is extraordinarily unacknowledged. I think sometimes you have to define a problem before you start to find a solution and for years and years I've felt as though I live in occupied territory. My interest is in finding a way of constructing a path out of that territory.”
Joan Smith (born 1953) first seen 1989 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Interviewed by Angela Neustatter "An everyday Guide to Misogyny" The Guardian (18 April 1989) p. 17
“[On Julian Assange] The super-hacker appears to be relaxed about links with authoritarian regimes, presenting a chat show for Russia Today, a state-funded TV network, and seeking asylum in a Latin American country with a not exactly admirable record on freedom of expression.”
Joan Smith (born 1953) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“It's time his double standards were spelled out: Assange has used his hacking skills to turn himself into a worldwide phenomenon, and now he demands for himself exactly the same impunity he excoriates in politicians.”
Joan Smith (born 1953) first seen 2012 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Why do we buy Julian Assange's one-man psychodrama?", The Independent (21 June 2012).
“If history teaches us anything, it is that treating unstable psychopaths as if they are normal, reasonable people doesn’t work. [...] Europe didn’t pick this fight, but we should be in no doubt that Russia under Putin is an unpredictable rogue state.”
Joan Smith (born 1953) first seen 2015 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: President Putin is a dangerous psychopath - reason is not going to work with him", The Independent on Sunday (1 February 2015).
“Shocking though the Savile revelations are, they have to be seen in a wider context. His behaviour was enabled by a revolution in sexual behaviour that was supposed to liberate both sexes, but actually offered endless opportunities to unscrupulous men. Its effects were far-reaching, creating poisonous attitudes towards victims of sexual abuse that are still being recycled in rape trials today. But it has also prompted a feminist critique that is vital if we’re ever going to understand the context that men like Savile operate in, and stop them at an early stage in their criminal careers.”
Joan Smith (born 1953) first seen 2016 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Now we know – the BBC’s macho culture protected predatory men for decades" The Guardian (25 February 2016).
“The murder of Jo Cox rightly caused an outpouring of emotion, from shocked disbelief to calls for more civility in public discourse. But memories are short, especially in the feverish atmosphere of a Labour leadership contest. I could hardly believe my ears when Owen Smith, in a campaign speech about equality, said he was upset that Labour did not have the power to "smash" Theresa May "back on her heels".”
Joan Smith (born 1953) first seen 2016 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Woman-hating has come roaring back – now we must confront it", The Guardian (28 July 2016).
“The harsh fact is there are not sufficient safeguards in place to identify and discipline police officers who abuse women, yet we are expected to trust the very same men to investigate crimes against the most vulnerable female victims. If women in this country are ever to feel safe – and it is something that should be ours by right – we urgently need a public inquiry into institutional misogyny within the police.”
Joan Smith (born 1953) first seen 2021 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: How can women trust British police when so many have been accused of abuse?" The Guardian (15 June 2021).
“The last week has been a lesson in the difference between theory and practice. For several years now some feminists have tried to point out the risks posed by unquestioningly accepting claims about gender identity. When we pointed out that self-identification is unverifiable, and open to exploitation by sexual predators, we were shouted down and accused of transphobia. When we argued that vulnerable women prisoners should not have to share intimate spaces with men convicted of sex offences, we were told to think of the feelings of trans prisoners.”
Joan Smith (born 1953) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The slogan "trans women are women" admits no ifs or buts. If a man identifies as a woman, even if he has taken no steps towards transitioning, we are supposed to accept that his "gender identity" trumps biological sex. But if Bryson is genuinely trans, rather than a sexual predator gaming the system, this strikes down the claim that trans women never pose a threat to women and can be safely placed in the female prison estate.”
Joan Smith (born 1953) first seen 2023 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Why liberals keep being fooled in the gender debate" The New Statesman (30 January 2023).
“That's me done. I wrote to Keir Starmer and spoke to him in person. I warned him about misogyny. He never replied. Labour has betrayed women with a raft of policies designed to appease trans-identified men. I don't suppose Starmer cares, but I've resigned my membership today.”
Joan Smith (born 1953) first seen 2024 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: From a post on X, as cited in "Prominent writer quits Labour over 'betrayal of women for trans rights", The Telegraph (24 June 2024)
“[During the 1981 trial of Peter Sutcliffe, commonly known as the Yorkshire Ripper.] I remember having terrible nightmares during the trial, feeling that the police were misunderstanding things badly because they insisted that Sutcliffe had a moral stand. To me it was clear his crimes expressed a simple, virulent loathing of the female which did not need fancy explanations like those arrived at by the police. The thing is that most people in the book are not what ordinary people would describe as outcasts; they are ordinary men. That was why it was important to end up with the Ripper. Because what is important about him is that he is not different; it's only a question of degree. I don't go along with the idea that all men are rapists or that they are the product of Original Sin, rather that we have a culture which supports and encourages misogyny and what we have to face is that a sizeable number of men hold very strange and perverted views about women.”
Joan Smith (born 1953) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“This has been a good week to be a republican. Strike that: it's been a fantastic week, as news organisations wake up to the fact that sentimental attitudes to the Royal Family are not universally shared. I've lost count of the times I've been asked to provide "a republican voice" by broadcasters, which is a very welcome change. But editors should have been warned by a YouGov poll earlier this month, which showed that more people in India than the UK were interested in the royal birth. Far from a nation panting for news, just over half of British adults (53 per cent) were uninterested, compared to 46 per cent who were "very" or "fairly" interested. In this context, any headline beginning "the country" or "the world" is bound to be wrong; I'm sure there were swathes of the Democratic Republic of Congo where the arrival of Prince George went entirely unremarked, but degrees of indifference were visible in London as well. When I arrived on Monday evening to do a TV interview outside Buckingham Palace, where an eager crowd had supposedly gathered to wait for news, I found what looked like the usual complement of tourists. There were dozens of film crews, but that's a different matter.”
Joan Smith (born 1953) first seen 2013 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: This has been a good week to be a republican" The Independent on Sunday (27 July 2013).