Susie Bright



Susannah "Susie" Bright (born March 25, 1958, Arlington, Virginia), also known as Susie Sexpert, is a writer, speaker, teacher, audio show host, performer, all on the subject of sexuality. She is one of the first writers/activists referred to as a sex-positive feminist.

Quotes

 * Sometimes I wonder if MacKinnon has simply been driven mad by all the sick things people do to one another. I, too, recoil in pain and incomprehension whenever I hear about the latest psychopath who has shot his mother, machine-gunned his coworkers, raped his daughter, or slashed a prostitute. I notice that such men are more likely to have read the Bible than pornography, but I do not hold either script responsible for their actions.
 * "The Prime of Miss Kitty MacKinnon", East Bay Express, October 1993.


 * Sexual speech, not MacKinnon's speech, is the most repressed and disdained kind of expression in our world, and MacKinnon is no rebel or radical to attack it.
 * "The Prime of Miss Kitty MacKinnon", East Bay Express, October 1993.
 * On Catharine MacKinnon.


 *  "Natural" is a very dangerous word to use about sexuality ... Our society's notions of normality are completely fake and meta-trendy, since they rely on the changing standards of superstition, religion, Christianity and gender bias to define themselves. Americans, in particular, exhibit very childish reactions to sexual practices that are new to them, much like little kids who are offered a vegetable they haven't seen before: "That's disgusting!" "But darling, you haven't even tried it!" "I don't care, I hate it, I hate it!
 * Introduction, Nothing But the Girl, 1996 ISBN 186047005X.

Well, it's all over, sweethearts. I'm taking away your library card, I'm stripping badges and I'm not returning phone calls. Calling NOW feminists is like calling the People's Republic of China communist: Marx and Emma Goldman are both rolling in their graves.
 * Take the National Organization for Women — please! They've embarrassed me enough over the years, and now I'm going to give them a taste of their own medicine. They were always so holier-than-thou, systematically getting rid of everyone who wasn't just like them: white, upper-middle class, straight (or closeted), sex-phobic Democratic party apologists. As you can imagine, that's not a huge group anymore —  but they still manage to hang onto a name that insists that they represent half the population!
 * "This shameless hussy ballbuster Clinton scandals", Salon, March 13, 1998.


 * Andrea presented herself as a street fighter intellectual, a bohemian freedom fighter, and someone who wanted to get to the bottom of things. That quote about Malcolm X is apt. Malcolm pointed out “The problem is WHITE PEOPLE.” Dworkin said, “The problem is MEN.” And for all the holes that can be poked in that cloth, there is something about that grain that is absolutely true, when you are the short end of the bolt.
 * "Andrea Dworkin Has Died", Susie Bright's Journal (blog), April 11, 2005.


 * I’m sorry Andrea Dworkin started a sexual revolution that she ended up repudiating. She never got to see people like me, Carol, and the rest of us little protégées who took her inspiration and flew to a new dimension. She got stuck, and then she got sick, and when you’re famous for one thing, no one wants to see you change unless you reject it all, like a pathetic sinner seeking redemption. She was too stubborn and too old-fashioned for that. Andrea Dworkin never would have admitted that she was a SuperStar. She was the animator of the ultimate porno horror loop, where the Final Girl never gets a chance to slay the monster, she only dies, dies, dies, with the cries of the angry mourners to remember her.
 * "Andrea Dworkin Has Died", Susie Bright's Journal (blog), April 11, 2005.


 * At that time, there was general agreement among everyone involved in women’s liberation that women should have a defined sexual self-interest.
 * Keeping people neurotic and depressed and ignorant and self-doubting is oppressive.
 * People who love science fiction really do love sex.
 * When AIDS was at its most brutal, frightening, my-God-what-are-we-going-to-do era, that was when vampire stories and stories about blood and trust swept the literary world.
 * "Bright Ideas", interview by Tamara Wieder, Boston Phoenix, February 11, 2005.


 * Familiarity with your lover is what initially makes sex really good.
 * Human beings like variety, and they also like partnership... these are scientific values we can point to.
 * I had no idea that mothering my own child would be so healing to my own sadness from my childhood.
 * I think women need to realize that they would be much better moms if they were well-rested, sexually satisfied, and had some interests going outside their childrearing.
 * Interview by The Naughty Mommy, Literary Momma, n.d.