Performativity Quotes

“The misapprehension about gender performativity is this: that gender is a choice, or that gender is a role, or that gender is a construction that one puts on, as one puts on clothes in the morning, that there is a 'one' who is prior to this gender, a one who goes to the wardrobe of gender and decides with deliberation which gender it will be today.”
― Judith Butler, Bodies That Matter: On the Discursive Limits of "Sex"

“Not many boys like boys; but they like being a boy, showing it, being it together" (22)

(rbt: where does this come from? this being a boy, which is also a doing -- this being wrapped in desire? who teaches it? how? when?)”
― Duvert Summers

“Men and women are performative and somatic fictions, convinced of their natural reality.”
― Beatriz Preciado

“There's some satisfaction in performing, reading the script, wearing the costume, after all. And on the other side of the satisfaction there is rage. The deep and exhausting rage of having fallen for a scam. Because when all is said and done, being beautiful only offers you a temporary haven. A pedestal to fall from.”
― Celine Saintclare, Sugar, Baby

“Does your knowing a thing go so far for nothing unless another person knows that you know it?”
― Persius, The Satires of Persius

“-... kutsal ancak tekrar yoluyla vardır ve her tekrarda değeri biraz daha artar.- İsfahan halifesi, İki Şölen ya da Anma Töreni”
― Michel Tournier, The Midnight Love Feast

“[Silent Messages 2]
She sat to rearrange the contents of her disorganized handbag
At the crowded bus terminal
When she lifted her head for a short interval,
Her eyes caught a young couple kissing, touching, and hugging
In a performative and exaggerated manner...
When the couple noticed her,
The young woman gave her a mean and malicious look as if asking:
Are you jealous of all the love I am surrounded by?
She returned the look with a sly one as if responding:
The love that exaggerates in displaying itself in public
Is either immature, dead, or dying…

[Original poem published in Arabic on December 5, 2022 at ahewar.org]”
― Louis Yako

“Political correctness was never supposed to happen. Ever. The problem with politically correct language is already in the term itself: it corrects the language, and in doing so, it politicizes it through such imposed corrections. The problem with political correctness is that it corrects the language without correcting the conditions that produce and enable that language. In doing so, we lose two battles: the battle for correcting the conditions that produce the need for the language of political correctness, and the battle for creating awareness among those who think that using politically correct language is going to make any meaningful changes.

[From "Understanding the DEI Dismantlement” published on Counterpunch on January 31, 2025]”
― Louis Yako

“[Silent Messages 2]
She was rearranging her messy handbag at the crowded bus station
When she lifted her head for a short interval,
Her eyes caught a young couple kissing, touching, and hugging
In an exaggerated and performative manner
When the couple noticed her,
The young woman gave her a mean and malicious look as if asking:
Are you jealous of all the love I am surrounded by?
She returned the look with a sly one as if responding:
The love that exaggerates in displaying itself in public
Is either new and inexperienced, dead, or dying…

[[Original poem published in Arabic on December 5, 2022 at ahewar.org]”
― Louis Yako

“He's always lying and he never lies. His falseness is his truth - it sounds complicated, but actually it's quite simple. He believes everything and he believes nothing.”
― Klaus Mann, Mefisto