Radius Quotes

“There is a border between any two bodies, of skin and perspective and the distances we hold around ourselves. We think that intimacy and meaning with others happens when these borders open up in patches. The distances grow smaller or vanish altogether, for a time, when we let someone in on our real thoughts, our real feelings, when we show them something that scared us.
There is a state where all of this protocol is suspended: in emergencies, in moments of danger, in situations where the individual is no longer supreme because survival depends on the ability to bond with others. You may stop knowing that you are opening, because that is now normal. When we are in a prolonged state of crisis, nothing is just mine or just yours.
But this state shouldn't be mistaken for complete fusion with others, with a total exchange. It is quieter than this. It is not that you understand me, or I you, because we are the same. There is simply no need to explain, to express, or to share, because there is an extraordinary leveling of the past, of the future. Between us, there is only now.
What happens when the crisis is over? How do we talk?”
― Yasmin El-Rifae, Radius: A Story of Feminist Revolution

“That something about cultures of contempt for women, of refusal to see them as equal in systems that are set up by men, rotates around this biological difference that makes us able to deliver life. That it—we—need to be controlled because we have this ability, which makes us so powerful but also, at times, so vulnerable. That we need to be defined by it.”
― Yasmin El-Rifae, Radius: A Story of Feminist Revolution

“In some sense, my body has always been treated like it was not just mine—it was always all of its reproductive potential, both a potential asset and a potential disruption.”
― Yasmin El-Rifae, Radius: A Story of Feminist Revolution

“When she says “with her” she doesn’t use ma‘aha, which you would you use to say, for example, I went to the store “with” someone. She uses beeha, which is used for tea with sugar, or pregnant with twins. Its meaning stretches beyond companionship.”
― Yasmin El-Rifae, Radius: A Story of Feminist Revolution

“Because in a way when you’re a survivor, this becomes part of you for the rest of your life. There’s no way of forgetting it, it becomes part of your identity, you keep surviving, it’s open-ended.”
― Yasmin El-Rifae, Radius: A Story of Feminist Revolution

“What effect do these experiences have on us? Maybe, even when we brush them off, they make us understand that our bodies are potential prey.”
― Yasmin El-Rifae, Radius: A Story of Feminist Revolution