A radical feminist who led the charge against pornography.
Andrea Rita Dworkin is known as one of the strongest feminists who opposed pornography. Tragically, she was molested as a young girl, and married into an abusive relationship. Such personal experiences fueled her writer’s pen and she authored many influential books and articles opposing pornography and all sexual exploitation. She spoke at the first Take Back the Night march in 1978, worked as a leader of Women Against Pornography, and testified before the Attorney General’s Commission on Pornography.
From Dworkin: “Pornography is the orchestrated destruction of women’s bodies and souls; rape, battery, incest, and prostitution animate it; dehumanization and sadism characterize it; it is war on women, serial assaults on dignity, identity, and human worth; it is tyranny. Each woman who has survived knows from the experience of her own life that pornography is captivity — the woman trapped in the picture used on the woman trapped wherever he’s got her.”
Dworkin died in April of 2005 from acute myocarditis at 58.
Find a list of many of her books here.
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This feature is a part of the It’s Our Turn Campaign.
The “It’s Our Turn” campaign celebrates the rich history of men & women willing to defend human dignity. By telling their stories we hope to inspire the next generation of leaders willing to take a stand against sexual exploitation.
