Susie Orbach Quotes

• I'd like to see much more understanding of emotional issues around hurt, abandonment, disappointment, longing, failure and shame, where they stem from and how they drive people and policies brought into public discourse.

  Susie Orbach

  Hurt, Disappointment, Emotional

  "Britain's intellectuals: leading thinkers have their say" by Alain de Botton, AC Grayling, Susie Orbach, Paul Gilroy, Will Self, Mary Beard, Brian Cox, Lionel Shriver, James Lovelock and Lisa Jardine, www.theguardian.com. May 7, 2011.

  49 Copy quote

• I wish we could treat our bodies as the place we live from, rather than regard it as a place to be worked on, as though it were a disagreeable old kitchen in need of renovation and update.

  Susie Orbach

  Kitchen, Wish, Needs

  18 Copy quote

• Many young girls are constantly consumed by controlling and managing their body image to the extent that they are much more involved in the production of the self than in living.

  Susie Orbach

  Inspirational, Girl, Women

  18 Copy quote

• Today, 'fat' has become not a description of size but a moral category tainted with criticism and contempt.

  Susie Orbach

  Criticism, Today, Size

  "Fat is a prejudice issue" by Susie Orbach, www.theguardian.com. May 3, 2012.

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• Emotional Literacy means being able to recognise what you are feeling, so that it doesn't interfere with thinking. It becomes another dimension to draw upon when making decisions or encountering situations. Emotional expression by contrast can mean being driven by emotions, so that it isn't possible to think. These two things are often confused, because we are still uncomfortable with the idea of the validity of feelings.

  Susie Orbach

  Confused, Mean, Emotional

  "Bite by bite to success" by Susie Steiner, www.theguardian.com. January 4, 2002.

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• Our idea of a healthy body is so destabilised that insecure people have come to bolster their own bodies by deeming others - those with fat bodies - less worthy, less capable and less employable.

  Susie Orbach

  Insecure, Ideas, People

  "'Bodies are a big business'". Interview with Julia Korbik, www.theeuropean-magazine.com. December 29, 2014.

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• No one likes to feel helpless. We find it psychologically unbearable and inside ourselves we may try to make ourselves part author of our misfortune rather than simply the recipient of it.

  Susie Orbach

  Trying, May, Likes

  "The Chetham music school trial shows therapy is crucial for sex abuse victims" by Susie Orbach, www.theguardian.com. February 12, 2013.

  9 Copy quote

• Bodies are becoming our personal mission to tame, extend and perfect.

  Susie Orbach

  Perfect, Body, Becoming

  Susie Orbach (2010). “Bodies”, p.25, Profile Books

  7 Copy quote

• Fat is a way of saying no to powerlessness and self-denial.

  Susie Orbach

  Self, Denial, Way

  Susie Orbach (1997). “Fat is a Feminist Issue: The Anti-diet Guide for Women”, Bbs Publishing Corporation

  9 Copy quote

• A wanted pregnancy as much as a dreaded pregnancy can play differently than all one's previous imaginings.

  Susie Orbach

  Pregnancy, Play, Wanted

  "Abortion services aren't about selling soap powder or shoes" by Susie Orbach, www.theguardian.com. September 3, 2011.

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• Fat people are so rarely included in visual culture that fat is perceived as a blot on the landscape of sleek and slim.

  Susie Orbach

  People, Culture, Landscape

  "Fat is a prejudice issue" by Susie Orbach, www.theguardian.com. May 3, 2012.

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• Fat is a social disease, and fat is a feminist issue.

  Susie Orbach

  Issues, Feminist, Disease

  Susie Orbach (1988). “Fat is a Feminist Issue ...: How to Lose Weight Permanently - Without Dieting”, Hutchinson

  8 Copy quote

• Beauty has been democratised. No longer the preserve of movie stars and models but available to all. But while the invitation to beauty is welcomed, it has become not so much an option as an imperative.

  Susie Orbach

  Stars, Movie Star, Invitations

  "Body confidence and the new political line on beauty" by Susie Orbach, www.theguardian.com. April 20, 2012.

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• Being able to provoke a different point of view to the standard current ideological or political perspective as played out in conventional newspaper or radio reportage is what a public intellectual does. But it's not merely about being oppositional, because that's too negative.

  Susie Orbach

  Views, Perspective, Political

  "Britain's intellectuals: leading thinkers have their say". www.theguardian.com. May 7, 2011.

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• I thought of the analyst Winnicott's observation: 'It is a joy to be hidden but disaster not to be found'.

  Susie Orbach

  Joy, Disaster, Analysts

  12 Copy quote

• Mothers unconsciously allow more latitude to sons, and open encouragement, and with daughters they treat them as they would treat themselves.

  Susie Orbach

  Inspiring, Mothers Day, Daughter

  "Are mothers harder on their daughters - and if so, why?" by Jenny Colgan, Luisa Dillner, Anne Karpf, Susie Orbach, www.theguardian.com. October 6, 2010.

  7 Copy quote

• We know that ever woman wants to be thin. Our images of womanhood are almost synonymous with thinness.

  Susie Orbach

  Food, Want, Thinness

  Susie Orbach (1997). “Fat is a Feminist Issue: The Anti-diet Guide for Women”, Bbs Publishing Corporation

  7 Copy quote

• There are so many young women who tip over into being a facsimile: they don't really inhabit their lives or their bodies.

  Susie Orbach

  Body, Young, Young Women

  Interview with Aida Edemariam, www.theguardian.com. February 26, 2011.

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• In general, the Western body has become a global brand.

  Susie Orbach

  Body, Brands, Western

  4 Copy quote

• I'm a therapist and that fascinates people because they think I carry secrets.

  Susie Orbach

  Thinking, People, Secret

  4 Copy quote

• When they took TV to Fiji they found that after 3 years nearly 12 girls out of 100 were over the toilet bowls with bulimia because they felt inferior.

  Susie Orbach

  Girl, Years, Tvs

  9 Copy quote

• If you continually diet, you are putting your body in a quasi-famine situation. It slows your metabolism down and breaks the thermostat. Diets don't work. They don't help you understand why you're eating more than your body wanted in the first place.

  Susie Orbach

  Body, Down And, Firsts

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• Celebrity culture is something that pains me.

  Susie Orbach

  Pain, Culture, Celebrity Culture

  53 Copy quote

• We accept there's an emotional aspect to life. But we're not very developed in our ways of understanding it.

  Susie Orbach

  Emotional, Understanding, Way

  "Britain's intellectuals: leading thinkers have their say". www.theguardian.com. May 7, 2011.

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• Boys, young men, men of all ages are being captivated by the new visual grammar which pushes men to pout and posture.

  Susie Orbach

  Boys, Men, Age

  "Body uniformity? Don't do it, guys" by Susie Orbach, www.theguardian.com. May 10, 2010.

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