gloria steinem still fights for your rights
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The Wonder Woman of Feminism Flies into Town
he loved the superhero’s truth-coaxing lasso. She slapped the comic-book character on the cover of the first issue of her feminist digest, Ms. magazine. And to this day, she buys her bracelets in pairs as a nod to the Amazon princess’s bulletdeflecting bangles. Gloria Steinem grew up idolizing Wonder Woman. The rest of us grew up idolizing Gloria Steinem. From her early days as a brazen journalist exposing the Playboy Club’s sexist policies while working as an undercover bunny to her “no more asking daddy” speech before a sea of pink pussy hats at the Women’s March on Washington in January, Steinem, who’s now 82 years old, has been the enduring icon of the feminist movement. Courageous and compassionate, tireless and unifying, stylish and funny, she is the original Nasty Woman — the one who taught us all, nevertheless, to persist. A Smith College grad, Steinem wrote for Esquire and Cosmopolitan in the early ’60s, but it was her 1969 article “After Black Power, Women’s Liberation” that launched her to fame as a feminist leader and activist. She campaigned for the Equal Rights Amendment, cofounded the National Women’s Political Caucus, and has spoken out or written against female genital mutilation and pornography, and in favor of same-sex marriage by and reproductive freedom. StarShine She has been arrested for protesting apartheid in South Africa roShell and received this country’s Presidential Medal of Freedom. And in the pouty face of a new commander in chief who brags about grabbing women and vows to defund Planned Parenthood — and a Senate that silenced Elizabeth Warren mid-speech (“It was outrageous to interrupt her,” Steinem says) — our fight is far from over. “At first, feminists were assumed to be only discontented suburban housewives,” she writes in her latest book, My Life on the Road. “Then a small bunch of women’s libbers, bra-burners and radicals. Then women on welfare. Then briefcase-carrying imitations of male executives. Then unfulfilled women who forgot to have children. Then women voters responsible for a gender gap that really could decide elections. “That last was too dangerous, so suddenly we were told we were in a post-feminist age so we would relax. Stop. Quit.” That doesn’t look like it’s going to happen anytime soon, as evidenced by a conversation I had with feminism’s own Wonder Woman last month. Hindsight is 20/20, but if you’re being completely honest … were you as shocked as the rest of us on November 9? It may be illogical to say so, but I was less surprised that Hillary Clinton lost than that [Trump] won. He seemed and continues to seem so divorced from fact and rationality and empathetic behavior that I was shocked. In your new book, you say if you’d been listening to nothing but the media all these years rather than seeing the nation with your own eyes, you’d be a much more discouraged person. Has travel helped you make sense of this election? Yes. First of all, the media tends to only consider conflict news, sometimes in the extreme.“If it bleeds, it leads.” Secondly, it tends to see stories as having two sides when, in fact, they may have three or 12 sides. And finally, the media doesn’t reflect the population very well. There are very few general publications or outlets of any kind that look like the country. How do we grapple with the 53 percent of white women who voted for Trump? I was surprised by that — but maybe not as surprised as some other people because, remember, it was not poor Chinese women who had their feet bound; it was rich Chinese women. If you’re a woman who is economically dependent, and you’re pretty sure that you’re one man away from welfare, you’re more likely to vote for your husband’s interests and maybe not even see your own. Well-to-do women get better medical care and food and clothing — but we’re more likely to have our minds restricted. There’s a whole generation of girls who don’t know much about the women’s movement — the first one! — and some who don’t know who Gloria Steinem is. The point is not that they know who I am. The point is that they know who they are.
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Gloria Steinem will speak to a sold-out crowd at the Arlington Theatre (1317 State St.) on Thursday, March 2, at 7:30 p.m., but fans can buy tickets ($5-$10) to watch the event simulcast live at UCSB Campbell Hall on artsandlectures.sa.ucsb.edu. See independent.com/gloria.
glenn lowson
It wasn’t long ago that celebrities such as Katy Perry and Lady Gaga were telling fan magazines they didn’t consider themselves feminists. Was there any part of you that thought maybe that’s a good thing because it means your generation’s work was a success and … these young women can take their rights for granted? No, I would have to be deaf, dumb, and blind to think that. [Laughs.] cont’d >>>
independent.com
MarcH 2, 2017
THE INDEPENDENT
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