Gloria Steinem, feminist trailblazer and co-founder of Ms magazine, dies at 92

Gloria Steinem, the American writer, lecturer, activist and feminist organiser who fought for Gender equality, died at the age of 92 on Wednesday. Her foundation announced her death in an Instagram post on Thursday. She died “surrounded by some of the many who loved her,” said the foundation in the statement.

“Gloria’s near-century on earth were years well-lived, and she continued working for equality until the very end,” said the statement. She was awarded for her decade-long service as advocating for women’s rights in 2013 with the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the United Nations’ Society of Writers Award and the National Gay Rights Advocates Award.

Steinem's journey to feminism

Steinem was born on March 25, 1934, in Toledo, Ohio. She was the younger of two daughters. Her father was a travelling antique dealer. Because the family moved frequently, she did not attend school regularly till seventh standard. Her grandmother served as chair of the educational committee of the National Woman Suffrage Association and helped rescue members of her family who were Jewish from Germany in the 1930s.

Her mother suffered from a mental breakdown and depression after she separated from her father. She used to live with her mother and take care of her since the age of 11, which impacted her thinking. She once famously said she had taken care of a big baby and does not want a young one.

In the 1960s, after graduating, she tried to work in a male-dominated field of 1960s journalism, where she was often sexualised and dismissed for her Gender.

In 1963, she worked as a cocktail waitress to write the groundbreaking expose, "A Bunny's ⁠Tale," about the poor and sexist working conditions of the playboy bunnies. The story effectively launched her career.

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Steinem became one of the faces of the second wave of feminism in the 1960s and 70s, bridging the gap between activism and media representation, due to her media-savvy profile. Though she identified herself as a radical feminist, she was more of the liberal and mainstream face of second-wave feminism, advocating for women’s rights in the workplace, the right to abortion and sex education. During her time, the nascent feminist movement was mostly associated with white upper-class women. She was a white, college-educated woman and aware of her privileges. She frequently partnered with Black Feminist Dorothy Pitman Hughes and Margaret Sloan-Hunte to emphasise the identity of the women of colour in the narrative of the movement. In an influential 1969 article for New York Magazine, “After Black Power, Women’s Liberation, she drew parallels between Black Power Movement and the feminist movement, urging them to together form a “revolutionary vanguard”. Along with Dorothy Pitman Hughes, she co-founded Ms Magazine in 1972, which is considered to be the first national American feminist magazine.

Controversies and criticisms

Despite being an avid supporter of reproductive freedom, Steinem kept her abortion secret for roughly 10 years. She always criticised marriage but later married David Bale, father of the Hollywood Star Christian Bale. She was also accused of collaborating with the CIA, and participating in events sponsored by CIA-funded organisations in the 1950s. A 2016 New York Times profile of her claimed she “started her career as a C.I.A. operative,” which she promptly disputed.

“I was never told what to say or do at two Soviet-led youth festivals more than a half-century ago where American attendance was funded by C.I.A.-backed foundations,” she wrote in response.

She also made the controversial argument that the relationship between Former US Presidnet Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky was not sexual harassment, which she later said: “wouldn’t write the same thing now.”