“This is what 50 looks like,” Gloria Steinem said to raucous cheers from the several hundred people, mostly women, gathered at a luncheon event in Phoenix, now 42 years ago. When societal forces so often work to make women feel invisible as they age, her rallying cry for those with hard-won wisdom to take up space resonated with me.
That was the first time I ever saw the woman who, for many, symbolized American feminism for decades. Gloria Steinem’s death earlier this month at the age of 92 has filled social media feeds with outpourings of gratitudeand recollections of how she touched so many lives.
By the time I arrived at that luncheon, she had already unknowingly changed mine. Years before, when I was a young wife and mother of three living in West Texas, I stumbled across Ms. Magazine, one of the many feminist organizations that Steinem helped start.
Ms. Magazine was instrumental in showing me that I could construct a life of my own, beyond the culturally prescribed roles of wife and mother. But it also let me know that I could choose those roles if that was something that I wanted.
I would go on to serve as President and CEO of Planned Parenthood Federation of America and start my own organization dedicated to gender parity, Take The Lead. That day in 1984, Gloria’s joy in being exactly who she was captivated me, along with her exuberant embrace of her age and her unapologetic articulation of feminist values.
Her unapologetic joy is what I am going to remember the most about Gloria Steinem. She broke boundaries and blazed trails, certainly. But in the face of an unending fight, she approached it with an indefatigable, as she described it, “hopeaholic” attitude. I think that is one of the most enduring parts of her legacy.
‘When Gloria Steinem asks you to come to a meeting, you tend to go.’
Steinem was a journalist who stepped into a leadership role in an activist movement whose time had come. She was a woman who often said she disliked controversy but rode the wave of it anyway, and in doing so, captured its energy to drive the movement forward. She was far from alone in these achievements, as she readily and regularly acknowledged.
The changes wrought by the feminist movement allowed me to develop my talents. I built a small Planned Parenthood affiliate into a medium-sized one, and then a medium-sized affiliate into one of the largest in the country. I spent my last nine years at Planned Parenthood as the organization’s national president.
During this time, I began to get acquainted with Gloria Steinem, the woman. Gloria was always willing to use her influence on behalf of the causes she believed in and to amplify the voices of others.
She was gracious and never stood on ceremony. We often joked that the name “Gloria” required us to distinguish each other, so we added our middle names. She became “Gloria Marie” and I, “Gloria Ann.” When she was asked to speak, demonstrate and fundraise, she would fly coach across the country with one small duffel bag in hand and a jacket that could be thrown over her black pants and top if she needed to upgrade her attire for an event.
I’ll never forget canvassing voters door to door with her in 2004 and the priceless looks on people’s faces when they saw Gloria Steinem standing on their front steps.
Shortly after I left Planned Parenthood in 2005 to write the book that would become the basis for Take The Lead, she invited me to a meeting in a basement somewhere in midtown Manhattan. I can’t remember where, but when Gloria Steinem asks you to come to a meeting, you tend to go.
That year was an inflection point for those of us who had been working for women’s equality for decades and feared correctly that many of the advances women had made were being seriously threatened. But Gloria’s antidote to fear and despair was hope through collective action.
Many women in media and entertainment were in attendance that day, including journalist and President and CEO of the ERA Coalition Carol Jenkins, then-president of PBS Pat Mitchell, actor and activist Jane Fonda, and former Ms. Magazine editor-in-chief Robin Morgan. The Women’s Media Center was born out of that meeting.
We wanted to make women more visible and powerful in the media, to have more influence over what stories were told and by whom.
‘We are the leaders we have been looking for’
In her forthcoming book, “An Unexpected Life” — out later this month — Steinem wrote, “I’ve come to know that we all learn from diversity, not from sameness. To be with people of different ages, races, and experiences is a gift.”
I am grateful for the many lessons I learned from Gloria Steinem. “Telling your story is the greatest gift you can give to others,” is one I will always remember.
But I think that the most deeply felt lesson she wanted to impart, was as she often said, “We are linked, not ranked.” To me, that was never just a nice sentiment. It was an instruction and a legacy.
That is important in this moment when people are asking who could possibly step into Gloria’s role as “The Feminist Leader.” She, more than anyone, understood that we are the leaders we have been looking for.
And so, it is time for each of us to go forward, and lead with courage, intention, determination, and hope. What are you going to do?
Gloria Feldt is the co-founder and president of Take The Lead, a nonprofit organization with the boundary breaking mission of gender parity across all sectors. She is the author of “Intentioning: Sex, Power, Pandemics, and How Women Will Take the Lead for (Everyone’s) Good.”
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