One Hour of Babysitting, One Copy of Ms.
Updated: Oct 8
How Gloria Steinem Ignited My World
(Excerpts from this post will be featured in an upcoming issue of Trill Magazine)
Gloria Steinem came into my life when I was a teenager moping over a bad breakup, and in a very real way, she helped pull me out of the doldrums. Her message opened my eyes to the idea that my life, identity and happiness did not have to depend on a man. It sounds simple now, but for a teenage girl at that time, it was transformative.
I took my I took my babysitting money, earned at $1 an hour, and bought the first issue of Ms. magazine for $1, the one with that iconic Wonder Woman cover. I absorbed both the strength of that image and the words inside. Suddenly, there seemed to be possibilities for girls and women that I never really considered.
I started volunteering at Head Start, paying particular attention to girls who were being left out or overshadowed and like Gloria, focusing on racial justice. When I entered college, I created an individual student major in "Gender Correlates of Human Behavior," continued volunteering at a Head Start program near my upstate New York campus and completed a culminating project examining gender roles in early childhood education.
And I kept following Gloria.
I read Ms., shared it with friends, followed her writing and, after moving back to the New York City area, attended community forums and teach-ins where she spoke. Every encounter seemed to open another door.
One of her lines that stayed with me was, "We can tell our values by looking at our checkbook stubs." I have tried to live that principle ever since, supporting the organizations, causes and candidates that reflect the values I say I believe in, (especially as we approach the all-important midterm elections!).
By my twenties, feminism wasn't something I simply read about. I was living it. I served as Boston NOW’s (National Organization for Women) Education Task Force Chair, then multiple terms as Vice President and President. When the Equal Rights Amendment was still fighting for ratification, I traveled to Utah as with NOW’s ERA "missionary project," going door to door trying to build support at a time when the Mormon Church was mobilizing heavily against ratification. I often found myself channeling Steinem's historic Senate testimony, challenging myths about sex differences and explaining why constitutional equality mattered to men, as well as women.
That last point was important to me. Including men in feminist work (and dating them!) was controversial, but Gloria understood that inflexible gender roles damage men, too. Gender equality gives men permission to mitigate expectations of toughness, dominance and being hypermasculine just as it frees women from rigid prescribed roles. And just as my Black friends tell me to keep doing racial justice work as “white folks listen to other white folks”, men also listen to other men and are necessary allies in the movement.
My activism expanded into statewide coalitions bringing together women's rights, LGBTQ, reproductive rights, peace and racial justice organizations. Professionally, I became President of the Northeast Coalition of Educational Leaders, promoting women in school leadership, and when I worked in a vocational high school I focused on non-traditional roles for female students with an eye towards helping my students move out of poverty into higher-paying fields.
Education eventually became another way for me to carry those ideas forward. After leaving public school administration, I now teach graduate education courses and infuse questions of gender, race, culture, sexuality and disability throughout my teaching. I was thrilled to help launch a master's program in Diverse and Equitable Instruction focused on culturally responsive educational practices, and planning on honoring Gloria by sharing more of her writings in my upcoming classes.
Today I also chair a progressive women's political organization, so five decades after I first picked up Ms., I am still doing work that traces directly back to the possibilities Gloria helped me see as a teenager.
Her influence on women collectively is almost impossible to measure. Ms. magazine gave women a publication that took their lives, ideas and political concerns seriously and opened pathways for women journalists. She helped create institutions rather than simply becoming an individual celebrity. Take Our Daughters to Work Day originally centered girls at a moment when their aspirations and self-confidence were too often narrowing. The Ms. Foundation supported Free to Be... You and Me and other efforts to give children nonsexist, multiracial images of what girls and boys could become.
And there was something else about Gloria that mattered to me personally: her style, in both senses of that word. Women active in the feminist movement endured ugly stereotypes and slurs. As I walked out of the Boston NOW office, I was often called "dyke," "man-hater," or worse. Gloria demonstrated that there was no single way a feminist had to look or live. I could fight fiercely for women's equality, have close relationships with men (even married one!), enjoy feminine clothes and simply be myself. Feminism wasn't about trading one set of rules for another.
Her interpersonal style influenced me too. She listened. She asked questions. She knew leadership didn’t mean lecturing people. That helped shape how I have worked with students and younger women throughout my career: listen more than you talk, help people discover their own power, encourage girls to trust their gut, value themselves and understand that they don't have to play by somebody else's rules.
When I heard that Gloria had died, it felt like a gut punch. She was a presence in my life from adolescence until now, through her writing, persona, and the movement she helped build.
But that’s’ why I know her story doesn’t end with her death. I can trace choices I made at 17, 25, 40 and 62 back to doors Gloria helped open. Multiply that by countless women who read her works, listened to her speak, became journalists due to Ms., ran for office, organized, taught, wrote, challenged expectations or simply imagined a larger life for themselves, and you begin to understand her cultural impact.
Her legacy isn't just what Gloria Steinem accomplished. It is what millions of women went on to do because she convinced us that we could, and I know she lives on in the work I continue to do.
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