GLORIA STEINEM AND THE DOMESTICATION OF THE WOMEN'S MOVEMENT
Gloria Steinem became the most famous establishment face of American feminism. But her political legacy is also one that considerably undermined women's liberation.
Before becoming a feminist celebrity, Steinem directed the Independent Research Service, secretly financed by the CIA to send anti-communists to the 1959 Vienna and 1962 Helsinki World Youth Festivals to carry out pro-imperialist propaganda. When the CIA connection was exposed, Steinem acknowledged and defended it.
This was consistent with the politics she subsequently represented: liberal anti-communism, support for American capitalism, and confidence in the institutions of the existing political order.
The women's liberation movement of the 1960s and 1970s was potentially far more radical. Millions of working women demanded equal pay, childcare, reproductive freedom and economic independence. Mass demonstrations placed abortion rights and the Equal Rights Amendment on the national political agenda.
Steinem helped channel much of this insurgent movement toward lobbying, electoral campaigns and loyalty to the Democrat Party. She became a millionaire and embodied a bourgeois feminism increasingly concerned with middle-class and wealthy women's advancement rather than transforming the material conditions confronting working-class women.
The contradiction was enormous. The Democrat Party itself contained powerful forces hostile to abortion rights and the ERA. The 1972 Democratic National Convention rejected an abortion-rights plank. In 1976, Democrat Jimmy Carter opposed federal funding for abortion and declared that government should not attempt to make opportunities equal. Carter campaigned for and signed the Hyde Amendment stripping millions of poor women of meaningful access to abortion.
Yet liberal feminism increasingly instructed women to look toward Democrat politicians, courts and professional lobbying organizations rather than building an independent mass movement.
The consequences were disastrous. The ERA passed Congress in 1972 but died three states short of ratification in 1982. Instead of drawing the necessary conclusions from that defeat, the institutional women's movement became still more closely integrated into Democratic electoral politics.
Abortion rights followed the same trajectory. Bill Clinton popularized the formula that abortion should be “safe, legal and rare.” Hillary Clinton repeatedly embraced and restated that formulation, including as a senator and presidential candidate. Instead of unapologetically defending abortion as a woman's right, Democrat leaders accepted the reactionary premise that abortion was something regrettable that should be minimized.
Meanwhile, working-class women did not benefit from female politicians, executives and millionaires. They needed decent wages, strong unions, universal childcare, paid maternity leave, healthcare, housing and unrestricted reproductive freedom.
After half a century of dependence upon Democrat politicians and the Supreme Court, Roe v. Wade was overturned in 2022.
It would be wrong to hold Steinem personally responsible for every defeat suffered by American women, or to claim that she opposed abortion rights or the ERA. She supported both.
However, Steinem personified a bourgeois feminist strategy that subordinated the independent struggle of women to capitalism and the Democrat Party. Unfortunately that political legacy continues to undercut the fight for women's rights today, as most middle class "feminists" remain loyal to the Democrat Party that will never allow a real fight for women's rights.
A feminism capable of producing women senators, corporate executives and millionaires while millions of working women remain without childcare, adequate healthcare or reproductive rights has achieved equality principally for wealthier women. That is not women's liberation.
Only the working class has a material vested interest in the full emancipation and equality for all women.
___________________
Inside the Second Wave of Feminism
Boston Female Liberation, 1968-1972 An Account by Participants
Best title to "commemorate" GS yet.
An apt obituary. Thanks.
GLORIA STEINEM AND THE DOMESTICATION OF THE WOMEN'S MOVEMENT
Gloria Steinem became the most famous establishment face of American feminism. But her political legacy is also one that considerably undermined women's liberation.
Before becoming a feminist celebrity, Steinem directed the Independent Research Service, secretly financed by the CIA to send anti-communists to the 1959 Vienna and 1962 Helsinki World Youth Festivals to carry out pro-imperialist propaganda. When the CIA connection was exposed, Steinem acknowledged and defended it.
This was consistent with the politics she subsequently represented: liberal anti-communism, support for American capitalism, and confidence in the institutions of the existing political order.
The women's liberation movement of the 1960s and 1970s was potentially far more radical. Millions of working women demanded equal pay, childcare, reproductive freedom and economic independence. Mass demonstrations placed abortion rights and the Equal Rights Amendment on the national political agenda.
Steinem helped channel much of this insurgent movement toward lobbying, electoral campaigns and loyalty to the Democrat Party. She became a millionaire and embodied a bourgeois feminism increasingly concerned with middle-class and wealthy women's advancement rather than transforming the material conditions confronting working-class women.
The contradiction was enormous. The Democrat Party itself contained powerful forces hostile to abortion rights and the ERA. The 1972 Democratic National Convention rejected an abortion-rights plank. In 1976, Democrat Jimmy Carter opposed federal funding for abortion and declared that government should not attempt to make opportunities equal. Carter campaigned for and signed the Hyde Amendment stripping millions of poor women of meaningful access to abortion.
Yet liberal feminism increasingly instructed women to look toward Democrat politicians, courts and professional lobbying organizations rather than building an independent mass movement.
The consequences were disastrous. The ERA passed Congress in 1972 but died three states short of ratification in 1982. Instead of drawing the necessary conclusions from that defeat, the institutional women's movement became still more closely integrated into Democratic electoral politics.
Abortion rights followed the same trajectory. Bill Clinton popularized the formula that abortion should be “safe, legal and rare.” Hillary Clinton repeatedly embraced and restated that formulation, including as a senator and presidential candidate. Instead of unapologetically defending abortion as a woman's right, Democrat leaders accepted the reactionary premise that abortion was something regrettable that should be minimized.
Meanwhile, working-class women did not benefit from female politicians, executives and millionaires. They needed decent wages, strong unions, universal childcare, paid maternity leave, healthcare, housing and unrestricted reproductive freedom.
After half a century of dependence upon Democrat politicians and the Supreme Court, Roe v. Wade was overturned in 2022.
It would be wrong to hold Steinem personally responsible for every defeat suffered by American women, or to claim that she opposed abortion rights or the ERA. She supported both.
However, Steinem personified a bourgeois feminist strategy that subordinated the independent struggle of women to capitalism and the Democrat Party. Unfortunately that political legacy continues to undercut the fight for women's rights today, as most middle class "feminists" remain loyal to the Democrat Party that will never allow a real fight for women's rights.
A feminism capable of producing women senators, corporate executives and millionaires while millions of working women remain without childcare, adequate healthcare or reproductive rights has achieved equality principally for wealthier women. That is not women's liberation.
Only the working class has a material vested interest in the full emancipation and equality for all women.
___________________
Inside the Second Wave of Feminism
Boston Female Liberation, 1968-1972 An Account by Participants
by Nancy Rosenstock
https://www.haymarketbooks.org/books/1887-inside-the-second-wave-of-feminism
So, Caitlin…
Tell us how you really feel… 🤠
🤣🤣
Gloria was just another cheap jew whore piece of shit.
....and she dated Henry Kissinger
OMG! Good luck doesn't rub off when you shake hands with him.
...and Angela Jolie worked for MI6.
Well done. That’s some rip-roarin’ writin’ - did your keyboard melt in the process?!?
Good riddance.
Sorry not sorry. 😁