Gloria Steinem Obituary: A Feminist Organizer and Her Everyday Rebellion

Gloria Steinem describes herself on her website as a “feminist organizer”, real, like most women. Until the end, she hosted Talking Circles in her New York home, where people gathered for the clumsy activism work but also for the more subtle community building. This “momentum building” is what Steinem will always be remembered for.

The practice of gathering in a group where everyone is heard was inspired by India, where Steinem spent two years after graduating from Smith College, Massachusetts, USA in 1956. She came to India every few years and was closely associated with Ruchira Gupta, who founded Apne Aap Women Worldwide, a non-profit organization working to end sex trafficking. Steinem chaired Apne Aap’s advisory committee and was a “third parent” to Ms. Gupta.

Ms. Gupta says their relationship goes back to the 1990s. “She heard about my work through mutual friends and wanted to see it. I took her in an autorickshaw to the slums of Delhi where I organized some women. It started raining and I was hoping the women would show up,” she says. There, in front of the demolished building, Steinem spoke to the women about the abortion she had had in her youth. “She spoke English; I translated, but the women connected with her story. They started talking about their abortion experiences.” Later, Steinem told Ms. Gupta something she would always remember: “Honor your sister with the truth.”

With Steinem, she co-edited Steinem’s essays on feminist thought: As if Women Matter: The Essential Gloria Steinem Reader.

In addition, Steinem has written nine books, including The Truth Will Set Us Free, But First It Will Piss Off!, Outrageous Acts, and Everyday Rebellions, and her memoir, An Unexpected Life, is scheduled for international release this September. She was also the founder and editor of Ms. magazine, which was the subject of the documentary Dear Ms.: A Revolution in Print (on JioHotstar in India).

Gloria Steinem appears in New York on February 17, 1970. | Photo credit: AP

Freelance journalist and writer Ammu Joseph, who lives and works outside Bengaluru, recalls spending about a week as a journalism student in Ms.’s office in 1976, four years after Ms. started and sold 3 million copies of its first issue. “She was already known to Stein at the time, but she didn’t let celebrities touch her until the end,” says Ms. Joseph, describing her as easy to be around. “She debunked the whole idea that feminists are humorless and ostentatious, and maybe it’s because of her that women are proud to call themselves feminists.” It gave Mrs. Joseph confidence and the idea that things could be different; that a column in the Eve’s Weekly humor section that had sexist undertones might be removed.

In 2007, when Steinem was invited to the annual meeting of the Network of Women in Media in India, Ms. Joseph, a founder and member of the women journalists’ community, said that Steinem didn’t just give a keynote speech and leave. “The next day she came to a session with the women from the community media. She interacted with them and was engaged and engaged,” Ms Joseph adds.

The first issue of Paní magazine featured an illustration of a blue Kali with eight arms, each holding an iron, a mirror, a telephone, a steering wheel, a typewriter, a frying pan, a duster and a clock. It discussed the issues of domestic violence, sexual harassment, and repealing laws that criminalized abortion. In fact, Steinem, who was a product of the second-wave feminist movement that posited that the personal was political, believed that women had the right to make decisions about their bodies. She reframed abortion as “reproductive freedom.”

Also read | Reading Gender

“She had the audacity to look at women’s issues and how the world is shaped by men, for men, and how women are secondary players in that,” says Sujata Sriram, professor at the School of Human Ecology, Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS), Mumbai. Ms. Sriram notes that Steinem’s influence in the Indian feminist movement is not widespread, but that a great deal of international research has emerged from her ideas. “Even simple things in design like looking at whether the stairs on the bus are made for the average height of women.”

Ms. Gupta, who is an activist, author and professor at New York University, recalls the time just before Steinem died. “We were lying in bed and she was talking about a woman in the Himalayas who lived to be 105. She joked that she would too, especially to see (US President Donald) Trump out of office.” This time, Ms. Gupta quips, “I’d like to discuss it with her now.” Because humor is one of the pillars of feminism.

Published – 03 Sep 2026 22:39 IST