Gloria Steinem and Her Surprising Views

Gloria Steinem, the defining voice of American feminism, died Wednesday at 92. While media reports focus on her iconic role in women’s rights, she leaves a record that is more complicated than the slogans and accolades surrounding her legacy. In fact, with seasoned wisdom, she came to hold views that contradict what’s known today as “wokeism.” She actually held views that many Christians could agree with.

As part of a college marketing syllabus bibliography, I read Steinem’s Outrageous Acts and Everyday Rebellions. The sections on media representations of women were most interesting, as media and advertising were my field of study. I’ve followed her, as well as fellow feminist and social critic Camille Paglia over the years. Why? Because while speaking out on behalf of women (I’m interested because I have two daughters), they were not afraid to confront a movement they believed had been hijacked. Both Steinem and Paglia would agree that the “second-wave” of feminism promoted a victim culture and male-bashing while ignoring biological realities.

Does that shock you? You most likely won’t hear that on the news this week. Read on.

The surprising views of Gloria Steinem

For 60 years, Steinem was primarily known for her abortion advocacy, Equal Rights, and women gaining political power. Yet other virtually ignored stances sat uncomfortably beside the currents driving the modern feminist movement. She found herself on the opposite side of far-left progressivism when it came to free speech, pornography, and even how modern feminism sometimes played lip service to true personal choice.

Cancel culture

One powerful example came during the George Floyd and Black Lives Matter movements. During that period in 2020, as billions of dollars of public and private property burned and protests turned deadly, Steinem joined more than 150 scholars and other writers in signing Harper’s “A Letter on Justice and Open Debate.” It served as a direct challenge to the emerging and dangerous culture of cancellation.

The free exchange of information and ideas, the lifeblood of a liberal society, is daily becoming more constricted

“The free exchange of information and ideas, the lifeblood of a liberal society, is daily becoming more constricted,” the signers warned. The letter focused particular criticism on “an intolerance of opposing views” and said editors were being fired, books withdrawn and professors investigated for quoting classic Western literature in class. The nation’s higher education system, it argued, should not allow “the stifling atmosphere” found at the time to crowd out risk-taking, honest disagreement and cancelled views which were often conservative views.

On silencing Trump supporters

While the document criticized President Trump, it strongly warned his opponents of the risk of hardened “dogma or coercion” that was common in the liberal environment. Steinman and the other signers said the solution was simply debate. In the political sphere, the way to respond to Trump policies and supporters, it stated, was to discuss the issues with “persuasion, not by trying to silence or wish them away.”

The state of academia

Concerning academia, she held particular criticism for feminist professors. She claimed feminist scholarship had become increasingly inaccessible and career-driven in an attempt to acquire tenure and fame. So out of touch with students had the professors become; simple principles of women’s rights had become so mired in political correctness and intellectual language that students could not understand the underlying ideals.

Pornography and prostitution

Pornography was another surprising area where she diverged from the views of younger feminists. In a PBS interview, Steinem virulently rejected the growing notion among today’s feminism that pornography was just “liberated” expression. She drew a sharp line between porn and mutual love. “Porn means female slavery,” she said in the interview.

Porn means female slavery

She also opposed the work of Amnesty International, which lobbied for worldwide decriminalization of prostitution. Steinem would not have it, calling prostitution “commercial rape” and “body invasion.” Decriminalization rewarded traffickers, she believed. “Legalisation keeps pimps, brothel keepers, and sex-slavers in freedom and riches,” she said in 2015.

The #MeToo movement

She was criticized by some in the #MeToo movement for saying the quiet part out loud. Not all allegations of sexual assault are true, she contended. “We have to believe women,” Steinem had once said at the height of the #MeToo movement in 2017. She later admitted, “I wouldn’t write the same thing now.”

Biology

In recent years, her attention turned to transgenderism which holds that biology can be altered surgically. In a remarkable January 2026 interview, Steinem admitted that “Sex is pretty permanent” while calling gender “cultural.” Her interview shocked those in the LGBT movement, contradicting the gender-identity rhetoric pushed in media, entertainment and on college campuses. While not believing you can change your biology, she supported transgender people’s autonomy, a view many conservatives could agree with.

On female presidents

During a Sept. 3 segment on CBS Morning News reporting on her death, one broadcaster said the Equal Rights movement had not yet succeeded in seeing a female U.S. president. Steinem, however, believed it was still about the qualifications of the candidate, not the biology.

It’s about the substance, not just the form

Once asked if she would celebrate a female president, she responded, “It would depend who it was.” Bringing it back to qualifications, she stated, “It’s about the substance, not just the form.” For Steinem, victory was more than just equal representation. True feminist victory came by earning it.

Race and gender in society

In views that land more on the right than the left, she believed that American society should downplay race, gender, and class. Her views evolved over time, landing somewhere in the center. For her, the ultimate goal was to remove discrimination, but the ultimate purpose was to lift the individual to be the best person they can be and produce an “individuality as part of a community.” She opposed breaking society apart with self-identifiers.

Her personal choices

Steinem was often the focus of an identifier assigned to her by activists and media. But her private life often defied the caricature of her in the feminist movement. After decades of criticising marriage, at the age of 66 she married environmental activist David Bale. Her decision came at a time when marriage had seemingly fallen out of favor and was derided in pop culture and “new-feminist” ideology.

“I hope this proves what feminists have always said, that feminism is about the ability to choose what’s right at each time of our lives,” she said.  While never having biological children, she was the stepmother to Bale’s children, including actor Christian Bale.

If you are surprised by Steinem’s views on these topics, it’s because they just are not reported to any great length. Ironically, in the end, she rebuffed even fellow feminists and progressive activists who also wanted to silence her voice as a woman.

I still disagree with Steinem on any number of issues, including abortion.  But as a girl dad, I appreciate the work she did in opening up opportunities for my daughters.

She remained a feminist, and her wide range of views show a woman not afraid to confront those attempting to hijack the movement for their own causes, or do her thinking for her.

–Dwight Widaman

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