Yet another monumental icon of society and culture has left us.
On Thursday, the news broke that feminist activist and journalist Gloria Steinem passed away at the age of 92.
Throughout her lifetime of service, Steinem stood on the front lines in the quest for gender equality. She broke ground as a journalist, launching the influential Ms. Magazine, which gave women a voice in media that was controlled by women. Steinem was an instrumental presence during the second-wave feminist movement, or Women’s
Liberation, advocating for reproductive freedom, equal pay and combating sexual harassment in the workplace.
She founded the National Women’s Political Caucus and the Ms. Foundation to give women a voice in politics. Steinem also co-founded the Women’s Media Center to expand women’s involvement in media through training, scholarship and content creation.
She left behind a body of work that has pushed society forward.
It was that body of work that naturally found a home in the feminist world of women’s sports, and especially women’s basketball.
One of the first to come out and celebrate Steinem’s life was Minnesota Lynx head coach Cheryl Reeve, who posted a tribute on social media:
Thank you Gloria Steinem for a lifetime of devotion to equality. You paved the way for the life I live today. In whatever small way I can, I will carry the torch of equality so that the next generation of girls/women can live as you dreamed of for them.
We’ll never solve the feminization of power until we solve the masculinity of wealth.
Steinem didn’t have a background in sports. She set out to be a journalist in honor of her mother, who had to give up her career to take care of her family. Steinem eventually became involved in activism during the turbulent 1960s and 1970s.
During that time, a revolution was taking shape within a revolution. The 1970s marked the beginning of a new era for women’s sports, with the passage of Title IX in 1972 opening doors for women to take up sports with greater protection and investment than ever before.
Fast forward to 2026, and women’s sports, and particularly women’s basketball, have never been more visible and popular. And it took the same grassroots efforts Steinem put into motion to get the game to where it is today.
Nneka Ogwumike, Napheesa Collier and others got the landmark CBA deal across the finish line in March of this year, leading to higher salaries and increased benefits.
The WNBA also has prided itself on playing with a purpose.
When Maya Moore, Tina Charles and others wore shirts that read “Change Starts with Us” in the summer of 2016 to demand accountability in light of police violence towards Black Americans, their approach was right out of the Steinem playbook of women leading the way for social change. (This was one month before Colin Kaepernick took a knee, by the way.)
When the players huddled in the COVID bubble in Orlando decided to form a united front through the power of the vote, it got Rev. Raphael Warnock into the United States Senate out of the state of Georgia over then-Atlanta Dream owner Kelly Loeffler (who made critical remarks about the Black Lives Matter movement),
Their promotion of voting and the election of Warnock lived up to something Steinem wrote in her 2014 book, My Life on the Road:
Voting isn’t the most we can do, but the least. To have a democracy, you have to want one
The WNBA is also picking up where second-wave feminism arguably left off by including and understanding the role of men in the fight for gender equality.
And in this era where WNBA players are becoming household names in large numbers, they are not only role models for young girls, but they have also inspired a generation of young boys to grow up loving women’s basketball.
Contrary to what some attribute to feminism, Steinem sought men as allies in the fight for equality because there was something there for men as well.
It’s unknown as to whether Steinem was a regular consumer of the WNBA, but if she was, or if it was asked of her, she would have relished seeing a boy’s eye light up at seeing Caitlin Clark hit a 3 from the logo or Angel Reese grabbing board after board with sheer fire or A’ja Wilson doing it all.
Her impact is in every WNBA arena; all you have to do is look.
