Journalist Gloria Steinem, one of the most influential feminist activists in the United States, has died at age 92, her foundation announced Thursday on its Instagram account. From fighting for abortion to creating pioneering feminist media in the 1970s, this tireless traveler has worked for equality her entire life.

Published on: 09/03/2026 - 1:37 p.m.

A major figure in feminism has passed away. American journalist and essayist Gloria Steinem died at age 92 on Wednesday September 2, her foundation announced Thursday on its Instagram account.

Before becoming one of the leaders of this movement, Gloria Steinem cut her teeth in journalism at the dawn of the 1960s, a time when many American women still had to obtain authorization from their husbands to open a bank account.

In her articles, she denounces the inequalities suffered by her peers. She became known in 1963 by recounting her infiltration among the waitresses in bustiers and rabbit ears in a Hugh Hefner's Playboy club, and the ambient sexism.

But it was while covering a meeting where women who had had abortions spoke that she said she had a feminist breakthrough in 1969.

The founding experience of abortion

“It gave meaning to my own experience – I had had an abortion and told no one,” the activist later wrote in New York Magazine.

The London doctor who had performed an abortion - then illegal - in 1957 had made her promise two things: "first that you will not reveal my name to anyone. Second, that you will do what you want with your life".

Little by little, Gloria Steinem moves from writing to public speaking, and becomes more and more clearly involved.

However, giving a speech was scary for a young woman lacking self-confidence. “Often I knew what I wanted, but I worried about what people would think,” she confided to AFP in 2019.

“If I had to do it again, I would waste less time hesitating.”

Senior activist

Born in Ohio on March 25, 1934, Gloria Steinem grew up following the nomadic lifestyle of her father, a traveling antiques salesman, until her parents divorced when she was 10 years old. After the separation, she has to take care of her mother, who is prone to depression.

The taste for traveling remains with him. She spent her life traveling the United States and the world, from conference to event - but never learning to drive.

“For 20 years, not a week went by without me taking a plane,” she recalls in New York Magazine.

Age or illnesses, including breast cancer in the late 1980s, did not dampen this passion.

Throughout her travels, Gloria Steinem became one of the essential faces of the feminist movement. In the 1970s, she founded Ms. Magazine and the National Women's Political Caucus, or organized the first national women's conference in Houston.

But her slim physique, mini-skirts and brief experience as a Playboy Bunny are used to attack her credibility. “I was accused of being noticed because of my 'beauty,'” she tells the New Yorker.

Her personal life is also scrutinized: without children or husband, she does not fit into boxes.

At 66, Gloria Steinem married for the first time, to businessman David Bale, father of actor Christian Bale.

"I haven't changed. Marriage has changed," she responds to a journalist who asks her why she changed her position on celibacy.

Three years after their wedding, David Bale died of cerebral lymphoma at age 62.

On all fronts

Representative of a feminism from another time in the eyes of certain young activists, Gloria Steinem does not escape criticism, who criticize her, for example, for her defense in 1998 of President Bill Clinton, accused of sexual harassment.

To display this YouTube content, it is necessary to authorize audience measurement and advertising cookies.

An extension in your browser appears to be blocking the loading of the video player. To be able to watch this content, you must disable or uninstall it.

In 2016, when Hillary Clinton seemed one step away from becoming the country's first president but struggling to secure the female vote, she suggested that young girls liked her rival Bernie Sanders because "the boys are with (him)" - before apologizing.

Gloria Steinem remains in all the fights, and goes from university to university to give speeches.

In 2022, when the Supreme Court buries the “Roe v. Wade” ruling guaranteeing the right to abortion, the activist assures that “this will only prevent abortions from being safe” and calls on American women to fight.

After a life spent fighting against injustices, she explained to AFP in 2019 that "the role of older people like me is to have hope, because we remember periods when it was worse".

Also readHow the Trump administration rolled back rights and freedoms in the United States

With AFP

The content you are trying to access does not exist or is no longer available.