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Page 4 If I Met Gloria Steinem, Should You Care? by Amanda L. Maris LAMBPA Opposing Views Nov. '97 I met Gloria Steinem. I shook her hand, got a picture with her, and gave her my Smith ID from last year so that she’d remember who I was when 1 sent her a letter. Why did I do this? Why did my co-reporter, Joy, begin to laugh at me hysterically? Is Gloria Steinem a star, someone we should all want to meet and hear? Well I can’t decide that for ev eryone nor do I wish to do so. But I am glad to have heard her speak and know that she is more than just a name that al most everyone in the women’s movement reveres. You want to know what’s so damn special about the editor and founder of Ms. Magazine? Honestly there is just not a simple answer. What she represents is a great feminist leader in the women’s movement. In a world where women often feel restrained and don’t always know why, where homemakers have the high est cases of violence and depression, some of us ask ourselves what is the source of this frustration and inner tur moil? Betty Friedan wrote a novel about this problem; the Feminine Mystique. So many have tackled women’s issues, searching for answers and solutions or just trying to make them visible. It is my opinion that Gloria Steinem is one of the tacklers who is just trying to make us aware of the deceiving system that is dominating our lives and consciousness, the source of our social and political re strictions, whether we are aware of it or not: patriarchy. Now we must take a step back, really clear our minds, because patriar chy in itself is a powerful word. When Steinem speaks about the problems that have arisen from it, she is NOT blaming men. She blames the system that she says has established a “sex and race caste sys tem” that is “fairly universal.” She re fers to places around the world that shared similar statistics, portraying that in Saudi Arabia and Australia, “100% of the teach ers in primary education were female and only 20% in higher education.” She mentions an opinion of some people that “because this country is so rich, we think somehow that our problems are solved.” But this is not the case. Is having a nice home in suburbia with a doctor husband and two kids always heaven? Granted that some of America’s problems are quite different than other places, we all share the same underlying force that dic tates who is in the dominate and subor dinate group without our consent, and for some of us, without our knowledge. Once again, I speak of my beloved patri archal world, where the white male has no choice but to dominate over us all in the current system. Now here is something very in teresting that Steinem spoke of: back a long, long time ago, before the Europe ans came along, many indigenous cul tures lived in communities that were not easily divided into men dominate and women serve, so to speak. Steinem hy pothesizes, “I think, the more I read, it (the idea of an equal society) came from the indigenous cultures.” She suggests that the Europeans brought about patri archy, and that “perhaps African women brought with them more traditions of EgaUtarianism.” Even the early suffrag ists were writing about the indigenous cultures. Clues, clues, and do we have a clearer answer? Who knows. Steinem says, “to look to the past is helpful... if it wasn’t always this way, it doesn’t have to be this way.” I think she’s right. Why are we so scared, so damn afi^id of tak ing back our Uves? Maybe we just don’t reahze they’re gone. Before I conclude, I must say that this fight isn’t just about women’s rights. It’s about all of us fighting for each other.' Of course it’s complicated, hard, frustrating . . . And while the ideal may be living together without social distinc tion, first we must “make the invisible visible to reach that goal. So scream if someone or something is restricting you unjustly. Don’t be discouraged or dis heartened. Gloria Steinem says to us, ‘Though it looks like a circle that you are moving in, it’s in slightly different territory, it’s a spiral, so we have moved a long distance.” How many steps for ward have you taken today? “It starts when you say WE and know who you mean and each day mean one more. “ Marge Piercy (The last line of "Low Road, ” a poem Steinem read as she closed her speech here at UNC) X
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