Heilbrun, Carolyn G. The Education of a Woman: The Life of Gloria Steinem.
New York: Dial Press, 1995. 451 pages.
In this adoring biography of Gloria Steinem, the author proves that
feminists are not qualified to write about other feminists. Too much is
excused: Steinem's "feminism in a miniskirt" (using her good looks to
advantage); her jet-set affairs with the rich and famous (such as Mortimer
Zuckerman, or the Ford Foundation's Franklin Thomas); her self-esteem drivel
(the 1992 tome, "Revolution from Within"). And despite a chapter on the 1975
Redstockings controversy, in which Steinem's early years as a paid CIA agent
were raised as an issue by other feminists, one looks in vain for any hint
that this CIA association deserves repudiation. Steinem's only known regret
was expressed in 1967: "The CIA's big mistake was not supplanting itself
with private funds fast enough," she told the New York Times (1967-02-21).
So why bother? For one reason only -- this book names associates and
supporters, as Steinem began Ms. magazine in the early 1970s. Feminism got
a grip with private funds from Ford, Rockefeller, Carnegie, and Katharine
Graham (each laced with CIA connections), and then proceeded to strangle the
U.S. left. "The personal is political," they screamed, forcing issues such
as capitalism and interlocking transnational power structures into academic
oblivion. Valuable time was lost, so that two decades later we're getting
snuffed by the globalists. Is it possible that Steinem was being used?
ISBN 0-385-31371-3
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