Gloria Steinem and Reb Arthur: Activists at 91

by Rabbi Arthur Waskow

Dear companions in the joyful struggle for justice,

In 2013, Gloria Steinem and I spoke at The Shalom Center’s celebration of “This is What 80 Looks Like (for Two Activists).”

Gloria and I will be having a conversation for thoughtful and “feelingful” people the evening of Tuesday, October 22. It will highlight our free Hoshana Rabbah celebration, along with lots of music.

We do need registrations because there will be food, and we need to know how much.

The celebration will be at Masjidullah, a progressive mosque with a largely Black membership — where we held the 50th-anniversary Freedom Seder. Please register at https://theshalomcenter.org/save-in.

Eleven years ago, Gloria and I were each interviewed by a notable from WHYY. He asked her, “Where do you think our country is right now?” Remember, in 2013 there were signs of insurgency among Blacks, women, GLBTQIA people, Jews, and other minorities. Obama was President, and no one had announced a candidacy to succeed him.

She answered right away, with no delay to grope for an answer, and told me afterward it was the first time she had spoken it:

“Our whole country is living right now in the moment when in one household, an abused wife walks out. That is the moment of greatest promise and of greatest danger. If there is a community ready to receive her, respect her, heal her, protect her, she becomes a free person.

“Meanwhile, the man who abused her may become still more violent. If she cannot find support, he may even murder her. New freedom, or even worse repression. That is where we all are now.”

And that was the fall of 2013.

Before an ultra-right-wing Supreme Court abolished the Constitutional right to choose abortion, and insurgent women started to win back that freedom.

Before Black Lives Matter walked out of the abusive national “household” where police brutality had been endemic.

Before the undocumented young Dreamers walked out of the household of fearing deportation. Before young women in well-known elite colleges made known the hidden culture of endemic rape.

Before Bernie Sanders sparked a movement of millions who walked out of the household of despairing youthful apathy.

And before millions of white working-class and lower-middle-class men and women erupted in fear and fury at the sense they were losing not only their jobs, not only the America they thought was them, but their lives — as for the first time ever, their life expectancy dropped. They too burst out of their abusive household.

And in 2013 she spoke before one of our great political parties nominated for the Presidency —and the country, following the Constitutional rules, elected — a bully with a bully’s murderous political program — racism, hatred and disgust aimed at foreigners and great religious traditions, fear and disgust and contempt toward independent-minded women, celebration of the use of torture.

Gloria was right: the moment of new freedom, or even more violent repression.

I thought that was a brilliant answer, drawing on feminist experience to paint a national picture.

I intend to start our conversation on October 22 by asking her the same question — plus “And what do you propose we do about it?”

Please register at https://theshalomcenter.org/save-in to hear her answer. And to hear my own answer to the same questions.

With blessings for gumption, daring, and shalom for the coming year, as well as deep inner exploration for the holy days ahead,

Arthur