Gloria Steinem, Legendary Journalist and Feminist Leader Who Helped Transform Women’s Rights, Dies at 92

Gloria Steinem, the legendary journalist, author and activist whose work helped transform the fight for women’s equality in America and around the world, has died. She was 92.

Steinem died peacefully on September 2 at her home in New York City, according to her foundation. A cause of death was not immediately announced.

For more than five decades, Steinem stood as one of the most recognizable voices of the modern feminist movement, using journalism, organizing and activism to challenge inequality while advocating for women’s civil, economic and reproductive rights.

Before becoming a global symbol of feminism, Steinem made her mark as a journalist. One of the defining moments of her early career came in 1963 when she went undercover as a Playboy Bunny at New York’s Playboy Club, later writing an exposé detailing the working conditions women experienced inside the organization. But journalism would become more than a career for Steinem — it became one of the vehicles she used to create change.

In the early 1970s, she helped launch Ms. magazine, creating a groundbreaking national platform where issues affecting women could be reported and discussed with a seriousness often missing from mainstream media at the time. Her influence extended far beyond publishing.

Steinem helped establish organizations including the National Women’s Political Caucus and later the Women’s Media Center, while spending decades advocating for equal rights, reproductive freedom and greater representation for women.

Her work also intersected with broader fights for racial justice and LGBTQ+ equality, reinforcing her belief that struggles against discrimination could not simply be separated from one another.

In 2013, President Barack Obama awarded Steinem the Presidential Medal of Freedom, one of the nation’s highest civilian honors, recognizing a lifetime dedicated to advancing equality. Even as she entered her later years, Steinem remained engaged in the conversations and movements she helped push into the mainstream.

Her death marks the passing of not only an activist, but a journalist who understood the power of storytelling to challenge institutions, shift culture and give a platform to people whose voices were too often ignored.

Gloria Steinem spent her life pushing generations to imagine a more equal world.

Now, after more than 90 years of life and more than half a century of activism, the movement continues without one of its most influential architects.

The Prince Report