The first problem for all of us, men and women, is not to learn, but to un-learn. We are filled with the Popular Wisdom of several centuries just past, and we are terrified to give it up. Patriotism means obedience, age means wisdom, woman means submission, black means inferior — these are preconceptions embedded so deeply in our thinking that we honestly may not know that they are there.
- Women’s rights advocate Gloria Steinem, born today in 1934. Beginning in the 1960s, Steinem played an essential role in empowering women and striving for equality for all American citizens.