Wiser Than Me with Julia Louis-Dreyfus - Julia Gets Wise with Gloria Steinem

Episode Date: May 29, 2024

In this episode of Wiser Than Me, Julia sits down with 90-year-old author and revolutionary Gloria Steinem. The two delve into Gloria's remarkable journey as a pioneering feminist and discuss joining the army of gray-haired women who will take over the world. Gloria also gives Julia THE most incredible advice for aging without shame. Plus, Julia’s mom, Judy, recounts her early ambitions in acting and her initial reservations about working outside the home.   Follow Wiser Than Me on Instagram and TikTok @wiserthanme and on Facebook at facebook.com/wiserthanmepodcast.   Keep up with Gloria Steinem @gloriasteinem on Instagram.    Find out more about other shows on our network at @lemonadamedia on all social platforms.   Joining Lemonada Premium is a great way to support our show and get bonus content. Subscribe today at bit.ly/lemonadapremium.    Maker’s Mark is a proud sponsor of Wiser Than Me. Celebrate the wise women in your life by creating a custom, personalized label from artist Gayle Kabaker today at www.makersmark.com/personalize.   Hairstory is a proud sponsor of Wiser Than Me. Check out their hero product, New Wash, today at Hairstory.com and get 20% off with code WISER.   COVERGIRL is a proud sponsor of Wiser Than Me. Check out their Simply Ageless Skin Perfector Essence. Learn more at covergirl.com. Only from Easy, Breezy, Beautiful COVERGIRL.   For exclusive discount codes and more information about our sponsors, visit https://lemonadamedia.com/sponsors/.  For additional resources, information, and a transcript of the episode, visit lemonadamedia.com.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

We are so excited to be back for a second season of Wiser Than Me. I have been, and I really do mean this, truly blown away by the support that this show has received. We really do have a lot to learn from the glorious older women in our lives. And to celebrate, I've got a super fun announcement to share with you. Wiser Than Me now has its very own merch. Yah! Merch! Wiser Than Me now has its very own merch. Yeah, merch. Our team has whipped up some items

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and family. And presto, holiday shopping done early. Lemonada. Maybe thanks to Wiser Than Me, I've been thinking a lot lately about what it means to be a woman, which is what I am and am so happy to be. I know that every individual's journey with womanhood is unique and I recognize that my experience might not align with everybody else's who identifies as a woman, but I cherish the aspects of femininity that resonate with me.

I mean, I just love being feminine, being a feminine person. I loved carrying and birthing children. I love physically being a woman, which is why it was so hard to have breast cancer, or it's one of the many reasons it was hard to have breast cancer, because it took part of that away from me. But anyway, I think the thing that I really love most about being a woman is the kind of emotional intelligence that comes with it.

I think it's a big part of what they call female intuition. There's a reason that it's not called male intuition. I believe in female intuition and I believe I have it, and so do my fabulous sisters, FYI. At critical moments in my life, I've had this intuition, this feeling of knowing something without any conscious reasoning and knowing it with certainty, a kind of certainty that surpasses intellectual reasoning or fact-gathering or weighing of evidence. And I trust that intuition because frankly it's never been wrong that I can think of. And I can feel that with other women and I love it. I have two groups of

really close female friends. One group of friends from grade school and another from college that includes Paula Jean Kaplan, the beauty and the brain who produces this show with me, and a third sort of looser group of more recent friends. I call them my work friends, even though they're not all from work. And by more recent, I mean like 25 years ago

instead of 40 years or 50 years ago. And all of these women are unbelievably important to me, critically important. Don't get me wrong, I like my men. Men are great. They talk too much, of course, but they're great. But when I get together with these women, I am at ease. I don't know how else to say it. Just completely at ease. I don't know how else to say it. Just completely at ease.

I mean sure, it helps that we have decades of shared history and common interests and tastes and politics and values and a shared sense of humor, but I think there's something more, more, I don't know, what, ancient, more transcendent about the bond that I feel with them. It is profound. And for me, it's a very important part of having a happy life. And it goes back to that emotional intelligence. These women are emotionally smart. Like when I was really sick,

my friend, Carleen, would come over. All of them would come to tell you the truth, which is just such an incredible gift that I can never thank any of them enough for. But I remember particularly Carleen Cumming when I was sick, as a dog sick, and she would just sit there in my bedroom, you know, and she didn't have to say anything, and I didn't have to say anything, and I could be so relaxed about that and sometimes not even respond if she did say something and she got it.

And we would just be there, you know, occupying space together. Or even when I was in chemotherapy and I was hooked up to all these poisons and I had a huge cold cap on my head, the cold cap is something you can do to keep you from losing hair during chemo. And all of my girlfriends would come to my chemo

and I'm telling you it was this tiny little space and like eight women would squeeze into this space and they would bring food and they would be chatting and Carleen made everybody who came wear a mustache. She brought these fake mustaches for everybody to wear that was sort of part of the uniform and everybody looked ridiculous. And it was just so hilarious. I was sort of slipping in and out of, because you know you're on drugs and stuff,

so I was sort of slipping in and out of kind of consciousness being there, and I would look, and all my girlfriends would be howling, laughing in mustaches. It was just, none of it made sense. All of it was beautiful, you know? And that might not be unique to a female friendship. I mean, obviously loyalty isn't gender-based.

It just speaks to the depth of tranquility that I feel with my female friends. And Carleen's, you know, she's like a hot shot lawyer. They're all hot shots, these women. These are all very accomplished people. But there's no sense of that success being definitional when we get together. If you know what I mean? Every time we gather, no matter the occasion, I know that the conversations will be completely interesting to me. You know, I want to hear everybody's thoughts. Nothing will be off

the table as far as intimate conversation. Nothing. And we'll laugh our asses off, the kind of laughing that, you know, that hurts the next day, right? Oh my God, you can't put a price on that. I mean, that is, well, that is just living, living good. There's a spectacular book that my friends Yoji and Janice gave us. It's by Myra Kalman and it's called Women Holding Things. It's an extraordinary book of her illustrations and writing, and it's just what the title describes. It's drawings of women holding things. And here's what she says, what do women hold?

The home and the family and the children and the food, the friendships, the work, the work of the world and the work of being human, the memories, and the troubles, and the sorrows, and the triumphs, and the love." How true is that? That's what women hold. And I think that that is maybe at the heart of why I love my female friends so, and I need to connect with them often to replenish my strength and my spirit. It's because we women are holding things,

real substantial things with physical weight and ethereal things too, which have so much weight as well. So when I get together with my female friends, I think we put those things down just for the moment. You know, maybe we laugh, maybe we have a glass of wine or two. and if we need to, we ask each other for a little help with the load when we pick those things back up. And only another woman can fully understand that. that today's conversation is with Gloria Steinem. Hi, I'm Julia Louis-Dreyfus and this is Wiser Than Me, the podcast where I get schooled by women who are wiser than me.

You know how there are songs like, I don't know, blowing in the wind, that are so ingrained in the culture you can't believe somebody actually sat down and wrote it. Well, I feel like today's guest is kind of the human version of that. She is so ingrained in the culture you kind of forget that she's an actual real person. She's much more than a leader. She's really an architect of the feminist movement. I mean, if the feminist movement had a Mount Rushmore for example and it ought to, she would be up there. That's how monumental her legacy is. She has been at the center of every conversation about the place of women in society since the early 60s. She founded the National Women's Political Caucus with Betty Friedan, Bella Abzug, and Shirley Chisholm.

And then in 1968, she was there in the nascent stages of New York Magazine. And then, with all that experience, she went on to co-found Ms. Magazine in 1972. I mean, I don't know if young people today truly realize how important that magazine was in shaping feminist conversations and platforming women's work. Critical. But she didn't stop there. In fact, she's still at it. This woman, who has been the most enduring symbol of feminism, knows that the work is far from done. When she turned 80, her friend and fellow activist, Robin Morgan, told the New York Times that she is more effective

than ever. She's a better organizer now than she ever has been. She's a better persuader. She's a better writer. She jokes about turning her funeral into a fundraiser and continues to utilize every tool at her disposal because she understands activism is a job from which you never truly retire. When you're on the front lines of a movement for all those years, you pick up a couple of accolades along the way. She's the recipient of a Presidential Medal of Freedom from President

Barack Obama, the Freedom Award from the National Civil Rights Museum, the National Magazine Award, the Lifetime Achievement in Journalism Award from the United Nations, and oh yeah, she's written 19 books. That's barely scratching the surface of the impact she has had. When someone asked her what her greatest contribution was to the women's movement, she said, I haven't made it yet. Those are the words of a woman on a mission, a woman at whose feet I sit today, and who is so much wiser than me, Gloria Steinem. Hi Gloria. Gloria Steinem Now you've left me with the quandary of how

I can possibly live up to that introduction. I mean, we should have a technological failure. Anyway, thank you, and it's lovely to see you. It's lovely. It's an honor. May I ask your real age, Gloria? Yes, my real age is 90. I'm as shocked as anybody else.

I don't know exactly how it happened, but I would just like to say that you're always the same person inside. So it goes right on. I love that. I love it. And how old do you feel? I think we have an age when we kind of chilled, you know what I mean? Yes. And I would say mine was 50. I love that you feel 50. By the way, I need to mention to you that you, to me this is

very significant, you and my mother share the same birthday and share the same age. Really? Oh, that's amazing. Yeah, it's amazing to me. And you're both from Ohio, which I also love. And we survived. I survived Toledo. I don't know where she was. Yes. And she survived Columbus and it's here to tell the tale. Okay. Well, give her a hug from me. I absolutely will.

We will have to compare notes. Yes. Do you exercise, Gloria? Do you have a routine, an exercise routine? I don't. I didn't grow up with an exercise routine. I'm not part of the generation that runs every morning. I have a wonderful woman who's a former rockhead who drops by twice a week and makes me exercise

a bit, which was fun. So as you've gotten older, has your thinking ability changed? Have you noticed changes? It doesn't seem as if there are any. No, no, I think I have noticed changes, which has caused me to, for instance, consider manufacturing a t-shirt that says, I'm at an age when remembering something right away is as good as an orgasm. I think this would sell. Oh, it would definitely sell.

I mean, the retrieval time is longer or the need for association with something else. No, I think memory does. Because there's just more quantity, for one thing, of things to remember. Yeah. Gosh, that's a hilarious idea for a t-shirt and we may have to fabricate that. So I want to read, Gloria, a poem that you've written that is in one of your books, The Truth Will Set You Free, But First It Will Piss You Off, is the title of the book. And I would like to read this poem that you wrote. Dear Goddess, I pray for the courage to walk naked at any age, to wear red and purple,

to be unladylike, inappropriate, scandalous, and incorrect to the very end. So let's talk about the blessings of aging. I mean, have you been able to live up to the expectations of that absolutely glorious poem that you wrote? No, I'm sure I haven't. I'm sure I've been too pressured by the way things are already being done to envision how they might be done. But I think especially because we still live with patriarchy and racism and, you know, various structures that make no sense, it's good for us to imagine the most we can

possibly imagine so we move the boundaries of where we can go. And I think that was my effort, one of my efforts to move the boundaries. Well, let me ask you this. In what ways do you think you have gotten better over the years? I mean, I know in your mind you say you think of yourself sort of, you feel 50. What has age given you? What have the blessings of getting older given to you? One big thing is that I'm past the age of expectation that we should follow a certain pattern which in my generation was very strong, that we should marry, we should have children,

we should take our husband's name and his identity, you know, we should in a way lead a secondary life. And that was very much the norm or at least the norm of expectations when I was growing up in Toledo in a factory working neighborhood where families were supported by their husband's salary in the factory. And people generally got married very young. So I mean, I always knew thanks to my mother having saved money that I would be able to go to college, which already was a blessing beyond almost everybody in my high school

class. But I had no idea. I mean, I got engaged when I was a senior in college because everybody got engaged and this was a very lovely, handsome, desirable guy. Yes. And partly I went to India, took a fellowship and went to India and stayed there for two years because both I was fascinated with India but also I was trying to lead a different life and I wasn't sure that I would be able to if I

stayed home. Was that a way of getting out of the engagement, by the way? Yes, I sort of left my ring under the pillow and disappeared. Yes, right, right. And your travels in India, I know you taught, I mean, it sounds like your activism began there, is that right? Well, I certainly saw for the first time in my life the results of the grassroots populist movement, because of the independence movement against the British and Mahatma Gandhi and everything.

And I was writing a essay about Gandhi, so I was going around and interviewing people he had worked with. And finally, I got to a woman named Kamala Devi Chattopadhyay, a great woman, and she was sitting on her porch rocking and drinking lemonade. She listened to me and finally she said, well, my dear, we taught him everything he knew. No. And it turned out that the basis of Gandhi's independence movement was a national women's

movement which already existed. Wow. So there it began. Yes, I began to understand that history was not always told in an accurate way. Well, it's told through a male lens, isn't it? Yeah, well, in a cultural lens. It's good to think of history with a certain critical sense because it tended to be written by the winners and not necessarily the whole truth.

Right. This seems very kind of trite and lightweight on the heels of this conversation thus far, but I have to ask you, I want to talk about beauty for a second because beauty and power are so interlocked with one another in a way that is probably quite, well, negative. What has you have gotten older, what have you had to unlearn or unbrainwash yourself if you've had to in terms of beauty as a woman? Because you're a beautiful woman. I'm curious about that.

I don't think I was brainwashed into plastic surgery because I'm a coward. I still have my tonsils. I didn't want to have any kind of surgical procedure so I just didn't. I probably have more gray hair underneath here than you can see. Right. That's one artificiality probably. But otherwise, I might still be wearing the same blue jeans right now that I don't know how many years. Blue jeans, that's the holy grail. If you find a good pair of blue jeans and they really work, hang on to them. I actually had a question about the glasses and your look back in the day. Was this a choice, Gloria, putting your glasses over your hair?

Was that a sort of fashion statement for you that you found? Because I also think you talked about hiding behind your glasses and hair because it was very iconic, that look, obviously. Coming from a nearsighted family, I had needed glasses since I was about 10. And somehow I preferred the kind of pilot's glasses, which were then men's glasses. You had to go to the men's section to find them. Yeah, the aviator kind, yeah.

Yeah, right. And they were good for both aviator kind, yeah. Yeah, right. And, you know, they were good for both sight and hiding behind, yes. But I get the sense that you don't feel like you need to hide behind anything now. Is that true? No, well, I mean, I didn't then. Yeah. I just think that age is a blessing. I mean, we're adding experience, we're discovering new things. It's not a drawback. But because the emphasis on women's age is still very much connected to reproduction and the years in which women can reproduce, it's still different for women than for men. It sure is. And would you have any specific advice to women for aging without shame?

Well, I don't know that my advice is helpful, but I think one thing is to be together with women who are your age and older so that you have an example and a counterweight to the media image of women who were always younger, more beautiful, usually more white, and you know, just not realistic. Yeah. Community. Community, community. And connection. Right. We'll get more wisdom from Gloria Steinem after this break.

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that the desire to control wombs is central to all authoritarian systems. So having said that, let's talk about this Dobbs decision, this fucking Dobbs decision. Did you see that coming, Gloria? I mean, what did we miss? How are you feeling? Well, you know, I think that reproductive freedom should be as basic as freedom of speech. But because we are living in various forms of patriarchy. There is a continuing, though hopefully diminishing, effort to control women as the means of reproduction. I mean, when Hitler, you should pardon the

expression, Hitler was elected and he was elected, the first thing he did the next morning was to order the padlocking of all the family planning clinics in Germany. Get out of here. I didn't know that. And declare abortion a crime against the state. And the same was true in Italy. Authoritarian fascist movements have been especially obvious in their desire, compulsion with controlling reproduction, whether for racist reasons or sheer patriarchal

reasons or both. So when the Davos decision came down, because obviously Roe v. Wade came into law in 1973, so 50 years later, it's reversed. How do you react to that? Are you not surprised, Gloria? Well, I guess the hopeful part of me is alarmed. The realistic part of me is not surprised because the attempt to control women's bodies as the most basic means of production, the means of reproduction, has been consistent. And the reverse is also true. That is, when Europeans first arrived here and the women say in upstate New York, the European American women were inspired by the Native American women they lived next door to, who understood fully how to control reproduction, how to

decide when and whether to have children. And that was an inspiration to the women next door. I mean, I once sat in a small gathering with women in Africa in a desert area. And they were showing me the herbs, literally, that grew there, that they used to increase fertility, that they used for abortifacients. I mean, this is ancient knowledge. It's been around as long as people have been around. But to understand how much that the control of reproduction is intertwined with racism is very important. And the ultra-right-wing folks who say, you will not replace us, are very aware that the first generation of babies who are majority babies of color has already been born.

You know, it seems to me a good thing. I mean, if this country looks more like the rest of the world, we'll probably have better relationships with other nations, better food, I don't know. But if you've been raised as a white supremacist, you may feel threatened by the fact that the first generation that's majority babies of color has already been born. Yeah. I mean, it makes sense. They're fearful of a shift in the power dynamic.

When did you first realize that you had power, Gloria? When have you felt the most powerful in your life? Well, I don't think I have ever felt that I had power in the sense of giving a command because I've never been in that kind of situation. But I hope that as a writer and an activist or a speaker, I have the power of persuasion. Because that still honors the decision-making power of the person who's reading or listening to you. Right, exactly. It doesn't deprive them of power, but it means that you can present an alternative.

Yes. You know, it's funny because I was thinking about how even in my own life, the patriarchal culture that we live in has sort of crept into my own life in a way that I almost didn't realize until I was sort of living it. For example, I'm married and I have two children, two sons, who I hope to Jesus I've raised to be good feminists. I think that I have. two sons who I hope to Jesus I've raised to be good feminists, I think that I have. I'm going to ask them that question later. I'm going to ask them if they think of themselves as feminists. I would be curious to know what their answer would be. But anyway, I'm musing. But I worked. When they were both born, I was working full-time. And that was a huge struggle for me. That was a hard thing for me to reconcile, the going back and forth.

And I had to intellectually remind myself that working, being a mother who worked outside of the house was good for them to witness. But it was a struggle for me. And I have the benefit of learning you know, learning from you and learning from the movement, and yet that struggle existed for me. Well, because the reason we need a movement is we are still living in a somewhat patriarchal and racist society. So the suppositions of what we should do are still with us and they were still with

you. But actually for your sons to see and experience a loving, authoritative, nurturing, achieving human being who's a female human being is a gift. And they're much more likely if they happen to choose a female partner to choose a female partner who really is a partner. Mm-hmm. Yeah. I wish I had called you 30 years ago to talk about this. I wish we had been friends back then. Well, but what do your sons say? I mean, they don I mean, I bet they don't say, oh, I wish I'd had a mother who stayed home and baked cookies all the time. No. No, I don't think so. I've never heard them say that unless they say it behind my back,

but they're more intelligent than that. I know you've spoken about being with many people in your life as they've passed away. And I know that you were unable to be with your dad, which was a regret for you when he passed away. I would like to talk about grief and your experience with grief. What have you learned about grief as you've lost people who are dear to you? Well, I've learned that it's inevitable and in a way it's precious because it's a measure of how important and loved those individuals were. Whether it's Bella Abzug, who I remember speaking at her funeral and suddenly realizing that I was never going to see her again, which, you know, it just, I don't, you know, they're just moments when it comes

over you. It hits you like a ton of prerestia. Right. I think about my mother and regret that she wasn't able to do what she loved because before I was born, she had been a journalist and worked for a newspaper do what she loved because before I was born she had been a journalist and worked for a newspaper which she loved and had to give it up. It's a reminder of how important it is to live in the present. Right.

Well, in these moments when you lost Bella or I know when your husband David Bale passed away, were there activities or rituals that you took on that gave you solace or comfort? Yes, I don't know. I mean, probably we may all find different ways. But I remember sitting here in the house where I am now, writing a letter to David Bale, who... Oh.

Right, because after he was gone. And I don't know why I did that exactly, but it just felt helpful to say things I wanted to say or hadn't been able to say. I mean, obviously I was doing it for myself, clearly. Yeah, of course, yeah. But I don't know if it would be helpful to other people or not, you know, just to sit down and write a letter, yeah.

Well that's fascinating to me, actually, to write a letter. It reminds me, when my father passed, I had a moment in which I was by myself and I sat down and I just spoke to him. And I think I spoke for like easily an hour, I had a lot to say. But it stayed with me, you know? No, it's important because there must be some sense of both continuity and feeling unfinished, and continuing a connection that is inside you, it's helpful. It's helpful. And so in your letter to David Bale, were you talking about things that were unsaid or that you felt needed saying or reiterating or all of the above?

That's interesting. I'm not sure. I mean, I think I was speaking partly to what he wanted to continue and hadn't been able to, also to his childhood, which had been a bit isolated in England where he grew up and in South Africa. But it was a way of continuing a connection just in case, you know, just in case we can still be heard. I know my mother has said before that when someone who's close to you passes away in your life, it's not that the relationship ends, it's just that it changes. Changes, yeah, right. I find that to be a very comforting way to think about loss. It somehow cuts the

loss in half because you can envision that the relationship is still there. It's just altered, right? And sometimes you can be helped by the relationship that's gone by saying to yourself, as I used to say to myself, what would Bella do in a certain situation? Yeah. Right. And it helps you to see alternatives. Yeah, exactly.

So I know you had said that you wanted to make your funeral a fundraiser, which by the way, I think is a grand idea. Is that actually part of your, it is, I mean what the hell? Is that part of your plan? Do you have a plan? No, I don't have a plan. It'll be up to whoever is around. Who's ever in charge.

Whatever, yeah. Okay. Right. Yeah. No, it was, I don't think I want to demand money from people in the end, right? Yeah, I get it. But, you know, I'd pay, I'd pay. If the funeral was a fundraiser for something

that was critical for you, I would absolutely give money. Just FYI. No, a fundraiser, also maybe our funeral should be dances. That would be kind of great. A dance, a blowout party, right? Right. That is the principle of the Irish wake, isn't it? Yes, it is. That you kind of haveout party, right? Right. That is the principle of the Irish wake, isn't it? Yes, it is.

That you kind of have a party, right? A big party, which I'm in favor of. You're a tap dancer, Gloria, I understand. Yes, I am. Yes, I still have my tap shoes upstairs. Do you still tap? No, I haven't in a long time. But I could. I could. We're going to take a short break right now.

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space could be worth or visit airbnb.com slash host. It could be the start of a whole new chapter for your home. Go to airbnb.com slash host. Here you are, it seems in perfect health, you're living this gorgeous life in New York. Do you have help? Are people helping you? I mean, how does that work? Do you have, I don't know what the word is, caregivers or is somebody there with you? Well, yes, I mean, it sort of happens. I mean, there's a woman who came into my life when she was a student, Amy Richards, who

is the smartest person I know and who keeps an eye out for what's happening in my life and household and I'm very grateful to her. Oh, it's nice. I live in a brownstone and there's a friend who lives on the third floor. I have the first two floors. She lives on the third floor, which is also very helpful because just to know that there's someone else I'm communicating with who's in the same house is good. Yes, very good I mean I have the old editors of Miss magazine. We have lunch at least once a month. Oh nice. So You know, I have a chosen family. That's nice

I mean I have a sister who had six children and they have children and so on No, but an older sister who's no longer alive, but her six kids and their kids are. And they live in DC or in Maryland. So I have relatives, but they're not close enough so that we see each other regularly. So it's really my family of friends whom I see. I think that that's amazing that you chose not

to have children and your sister tripled down on having children, right? That's an interesting reaction to the childhood that you both had. Were you close with your sister? Yes, I mean, I was very, because she was nine years older, she looked after me. So she was kind of not a mother exactly, but definitely an older sister I looked up to. Oh yeah, that's nice. And by the way, that's the other thing that is so amazing about your life story that your grandmother was a suffragette. Did you know her? Yes, I knew both my grandmothers a little bit.

And did she talk, she didn't talk about her work as a suffragette? No, she didn't. Or maybe I was just too young because it was my father's mother. And maybe I was too young to have that conversation. But I did know that she was an activist and an admired person in the community that she had helped to start the first vocational high school in Toledo. And that she had encouraged women to go to the polls in groups because there were gangs of men and boys hanging around the polls. So they wouldn't be harassed. Trying to harass, yeah, women out of voting. And I think maybe she addressed Congress once. I don't know.

She died when I was very young. My other grandmother was not active in that political suffragist way, but she was nonetheless very self-willed and independent and had been married to a railroad engineer. So she had a free pass on the railroad and she would go off to, you know, distant journeys from time to time, right? Yeah. I am so moved when you write about humor and laughter as somebody who lives in that world to a certain extent,

when you say laughter is the only emotion that cannot be compelled, as somebody who lives in that world to a certain extent, when you say laughter is the only emotion that cannot be compelled, it's the essence of humanity and free will and orgasm of the mind. And I would even argue that it is the most powerful tool to communication. And I'm thinking of when you were lecturing with Flo Kennedy and speaking about feminism, and invariably somebody

would ask, and I'll have you take it from there, if, well, anyway, you go ahead. You tell the story because it's a great story. Well, I think what you're referring to is, I mean, I traveled because I was, for one thing, afraid to speak by myself, so I always found a friend. Yeah, me too, by the way. I love having somebody with me. Dorothy Pittman Hughes or Florence Kennedy, who was a great civil rights lawyer. So in an audience, just an average audience, there would often be a hostile guy who would stand up and say, are you lesbians? And Flo would always say, are you my alternative?

Which was the perfect answer because it made everybody laugh and it didn't tell him, you know. Yes. Didn't answer him. It didn't answer him, which was appropriate. And it just completely took the air out of his vitriol. And that's what I mean by a powerful tool. So not only does it shut him down, but it turns the energy of the room around completely, you know? It could have been very tense.

Yeah, I mean, I'm very grateful to the great Flo Kennedy and Dorothy Bimenears and the women I lectured with and learned so much from. And it's ancient knowledge that laughter is important because, I mean, in Native American culture, various cultures, there is a god of laughter who is neither male nor female because the principle is, I think, that laughter cannot be compelled. You can make someone cry or be angry or whatever, but laughter is free. You can't force somebody to laugh who doesn't want to, right? That's right. It's sacred in that sense.

Yes, absolutely. Yeah. And it's also interesting to me that I think men particularly are often threatened by funny women. Do you agree with that? Well, I think authority doesn't want to be laughed at. So maybe men who cling to masculine authority don't want to be laughed at, especially by women. That robs them of their power and their view. Do you think that women become more radical as they get older? I suppose nothing is true all the time, but I do think it's possible that it's often true because we outlive the stereotypical expectations of marriage and family and the subordinate role, if that's still around or, you know. I mean, I think just as we are maybe more ourselves when we're

before 10 or 11 years old and we're little girls who are climbing trees and saying, you know, I know what I want, I know what I think. And the feminine role hasn't descended upon us yet. We may also be more ourselves at the other end of the feminine role. And I always think it would be great if an army of gray haired women could take over the earth. Well, then the earth would be a safe place in my view. You know, it really would be. It would be much better.

It would be much better. It would be much better. I certainly feel more radicalized as I've gotten older. And to your point, I feel freer of certain cultural burdens that felt heavier when I was younger. And maybe, I don't know, stuff gets clearer, doesn't it? It gets clearer. Have you written about that or spoken about that? Because I think it is helpful to share that,

because it's not necessarily something we learn in school. Yeah, I've never written a book. That's not something I've tackled. I find that daunting. And I guess I've spoken about it. I mean, we talk about this on this show. The whole reason that I wanted to do this show is because I felt like there was a whole,

a true need to hear from older women, that it was a group of human beings that weren't being listened to in the way that they should be, and that we were missing this extraordinary opportunity to glean wisdom and information about life that we could find very useful. And I found this podcast, it's emboldened me as a woman who is not getting younger.

There's nothing more helpful than sharing experience and learning from each other and discovering we're not alone, we're not crazy, and that we're together, we can do a lot more than we can individually. It's the nature of all political movements, of civilization itself, and it's especially necessary for any group that has less power than others in the same area. It's especially good for women. And I think it's especially helpful if we're in groups that kind of look like the country, so we're not replicating a racial division. Danielle Pletka That's right. Yeah, that's right. And what's on your to-do list, Gloria? Gloria How long do we have? We have forever.

Go, tell. I owe my publisher a book of essays, which I've owed for some time. I keep answering my email and having meetings in my living room and doing things other than doing that, but I really do want to do that. I still value writing as a permanent way of communication. And I think the book is still a kind of sacred being, but books have probably come to take up less power in our lives as we've been reading online more and more. I know, but you know, I find that when I read online, like even the newspaper, for example,

it doesn't stick in my brain the same way. I need to hold it in my hands to have it stay with me in a sort of more impactful way. Speaking of reading, I see there's a needlepoint pillow behind you. I'm wondering what that needlepoint pillow says that's on the chair. Oh my gosh, I don't know. What does it say? Oh. It says, being on the bestsellers list is the best revenge. And I think that's because I wrote something that got bad reviews in the New York Times and then sold anyway.

Yes. Right. That's very Yes, that's very good. That's very good. Well, I hope that your next book of essays is actually on the bestseller list. I have no doubt that it will be. And before I let you go, can I ask you a couple of very quick questions that we sort of like to ask our guests at the end of a conversation? Is there something that you would go back and tell yourself at 21? Yes, I would just go back and put my arms around her and say, it's going to be all

right. Because the pressures then, given my age, the pressures then were especially to get married and have children and so on. And I was at that time just graduating from college and about to flee to India in order to make a different path. But I would just put my arms around her and say, it's going to be all right. Oh, that's nice. And is there anything that you wish you could go back and say yes to?

Gosh, that's interesting. I actually, nothing springs to mind because I think I was a little addicted to yes. I mean, I didn't. I hadn't learned how to say no. Ah. So maybe you wish you had said no. I was probably overdoing the yes thing. Overdoing the yes.

Right? Got it. Is there anything you want to tell me about aging from where you sit right now? Is there anything you'd like to tell me? I think especially for women, the view of aging is more negative than it should be. And actually, it's a time of freedom. It resembles before the feminine role descended upon you when you were a little girl climbing trees, as I was saying. Now you have the spirit back

of the little girl climbing trees, but you have probably a house of your own, a room of your own, a little bit of way more ability to do what you love and care about and see the people you love. So aging as a time of freedom and reward is probably a bit of a revolutionary idea for women since we've been so corralled into the time of reproduction and raising kids. I love that. the time of reproduction and raising kids. So there's freedom and humor and rebellion and all kinds of great things awaiting. I love it. I'm in the middle of a great rebellion, self-rebellion, rebellion period.

That's something to celebrate. Gloria Steinem, thank you so much for talking with us today. Thank you so much. Thank you, thank you, thank you. I'm going to look you up when I'm in New York and perhaps we can go have a... Yes, please come. Yeah, please come. I promise. I'm going to look you up when I'm in New York and perhaps we can go have... Yes, please come. Yeah, please come. I promise.

I'm going to. I promise. That would be great. Great. Okay. Lots of love to you. Love to you. Love to you, too.

Wow. How about that? Hi, listeners. Okay. So I thought it would be cool to have my mom listen in on my conversation with Gloria because, you know, come on, it's Gloria Steinem. And she was such a big force in my mom's lifetime and in my lifetime too. And obviously it doesn't hurt

that they have the exact same birthday. So let's pop back into the Zoom and see what she thought about it. So mommy, this time you're able to listen in on the whole conversation with Gloria Steinem. How about that? How about that? I mean, that is a moment in my life. I want to tell you a moment in my life, especially since we're under the same sign.

Yeah. We're both heirs and we're, actually, we should have found out what time she's born. Oh, fuck. Well, I'm going to go see her.. I am in fact gonna go and visit her in New York. So when I do that, I'll ask her. I don't know what time I was born, but I've got my birth certificate and my little feet were this big. Okay. Yeah, I also loved it when she said, but I'm still here. Yeah. Do you feel like Gloria Steinem was talking about, do you feel a kind of rebellion, do you feel more radical at this age to a certain extent? Well, I don't use the word radical because that's not really me, but what I feel is

completely being honest to the situation, to a situation. And so in a way, you know, that's so like in we're in a new situation. Meaning in your new living situation where you've just moved. Yeah, and if I'm in a committee and something comes up that I just, you know, and outraged about or a question, I have no hesitation to absolutely put it on the line and say, you know, is that, tell me more about that or to really pursue the things that I, where I feel my pulse rise. Good. And do you, I mean, do you consider yourself a feminist? No. I mean, in that, yes, in my sympathies, in my actions now, yes. But of the same time

that she's talking about, no. I went along with the with them the cultural expectation Mm-hmm and life kind of has brought me in into feminism But it's not I I consider a feminist one of these women that sort of took up the cause and lived it And I did not take up the cause and live it. I've come to it. I've sort of been broadsided by it. I cause and live it. I've come to it, I've sort of been broadsided by it. I mean, I totally believe in it. That's nothing against feminism. That shows that I was embedded in the patriarchy. The patriarchy, yes, yes. Well, actually, I have a question. So when I was born, you were teaching. born, you were teaching. And I remember that you tell the story of my dad, but prior to your teaching, you were an actor. Weren't you trying to pursue? Didn't Daddy Will tell you that he

didn't want you taking acting jobs? Am I? Oh, yeah. But that was in college, too. I mean, that was just from the get-go. No acting. Uh-huh. And why was that?

Did he ever articulate? What was your understanding of why he didn't want you to perform? Well, it was in college, and so I thought that was going to be the end of it anyway. I never, I mean, at one point I had auditioned for the Royal Academy and that was my sophomore year. And if I had gotten that, I think I would have left Duke and I would have whatever, but I didn't get it. But your dad did not like me to be in acting. He didn't like it because you said that if you're an actor, all you did was say other people's words.

It's a stupid thing to do. But I think that also there wasn't, that he was jealous of other attention that came about and jealous of the time that it took. So I think that's, and I think I knew that, but that was just something that I just managed and was in plays all the time, but that it was almost like I had a promise that it's going to end now, you know, when I graduate. Got it. So you didn't try to pursue it after graduation? I did after he and I separated.

Oh. But I would say truly half-assed way. I mean, I was not, you know, I didn't really have training. I didn't have anybody supporting me, giving me confidence in doing it. I was just sort of out there in some some wild and flailing way so I never never got never really did anything with it. Hmm would have been fun if you could have gotten into Lee Strasburg's class in New York.

Can you imagine that? Well, I was in a class in New York and he was a small actor and I can't remember his name now, but he was, it was fun to be in the class. Yeah. So you took classes anyway. Classes, but I always felt self-conscious in the classes. I never talk about authenticity. I never felt, I always felt like I was acting. That was not that way at Duke. At Duke, I felt authentic. And afterwards, I felt like I was just, yeah, yeah. They'd say, pretend you're taking a shower. Well, what you just did is not, I would say you might want to go back to the drawing board

on that depiction of taking a shower. My mother's just patting her shoulders and going like this, as if that's how you take a shower. Oh, please, please, get me out of here. Okay. Now, you've done your depiction of taking a shower, and I'm giving you the Academy Award for that. And now you can thank the Academy and say goodbye to me.

Yes, I'll say goodbye. And I'd like to thank all the people that made this responsible. I mean, they made it happen. Bye bye. Bye bye. I love you. I love you. Bye.

There's more Wiser Than Me with Lemonada Premium. Subscribers get exclusive access to bonus content from each episode of the show. Subscribe now in Apple Podcasts. Make sure you're following Wiser Than Me on social media. We're on Instagram and TikTok at wiserthanme, and we're on Facebook at wiserthanme podcast. Wiser Than Me is a production of Lemonade Media created and hosted by me, Julia Louis Dreyfus. This show is produced by Chrissy Pease, Jamila Zaraa Williams, Alex McOwen, and Oja Lopez.

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