Celebrate Gloria Steinem's 75th Birthday with Outrageous Acts

Gloria Steinem is as ageless as her accomplishments, and that's why I hate to attach a number to this particular birthday. But it's a milestone. Today she turns 75 years old.

Who is Gloria Steinem? The face of feminism. The icon of the women's movement whose tireless efforts made us all better, stronger, more powerful, more free. Gloria Steinem is synonymous with women's liberation, but what does that really mean? She describes it better than anyone else can in an interview with the New York Daily News:

“Women and girls no longer feel crazy, alone or flying in the face of nature if they have the outrageous idea that they should be treated as full human beings....Knowing that the system is crazy, not you, is a huge leap forward.”...

But Steinem admits the fight for freedom is not over.

“We’ve demonstrated that women can do what men do, but not yet that men can do what women do. That’s why most women have two jobs — one inside the home and one outside it — which is impossible. The truth is that women can’t be equal outside the home until men are equal in it.”

She has always explained the struggle in terms we could all understand. She has never shied away from stating what she sees as the truth. And she's always done so in a thoughtful, calm, forthright way.

If I told you you could give a gift to Steinem that she truly wants, would you do it out of thanks and appreciation? Then consider the following an open-ended 75th birthday registry in which you pick the gift you want to give. All Steinem wants for her birthday is Outrageous Acts:

Outrageous Acts is a Ms. Foundation social networking, social change campaign that invites each of us to engage in, celebrate, and support acts in the cause of simple justice on behalf of women, families and communities....

Outrageous Acts takes its inspiration from Gloria Steinem, a founder of the Ms. Foundation for Women....Years ago, to further the power of grassroots organizing, Steinem began encouraging people across the country to turn their outrage into action, and to have fun doing it:

“If each person in the room promises that…the very next day she or he will do at least one outrageous thing in the cause of simple justice, then I promise I will, too. It doesn’t matter whether the act is as small as saying, “Pick it up yourself” …or as large as calling a strike….”

Find out more about Outrageous Acts, and see what other Outrageous Acts women have committed to. And see the YouTube video in which Steinem explains how to turn your outrage into action...and have fun doing it.

_{© Neilson Barnard/Getty Images}

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