The feminist icon suggested female millennial voters prefer Sanders to Hillary Clinton because of his popularity among young men: ‘The boys are with Bernie’

This article is more than 4 years old

This article is more than 4 years old

Gloria Steinem appears to have offended a large group of Bernie Sanders supporters by suggesting that his young female supporters are only backing the senator because of “boys”.

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The feminist writer and activist made the comments on Bill Maher’s show on Friday. Steinem suggested young women preferred Sanders to Hillary Clinton because:

Women are more for [Clinton] than men are. Men tend to get more conservative because they gain power as they age, women get more radical because they lose power as they age. They’re going to get more activist as they grow older. And when you’re younger, you think: ‘Where are the boys? The boys are with Bernie.’

Many young female Sanders supporters were unhappy with this characterization.

“Gloria Steinem’s statement was the worst kind of sweeping generalization I’ve heard in years about women my age,” said Moumita Ahmed, 25. She has been campaigning for Sanders as one of the leaders of the Millenials for Bernie movement.

“I was hurt because I consider her to be an icon of the feminist movement,” she continued. “I identify as a feminist. I’m not sure how she could admit us young women are graduating with more debt and earning less money, then say young women are supporting Bernie Sanders to impress all the boys.”

Tennessee Thomas, 31, has been hosting Sanders campaigning events at her shop The Deep End Club in New York City’s East Village. She was similarly unimpressed.

“I am supporting Bernie Sanders because of where he stands on the issues,” she said. “It wasn’t a good statement. The left needs to unify. We should be allowed to support who we want without attacking each other.”

She added: “I could list a million reasons why I prefer Bernie to Hillary. She supported the KXL pipeline, was in favor of TPP and opposed gay rights until three years ago.”



A tweet from Sanders on Saturday may have been a response to the controversy: