In 1968, somebody at DC Comics had a bright idea. Take away Wonder Woman’s powers and make her more like an ordinary modern woman. Gloria Steinem wasn’t impressed. To Steinem, there was something backward about taking one of the world’s best-known female heroes and deciding that being modern meant making her less powerful.
DC had moved Diana into a very different role. She gave up her powers and traditional costume, ran a boutique and learned martial arts. It was supposed to make the character more contemporary, but it also removed much of what had made Wonder Woman different from the other women appearing in popular culture. She wasn’t just another woman trying to get through the day. She was Wonder Woman.
Steinem understood something easy to overlook. Pop culture helps shape what people imagine is possible, and that includes how women are expected to behave. A comic book character might seem like a small thing compared with politics or legislation, but a character like Wonder Woman could reach millions of people without giving them a political lecture.
That became especially clear when Ms. magazine arrived in 1972 with Wonder Woman on the cover and the headline “Wonder Woman for President.” Steinem wasn’t simply putting a familiar comic book character on a magazine cover. She was putting female strength back in the spotlight, at a time when the women’s movement was challenging some very old ideas about what women could and couldn’t be.
Steinem made the point herself in her introduction to the Wonder Woman collection that same year. She wrote that Wonder Woman represented “strength and self-reliance for women,” along with sisterhood, mutual support and a respect for human life. There it was in black and white. For Steinem, Wonder Woman wasn’t just somebody who punched villains and flew around in an invisible plane. She represented an idea.
And this is the part I find interesting. Steinem wasn’t simply trying to fix a comic book. She was making an argument about representation. If a fictional woman could be strong, independent and powerful, why shouldn’t real women be seen the same way? Sometimes the stories we grow up with quietly establish the limits of what we think people are capable of, which makes the characters we put in front of children more important than they might seem.
Wonder Woman’s traditional powers and identity eventually returned in 1973, and her connection to feminism only grew stronger. The Ms. cover helped reinforce her place as more than a superhero. She had become part of a much bigger cultural conversation, one where comic books, politics and the changing role of women suddenly found themselves sharing the same page.
Of course, Wonder Woman was only one small piece of Steinem’s much larger legacy. She co-founded Ms., helped establish the National Women’s Political Caucus and spent decades fighting for women’s equality, political representation and reproductive rights. She became one of the most recognizable figures of the women’s movement, but the Wonder Woman story gives us a fascinating glimpse into how she understood the power of popular culture.
I like that connection because changing laws and institutions matters, but changing what people imagine is possible matters too. A little girl doesn’t need a political speech to understand that Wonder Woman is powerful. She just needs to see Wonder Woman standing there, ready to take on whatever comes next.
Steinem spent her life fighting for real women. Along the way, she understood that sometimes a fictional woman can help change the way we see the real ones. That’s why that Ms. cover still feels like more than a clever piece of magazine history. It was a reminder that sometimes the easiest way to make a point about the real world is to put a superhero on the cover. Wonder Woman had the lasso, but Gloria Steinem understood the power of the story.
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