Gloria Steinem Apologizes for Critique of Young Women Who Back Sanders

Gloria Steinem apologized Sunday morning for suggesting that young women are only voting for Bernie Sanders to gain the favor of their male peers.

"In a case of talk-show Interruptus, I misspoke on the Bill Maher show recently, and apologize for what's been misinterpreted as implying young women aren't serious in their politics," she said in Sunday Facebook post.

"What I had just said on the same show was the opposite: young women are active, mad as hell about what's happening to them, graduating in debt, but averaging a million dollars less over their lifetimes to pay it back. Whether they gravitate to Bernie or Hillary, young women are activist and feminist in greater numbers than ever before."

Steinem's snafu came during her appearance on HBO's "Real Time with Bill Maher" on Friday night. The talk show host had asked the famous feminist why more young, Millennial women weren't supporting Hillary Clinton.

"Women get more radical as we get older," Steinem said, NBC News reported. "Men tend to get more conservative because they gain power as they age, and women get more radical because they lose power as they age . . . When you're young, you're thinking, 'Where are the boys?' The boys are with Bernie."

"Ooh, now if I said that … you’d swat me," Maher responded.

"No, I wouldn’t," she said.

The comments were not only questioned by Maher, but drew swift rebuke from younger feminists watching at home.

"To suggest, as Steinem seemed to do, that young women choose their candidate to attract men is profoundly sexist and condescending," wrote Mashable's Juana Summers.

"It trivializes the voting preferences of a powerful group of voters: young voters — and particularly young women — while at the same time ignoring gay women."

Summers also suggested Steinem was a hypocrite.

"This is also a pretty shocking reversal for Steinem, who, as The New Republic's Elizabeth Bruenig pointed out, once deemed Sanders an 'honorary woman' during his 1996 campaign against a Republican woman."

USA Today reported that former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright also scolded and threatened young women while attending a Clinton rally over the weekend.

"Just remember, there’s a special place in hell for women who don’t help each other," she said.

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