5 Reasons These Lesbian, Bi, and Queer Women Support Bernie Sanders

On Friday night, feminist activist Gloria Steinem appeared on Real Time with Bill Maher and made some seriously tone-deaf remarks. When questioned about why so few young women supported presidential candidate and former Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, Steinem responded with a theory: women get more radical as they get older. She continued, "When you’re young, you’re thinking, 'Where are the boys?' The boys are with Bernie [Sanders]." Maher seemed taken aback by her comments, joking, "Now if I said that... you'd swat me."

Maher went on to ask Steinem how she felt about Caitlyn Jenner being named woman of the year, and crudely referred to her as a woman with "a dick." Steinem, in turn, brought up Martine Rothblatt, the highest-earning woman in the United States, saying, "The highest paid female in the corporate world, too, was a male previously, so, I mean, (scoffs)," which didn’t exactly prove Steinem’s theory about women becoming more radical with age.

However, the majority of the Internet backlash (and oh, how swift and mighty Internet backlash can be) focused on Steinem’s "Where are the boys?" comment. Many young women supporting Sanders felt it was sexist and condescending to imply they were voting based on the desire to attract men, while many Clinton supporters felt her comments reflected poorly on them, and reduced their voting preferences to the gender of their candidate.

Steinem later apologized for her comments on Facebook, chalked the error up to a case of "talk-show Interruptus," and said, "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. 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."

While much of the LGBTQ community is split between Clinton and Sanders, and SheWired doesn’t endorse any candidate, we were curious about the Sanders supporters in our community who don’t do it for "the boys." Here are five lesbian, bi, and queer women on why they support Sanders, their candidate of choice: