27/10/2024
The Guardian newspaper reports that Ruth Westheimer, an ally of minorities and LGBTQIA+ people, a humanitarian and frank promoter of sexual health, has passed on at the age of ninety six. She was known as Doctor Ruth to millions of people throughout the free world. Doctor Ruth started her career as an educator and sharer of knowledge, joining Planned Parenthood in 1967 and finding her vocation in life. She taught at Brooklyn College, Adelphi University, Columbia University, West Point, New York University, Calhoun College at Yale University and Princeton University, and was a fellow of the New York Academy of Medicine. She began her astonishing media career quietly in 1980 with a 15-minute recorded programme, Sexually Speaking, aired after midnight on a WYNY FM, a relatively small radio channel. A year later her presence had become an hour-long live phone-in show. Her cable TV show was soon rolled out across the US as The Dr Ruth Show. Her radio programme Ask Dr Ruth was syndicated nationally and internationally, so she became as well known in London and Hong Kong as she was in New York. As well as a weekly series on Israeli TV, she contributed to ITV’s This Morning breakfast show and spots on television in Luxembourg, Switzerland and France – she spoke English, French, German and Hebrew. Following emphatic success she went on to write more than 35 books, including Dr Ruth’s Encyclopedia of Sex (1994) and Sex for Dummies (1995). She also syndicated her column in newspapers worldwide, and developed games, videos, software and her own website. She was also involved in documentaries on family and religious values, Ethiopian Jews and Bedouin women, and in 2023 was named New York state ambassador to loneliness. While she managed to help so many people understand the need for sexual literacy, she never took herself seriously, and was happy to parody herself and her messages in advertisements for cars and shampoo.
