TULSI GABBARD, 31, Congresswoman (D-HI)

The Island OverachieverWhen Gabbard was 21,

voters made her the youngest person ever

elected to state office in Hawaii. Then she cut her

term short to join the National Guard, serving two tours in the Middle

East. Now she has become the first Hindu in

Congress and one of its first two female combat

veterans. “When I decided to run for Congress, I was

told left and right, ‘Tulsi, you’re a nice girl, but you’re too young and

inexperienced. It’s not your time.’ And these are

the people who ask, ‘Where’s the next

generation of leaders?’” Gabbard says. “On the

trail, I was inspired by a 65-year-old woman who told me how inspired she

was by my courage and for accomplishing something that almost everyone said

was impossible. It gave her courage to pursue her

own goals, and that’s what motivates me.”

THESE WOMEN ARE KICKING ASS AND MAKING A DIFFERENCE.By Malia Griggs

EMILY WOLF, 28, President of Fordham Law Students for Reproductive Justice The Contraceptive CrusaderAfter entering Fordham law school in 2010, Wolf was shocked to find out that the Catholic university in New York City would not prescribe her birth control through its health center. “I need the prescription to control the effects of my endometriosis,” she says. When a survey found that not a single student had received contraceptives for any health issue on campus, she joined Law Students for Reproductive Justice in opening a pop-up birth-control clinic, which has helped 150 students access birth control. “If I can inspire women to make their own sexual health decisions, that’s amazing,” she says.

JINETH BEDOYA LIMA, 39, Editor at El Tiempo The Super-Brave JournalistIn 2000, Lima was a 26-year-old journalist reporting on arms smuggling in Colombia when she was kidnapped and raped by a paramilitary group, then left on a desolate road. Today, Lima is an editor at Colombia’s largest newspaper, using her platform to speak for “thousands of women victims like me, who don’t have the same opportunity to be heard.” Her campaign, No Es Hora de Callar (It is Not the Time to Remain Silent), pushes for harsher punishments for sex crimes and encourages women to report these crimes and seek support. Her captors are still at large. “I’d be lying if I said I had no fear,” she says, “but I must live my life to the limit.”

AVA DUVERNAY, 40, Film director

The Self-Made MogulDuVernay has advice for

aspiring filmmakers: Forge your own path.

“They say you have to go to film school, that you

have to look a certain way, that you have to

have a specific amount of money, but you have to find your own way to

make films.” She certainly did, working

her way up from a childhood in Compton,

California, to become the first black woman to

win the best director award at the Sundance

Film Festival for last year’s love story Middle of Nowhere. She’s also

founded a film-distribution company

dedicated to getting movies made by people of color in front of wider

audiences. “Films by black women about

black women are for everyone,” she says. We

couldn’t agree more.

Fun, Fearless Females

Fun,FearlessFemales

She wants you to make a

movie too.

A journalist who would not

be silenced

Our second Hawaiian president?

150 women served, and counting.…

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124 COSMOPOLITAN | February 2013