Adulting - #50 Why Should Stop Apologising PART 2 with Scottee & Char

Episode Date: January 5, 2020

Part 2 of our live recorded conversation including questions from the aud Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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Gambling problem? Call 1-866-531-2600. Or visit connectsontario.ca. Select games only. Guarantee void if platform or game outages occur. Guarantee requires play by at least one customer until jackpot is awarded. Or 11 p.m. Eastern. Restrictions apply. See full terms at canada.casino.fandu.com. Please play responsibly. Hello, poddlters, and happy new year. I'm finally giving you part two of Adulting Live, why we need to stop apologising, with Scotty and Shah recorded at the Boulevard Theatre in Soho.

It's the end of our conversation, and we also open up the floor to some questions and I hope you really enjoy it. At one point I say I'm rich. I didn't mean to say rich although obviously it's all relative so I definitely am rich in some cases of the word but what I actually meant to say was posh. I just thought it sounded really brash and wanted to correct myself but also didn't want to edit it out. Please hope you enjoy it. That didn't make any sense. I have another live going up as well from the 15th of December when I spoke to Kuchenga and Catherine Gray about sobriety. So keep your eyes peeled. That will be going up soon too. Bye. I think mental health has come forward in swathes in the last few years.

Even one of the most helpful things anyone ever said to me was Charlie Cox, who said, we all have mental health and some people suffer from mental illness. But much like physical health, sometimes it's good and sometimes it's bad. And that was the best explanation I've ever heard because it meant that we're all... Because I found it really weird when people were like, oh, mental health and you're like mental health what what yeah the mental health um how have you guys come to becoming more unapologetic and more understand it because I've recognized especially one of the biggest things for me is not stepping into a place where I talk about mental health when I really don't have I felt anxious I feel down I do not have depression I don't have anxiety I don't really have any

jurisdiction in the conversations around mental health so if you would be happy to open the floor on those things I would love to hear ways that you've overcome feeling like it's something which you need to be silent about I think um initially it was really hard for me to talk about or for me to even go to the doctors to be diagnosed I did a speak I did a speak I did a panel for the charity shout last week or the week before and I basically explained that I felt like it was a lot harder to even reach out for help because like I was saying earlier like I'm saying earlier, like I'm seen to be strong. I'm seen to like just have thick skin and know how to deal with everything because I've received microaggressions every single day. So it's just like I'm just used to being seen to be strong.

So for me to then actually be like, you know what, I am suffering right now. So first of all, it took me a while to even get to the doctors and there was like a lot of shame around being diagnosed with depression um but then I found that once um I started taking the tablets and stuff and realized I was actually getting better and it was helping me that there shouldn't be a stigma around getting help for your mental health um and for your bad mental health and I basically started speaking about it more online and once I realized that there were other people that were going through the same thing it's like the same thing with everything it helped me and being able to talk about it in my work and being able to show for example like other young black women that might be going through because the facts show that

like there's more of more black people going through it than do you know what I mean so it's just like if they can see themselves represented in that oh this is actually happening to other people I always just say whatever I post on Instagram if it helps at least one person yeah like then it's enough for me um so I think talking about it and making it more normal um definitely helped. And it helped me to even, for example, if I can't meet up with a certain friend, if they know and I just say, look, I'm really low today. I don't have to explain it anymore. And it helped me with being unapologetic about the fact that I have depression and sometimes I just don't want to leave my bed. so I think people people are more able to be empathetic once they kind of have a level of

understanding and if for me being diagnosed and being able to say look I have depression I'm low today it's like okay like take your time take your space and then it kind of helped yeah totally um I I only excuse me clear my voice because emotional moment no not at all just clearing my voice um I only came out uh as being uh mental uh this year and of course classic me came out in Scarlett Curtis's new book it's not okay to be blue uh and otherwise um like why couldn't I just like do a soft launch why can't I just be like soft launch? Why can't I just be like, guys, there's this stuff. Because I'd only this year started going into therapy and using therapy and receiving help for that.

Because I think, and this is, again, class bingo. It's totally related to my class. Because I'm used to performing wellness, used to having to perform like I'm used to performing wellness used to having to perform like that I'm okay to like keep stuff at home settled performing that I'm okay to be able to like keep on the capitalist like wheel and earning money and I for Scarlett's book um wrote about how when we're having these conversations now about the mental health, that often what we would see from Mental Health Awareness Week, Mental Health Awareness Month,

that there's a parity of mental health. That we all, if you experience depression, we all experience depression in the same way. And what I wanted to bring to that book was to say, I'm not robbing anyone of their depression, but what I'm saying is there are other factors that will play that will mean reaching the help that I needed meant that I could only get it when I was 33 whereas people who perhaps have the money and

the privilege and Scarlett has been very forward in talking about having the the privilege of being able to access the care that Scarlett needed very very quickly means that actually you can live with this stuff for a very long long time and I really welcome the conversations that were like as funny as it is where we're talking about the mental elves that most people have and you know that like or the shorthand of like oh I'm feeling a bit sad because I lost 25 Instagram people so uh I've got mental health um as silly as that sounds I'm really glad that it's coming into the our um vernaculars that it is coming into the way that we talk about things that is okay that if you work with someone that they're taking a duvet day we don't need to go into like oh what type of mental are they it's just like it's really okay to start to have these

conversations and often I hate that chat it's okay to be depressed um I'm grateful uh that I've been able to come out and um now then again now shout we're the phone, but people want you to be like, be mental and public. Sorry, I just asked you to do that as well. No, no, no, I think it's good. But it's a question about how we are mental and public and then also what happens when we need to step away from that or not be a role model for that. Totally.

Well, that was actually my next thing. I was going to talk about boundaries because you briefly just brought up how when you want to see a friend or something you've learned that you can actually say you know I don't want to come tonight and not because my sister's dog's cat ate her goldfish but actually just because maybe you just don't want to go and that might be for whatever reason but generally if you don't want to go somewhere it's probably because of something that's going on in your mind that makes you not want to go. And I think setting up boundaries moves in every circle, whether that's your friendships, your relationships. With work, I found that Dolly and Pandora spoke about this on the Hilo once, and I found it really interesting because it's definitely something I did.

Women, as writers, often feel like confessional literature is the best way to move forward. So the best currency you have is to divulge every minutiae of your life because it's such a hook for other people to get into and I really got into that and I realized that even with social media at the beginning like doing fitness influencing you get better engagement if you're showing your body and like that would feel normal but then I actually think what's my boundary around like that what do I want to do that and those kind of things just stepping back and recognizing that sometimes just because something might open a door for you it doesn't mean that that's the route you have to go and it doesn't matter how many boundaries you put up there's going to be

another route like it will always you'll always find a way out of that maze it just won't be through the way that you thought it would I don't know if that isn't and I need to apologize for literally the whole way through this podcast um but with boundaries is that something that you've become this is really recent for me boundary stuff I don't know about you guys is that something that you've learned because I think that's the final apology is kind of going do you know what this is me these are what I'm happy to do this is what I'm happy to talk about I think once you cover those you really can start to feel safer in your own self yeah I think boundaries are really important and I didn't actually, I've learned about them recently as well

and probably through Floss. Just being like, actually, you don't owe anyone anything and no one else owes you anything either. I think that's like a major thing that I realized. And then especially when it came to my mental health, putting in boundaries and just being like, I actually don't have the capacity to go to this event or to see this person or so but what's the point if you don't want to do it you don't do it it's like for example this might

be a bad example but like the other day me and my friend were going to go um I think we're going to go around to our friends and I was like are you putting on makeup and she's like I don't know you put on makeup and I'm like do you want to put on makeup do And she's like, I don't know, are you putting on makeup? And I'm like, do you want to put on makeup? Do we want to put on? No, we don't want to put on makeup. We don't want to perform pretty today. So let's not put on makeup. It's kind of like just realizing that you don't have to

just because it's like, just because it's normal to. So I think just because you've been invited to something, it doesn't mean you have to go. If you don't have the capacity to go, don't go. And I think putting in the boundaries and just making sure that you only do things when you know you can do things or in every sense like you said it's in friendships it's in relationships it's in work it's in everything i think boundaries are so important to exercise and it's hard at first obviously but you will only ever get the best out of a situation if you practice your

boundaries I find it um strangely uh and absurdly I find it very hard to advocate for myself um give me a whole like a bunch of kids that like I want to get into the arts and support yeah great can do that easy I can advocate for other people really easy as soon as I need to go I need some time off I find it very difficult so we came up with a formula when I'm touring um which is a show parent and they tour with me and they advocate for me without my consultation so they'll say it's six o'clock it's time that Scotty has to leave. And I'm like, oh my God, this is great. So it means like I'm being looked out for. And it's about looking back at the industry,

largely when I'm making theatre work that this is in place, that we're saying like, if you want this sort of work, that's going to do this sort of thing to the artist, you need to understand that there needs to be support and care afterwards. And so we have check-ins, we talk about body my brain where i'm at expectations um and and and that i found really useful but that only came through another artist who who like we communicate our boundaries are when we are feeling really like heavy or like stuff is going on in our brains we communicate through emojis or top fives so it's like okay top five mystique songs of all time and it's just a way of talking to each other

without having to go I'm feeling this that and the other it's like completely distract distractionary okay so this is a very important one not doing the most and by this I mean again kind of coming back to the wokeness thing. But at the minute, obviously, we brought up climate change. We brought up politics. I think there's this idea, and I think I actually am quite bad at making it seem like I try and do everything, especially in the podcast, like talking about lots of things. People will mess with me, like, how do you know all this stuff?

I'm like, oh, I don't. You literally listen to my podcast, so you hear what I specifically know on each specific thing. It's not that I know all the things. And I think we live in a world where you've got to know all the woke terms you should be vegan you should be not driving a car and whatever whatever the myriad of things are that you should be doing so because I shop in charity shops I will then get messages like you're having a roast dinner with beef I was like I didn't say that I wasn't going to and I think that we need to get better at first of all not looking at what other people are doing so much obviously if they're being really awful then we should speak out and call that out if we can or call it in but I think especially with like

the climate change stuff it can get really heavy and it can make you just want to not talk about it how have you adopted any ways or do you come across it in your work where you feel like god there's a real pressure for me to be doing more but I am as you say I'm at capacity mentally emotionally with my work I can't afford to make these changes I think there's so many things that go into is this something you're coming across at the minute I literally had this conversation last night with a friend who is also an influencer and I just feel like I've had this conversation so many times with friends who have an online presence and I've said I'm gonna make a post about it because it just needs to be said like social politics advocates sorry I got distracted um we're not the news no so we don't talk about we're not there to like highlight everything that should be spoken

about at the time or we're literally human beings so we talk about what's important to us all the things that we talk from experience as well so I can't talk about um certain things because I'm too busy talking about all the black people that are dying in America and like all of do you know what I mean so it's like I just feel like there's so much expectation on us to talk about everything because we talk about something so because we we have the confidence to talk about something then they feel like okay you need to talk about this you need to talk about that you need to talk about this as well it's like I can't talk about everything because I don't know about everything and if I did start talking about everything then people will be coming for me and saying why are you just jumping on the bandwagon and talking about this when you don't actually know about it and it's just like I think if people

put the energy that they put into telling us what we need to be talking about and just talk about it themselves or put that energy into building your own platform so you can talk about it then it would just make more sense because you can't know about everything and talk about everything and say the right thing about everything. And someone's going to say something about it anyway. I just feel like there's too much expectation on the people that feel like they can talk out to then talk about everything and it's just impossible. I'm going to be quite contradictory to myself in saying that I

don't think there's a bad it's a bad thing that everybody tries to do the most yeah because it means that we're trying to acknowledge other experiences other people and the planet that we're living on which I think is really important but I also don't think we need to be a representative of everything as well. And as well as where I think that emotional labour shouldn't always be parked with the people that are affected by the shit, I also don't think that we should have the white saviours

come in and be like, I've got this, guys, OK? Because I've read a book. So it's tough. It's tough to know where to sit. I'm really okay with us feeling unsure and moving forward whilst trying to have that question in our mind. Cause I think if we've got that question in our mind, what we're essentially doing is thinking about privilege and power. We thinking about okay what am I able to do with my platform what who am I able to talk to on my platforms and who am I not being a representing on behalf of experiences that don't belong to me but what other voices can I bring up at the same time but I think it's a really difficult one with climate actually I think it's really tough because yes

everyone wants you to be complete everyone wants you to be the vegan um everyone wants you to like show us how to live as if you are um a spiritual leader because that's kind of the space which influences sit at the moment they're apostles that um and the thing which i really love is my husband i once said to me because he doesn't do the internet in his words he's like are there any like working class influences i was like what do you mean by that he's like anyone like trying to make you to swipe up into a food bank is anyone trying to get you to like like to look at their life which isn't about um scented candles and there's a lot of like capitalist influence which i think is like pushing us to buy more and do more which is counter to um climate

politic and i think it's i do think it's okay that you feel slightly overwhelmed by environmental politic actually because we do have to go through a sense of grieving a bit to be like oh fuck it's happened it's not happening it's happened and we can see that in lots of different ways in lots of different data i mean even just like the like the 900 scientists across the world that like it's happened tick um you know like i i'm all right listening to them because i don't know like the ins and outs of the science but they seem to be like quite astute on it um that that fear and that panic might motivate and generate us to a place where you do start and i know you've spoken online about um buying fast fashion it's like buying it consciously um and I wonder if without climate fear and climate panic whether

we would be um like like have these conversations no I don't think we would and I think it's interesting so I do think all right I think in some people it promotes change I think in other people what it can do is if you feel like and I don't anymore because I think I've been through this a few times but say your friends are oh my god I've cut and I don't anymore because I think I've been through this a few times but say your friends are oh my god I've cut down I don't eat chicken anymore and then someone's like well are you still eating cheese and they're like yeah and I'm like well what's the point and they're like okay and then they don't do anything I think that's sometimes where the conversation goes it's not like well done you've done this thing it's like well you've done 0.4 percent of

what you could be doing so you're basically doing nothing and that's that's the really disabling part of it I think for people um and going back to what you're saying I think I know what you're talking about people send me and I'm sure send you both all the time things that are going on around the world which obviously I feel really awful that they're happening but they will be like you have not spoken about what's happening in Sudan Iran Palestine wherever and I'm like oh my god it is so bad but i am not a i'm not a ward journalist and i don't also don't really know what's going on and i do want to share it but it becomes this thing of like again same with environmentalism i can't share every single atrocity that goes on in the world someone got killed not far from where i lived the other day

and i wasn't talking about that like i can't talk about everything and i think there is an importance to honing on on like something you want to talk about and believing that we all together collectively can bring out the important things because I cannot share about every atrocity in the world because I would be there all day long and it doesn't mean that we don't care I think it's sometimes giving people it's everything we've spoken about it's boundaries it's recognizing where your strengths are it's realizing the privilege of being able to buy charity shop clothes because I'm straight size and I can fit in an 8 to a 16 and it doesn't really matter if you're a plus size woman or man the likelihood is you're not going to be able to buy from charity shops so that won't be your fight that is for me that's easy for me and I've got

access in the time because I'm freelance you know it's like don't just look at what they're doing think about what's led someone to make that decision it might be that that's their their point of action is there and I think all of us having the empathy to think that we can all do it will then give us the release to not need to apologize if you are vegetarian like my friend who has secret chicken nuggets when she's drunk but also I think when people um, like, why are you not talking about this? Why are you not doing something about this? It kind of feeds into the idea that if you're not talking about it, you're not doing it. So I don't think they even think about the fact that maybe you are doing things that you're not posting about.

But they're just like, well, you're not talking about it, so you're not doing it. And I think that's also kind of dangerous because we need to get back to, well, the whole point of like doing stuff we say about like allies is like you can't just be an ally if you're shouting about it on social media. What are you doing in your day to day? And I think it's the same with messaging people like, why are you not talking about this? Why are you not doing this? It's like, but you don't know what I'm actually doing and I don't actually owe it to everyone to share everything that I'm doing. Do you know what I mean? I don't know.

I think sometimes it can contradict it if you are just constantly shouting about everything that you're doing as well it kind of takes away from it being genuine sometimes yeah totally I think it's nice when I do things like this and I meet people or I like do these weekenders where I bring activists across the board all together and I think oh god this is okay fine take the foot off the pedal because I know like you know I've been in rooms where I'll be like okay right you're helping the queer kids in Southampton you've set up the pride in Peterborough you've sorted out the arts festival in Newcastle but you can sort of map it and you can like take a bit of a breath to be like okay it's not it's not you against the world it's us trying to push the bullshit to the sides. I definitely think that.

Can I flip this on its head? Because I think this is an interesting thing that we see a lot online. It's kind of going to be about apologising. So, for instance, say someone does make a racial slur or say something that's homophobic or something, which is all of us can agree that kind of rhetoric should be dismantled and taken away. What is the correct way? I mean, I think I know the answers, but I think we should bring it to the fore how when we should apologize I think what happens is we're apologizing constantly for stuff that doesn't really matter we'll apologize when someone else stands on our

foot or when we hold the door open oh sorry but when when we really fuck up we'll go oh I'm sorry you felt like that or I'm sorry I said that and that you were offended and I think the irony is we're able to apologize when it means nothing. But swallowing your pride and actually apologising when you do make mistakes, which I make countless times, and I've said this so many times, but I think I was very lucky that my career started where people started to watch what I was doing at a time when I'd kind of done all my fuck-ups already.

Not all of them. I will continue to make a million every week. But the ones that probably now could get me cancelled, I'd already done them in private. So I don't feel like I continue to make a million every week. But the ones that probably now could get me cancelled, I'd already done them in private. So I don't feel like I have to make that many public apologies. I don't know. I might get an email after this. I'm ready to apologise though.

Is this something you come up against, that people are unwilling, especially people from a lot of privilege, to make a real... FanDuel Casino Daily Jackpots. Guaranteed to hit by 11pm with your chance at the number one feeling. Winning. make a real... 19 plus and physically located in Ontario. Gambling problem? Call 1-866-531-2600 or visit connectsontario.ca. Select games only. Guarantee void if platform or game outages occur. Guarantee requires play by at least one customer until jackpot is awarded or 11 p.m. Eastern.

Restrictions apply. See full terms at canada.casino.fandu.com. Please play responsibly. An apology. Yeah, I think, yeah, the only times I've seen it really is whenever I've spoken about white privilege and then people have obviously then their white fragility comes out and but they won't say they'll

just tell me that I'm wrong or that it doesn't exist or that I'm just an angry black woman or that I'm just moaning or they won't I don't know I just feel like they won't accept it and kind of or if people do you know the whole like blackface thing like people don't want to apologize for it it's just like oh but that was before and like this I just feel like people don't want to say a real sorry kind of like what you were saying I feel like it's it's hard for people to make mistakes and admit that they've made a mistake and instead just get defensive especially if they're like if it's online they're not face to face they're not they won't feel like they have to say sorry they can just ignore it and move on

or just delete your comment or this that and the other I think it's so easy to just like brush it away if you make a mistake and just pretend it didn't happen if it's online um so i feel like people are more inclined to just their ego will just get in the way i've seen a sort of new advanced version of um wokeness and passive aggression come together in certain rooms um and particularly when race has been spoken about um i've seen white folk kind of say you know so I'm just going to own the fact that I'm a white person and I am solely responsible for racism and it's and and it's like they want this self-congratulation of for have done the work and then it's done and then they can move on to the next thing and I was in a room with a very prolific artistic director of a very large space in London, careful for libel, who came out into a room full of queer folk and was like, I know that I'm homophobic.

And it's just because of the setting that I grew up in. So I'm owning that. Anyway, thanks so much for coming today and I was like whoa no you can't park that and like not address it or unpack it or so I think we've got to this place of like where it's become more sophisticated where blackface looks different now it's a code switching and stuff like that I feel I've seen there's also like when I often I talk to um people of different classes above me who will start to say in it and fucking hell and I'm like oh this is I think this is coming from a place of empathy but also it just feels a bit strange like it just feels strange um but we are

living in counseled culture right we are living in this time where it's like you're not you have not always been a perfect human being therefore you are deleted from the internet and I think we do have to get to a place where we can allow excuse me apology and we can allow people to reform and to change and to move forward and become better people but it does have to come with sincerity and work and labour. They can't just be like, I have wrote one of those iPhone notes thing, screen grabbed it and put it on Twitter, therefore done. That's not how you do it. You do it by doing the work.

And obviously doing the work is that dismantling of privilege. So I, when it comes to talking about race having read read any ready for any eddie lodge stories book why I'm not speaking about white people about race it took me so long to accept it because if someone accepts that yes this is I have white privilege whatever it means that you have to relearn the whole of the world and go oh maybe I didn't get that job because I was the best maybe I had some privileged access to something or maybe this happened because of this and and it is hard but you do have to do it and once you've done it I do think it improves I think I see the world so

differently from how I did when I was growing up I genuinely think I've done so much unlearning and I have this conversation with my friends all the time because my school I went to was one of the most unbelievable schools in the world and uh I always used to think private school was amazing and it is but it's also I have literally had to completely dismantle every single thing that I ever learned because the people I was around irrespective of like it could have looked like it was diverse but it was still this echo chamber which informed so many things that I think are really damaging and really problematic and if anything basically keep you living in this the idea that the world wants you to live in which is everything we're talking about today is I'm not

going to apologize from deviating away from trying to fit into a system which fundamentally will only praise you if you're you can try as hard as you want but the likelihood is even if you do everything that the world tells you to do so you're straight and you dress how they want and you stay skinny and you wear the makeup they want you to wear and you wear the clothes whatever you still probably are going to get fucked over and the not apologizing part of that is going well let's just give it a go and try and have a bit more empathy towards other people um I've kind of gone around about the houses here but basically this is what the whole podcast has made me realize that you think that privilege keeps you safe or it feels like keeping your privilege and not accepting others truths will keep you safe if anything it's

actually so dangerous because you're living a lie you look sharp sorry no like no it's like it's like no a light bulb has gone off in my head where I'm like wow that's what's going on in their brains yeah so like thank you for like sharing that because now I can slightly understand a bit better why people feel like they're being robbed particularly when we're talking about privilege so this is why it's really important right that we have like these chats that we have these different life experience and we don't just shut each other down um okay wow we're gonna move on to this section there's gonna be a floating microphone so please put your hand in the air if you have any questions over here amazing you guys all doing okay am i the only warm one in here you hot

okay good i'm very hot and I don't want to get my gin and tonic so I've definitely got massive sweat patches like hi hi I guess this is mainly to an only my question but you've spoken a lot about even just then talking about how you are so more aware now of your privilege have you ever been tempted or feel like you should apologize for that because I feel like you know all your podcasts and all the stuff you talk about is all about understanding privilege really and like everyone else's lives that you know you're trying to learn about do you not like when you're talking about it find it hard to not be like apologizing that you're so privileged because that's what I find hard totally it's a really good question it goes

back to what Scotty said um his point I think about when someone stands up and they think they can just apologize and park it the reason I don't apologize and it's in Renny Eddie Lodge's book as well it's a it's a really good question because actually when I first learned about race you want to apologize on behalf of every white person but apologizing is fundamentally pointless and doesn't do anything what would do something is if someone was racist on a bus you stood up and you went you don't fucking speak something like that etc you'd start you stop co-signing racist behavior if you want to feel apologetic for the fact that you're posh you change the way that you vote you act your actions promote a change just because I'm it's not my fault that I'm born white and it's not my

fault that I'm rich, but it is my fault if I continue to perpetuate levels of hierarchy or, what's the word, disparity in wealth. Or if I, if basically, if I, if I carry on to do all the things that are the negative parts of my privilege, then I should apologize but what I'm the apology if you say to a person of color oh I'm really sorry I'm white that doesn't stop racism do you know what I mean so it's I know what you mean because when you learn about it the guilt is one of the hardest things that's the first thing that happens when you understand racism as a white person you got all this guilt and you want to put it somewhere but the last place you should put your guilt is on a person of color and go here's my apology take my shame I shall now be absolved and carry on my day do you know because I think that's kind of what it does and I did apologize a lot at the beginning but now I don't

I'm not sorry that I'm privileged I'm sorry for the times when I've done something that's fucked up does that do you know what I mean does that make sense I'm sort of saying do you know what I mean oh I just spat does anyone else have any other questions for anyone? Oh, yeah, down here. Thank you. I have a question for Scotty. Just in regard to what you were saying about polyamory, I know you alluded briefly to kind of destigmatising

the idea of jealousy in that situation but um as you spoke about someone who suffers with mental health problems i wondered if you've ever experienced anything kind of like any difficulty with having multiple partners and if that's affected your mental health great Great question. Thank you very much. Yeah, and because of the setup that I have, there's open communication and it also means that everybody has to feel comfortable with everything that's going on.

So when I have had moments of crisis, and I use that language because it's like something immediately happens that like throws everything up in the air and it makes me behave in a certain way. I just, I know I have the ability to say to a partner, can you not go on dates this week? Is that okay? And they also have the ability to say, no, I don't think that's fair like we all have a

conversation about it I actually feel very supported in the relationships that I currently have and I have had relationships where I haven't and um perhaps my trust was abused actually and I've learned from that um so yeah, they have coincided with each other, but because of open dialogue, because of everyone knowing they have the right to say what's comfortable for them and what their boundaries are, often it means that support is sent my way or in the way of the partner that is in need of it.

Understanding it's not about policing somebody, it's just about um the sort of small plaster that might just help as uh being less distracting at that time so that you can do your self-care and your wellness to get you to a place of stability to answer your question yeah thank you also to that i guess the with mental health the irony being like the more that you push down the worse it is at least if you the irony being like the more that you push down, the worse it is. So at least if you're able to access the fact that you would rather be polyamorous,

would be better than like not doing it. Yeah, well, there are currently two people looking out for my wellbeing. Oh, yeah. There are two people that are able to offer lots of different supports. And a current boyfriend actually is the real product of, like, he was raised by two lesbians, his mums, and one of them's a mental health worker. And he's the first person that I've said to, oh, I'm in therapy,

and he's gone, he went, congratulations. And I was like, everyone needs to be raised by mental health working lesbians. I think that makes sense i agree um any other questions from the room oh yeah they're amazing hi um i wanted to ask a bit more about or sort of if you have further thoughts on the challenge of having the privilege but when it comes to like the corporate space because where I work where a lot of people I know work the like lack of diversity there is on paper they're trying to challenge it but then I find it weird because on one hand you've got like the social media space we have like really amazing discussions

and how that transfers into the the city space and especially like in London there are you talk about London being like a metropolitan space but then for a lot of like corporate jobs London is not a space where people can afford to live and do those jobs and I wonder if you'd had like interactions from as being like an arts person with how you can like bring that more effectively into some corporate I don't any more thoughts because that's the bit I find difficult is the bringing into more corporate spaces I did a corporate gig that I made them sign a non-disclosure that they couldn't say that worked for them a major conglomerate that exists across the globe and they wanted to get their six CEOs together and have a conversation about diversity. So I gave them a game, I made a game where they had to ask each other questions and they had to ask each other how much the

other person thought they earned and then the person had to respond and then the questions just became more and more around socialism and the workforce. So I think the arts can be a really good way of disrupting those spaces. And I'm really welcome when those sort of team away days are based around like, OK, let's put the cat amongst the pigeons. But I also think like apprenticeships are really valuable. My brother is a working class guy. He is in an apprenticeship at the city of london very corporate environment um and he's been given a job as a result of it and so those initiatives as well can be other ways um of like us looking at a class and also the workforce yeah i i think also if you're talking

about being within it it comes down to like we talk about privilege, but then you also think about like you might have societal privilege, but your personal power within a workforce might be that you're like the lowest rung and you probably might not have any jurisdiction or any say. And it's not for anyone to say like you should quit your job because like that's your job. So I think that as much as it might feel like we're basically hypocrites all the time in so many different ways, much like I was saying, much sustainable, that's your job. So I think that as much as it might feel like... Basically, we're hypocrites all the time in so many different ways, much like I was saying about the sustainable fashion vegan thing. But if you're worried about corporate spaces, you don't have to do it within your own work. Like, you could say to your boss,

I'd be interested in seeing more diversity in the workplace. I think it'd be really helpful. But a bit like what Scottie was saying, if you channel the energy into other areas that link back into... So maybe you could talk to your work about whether or not they do apprenticeships but you could also look into what how to vote to make corporate spaces more diverse but also doing things outside of your job I think sometimes you can't take everything with you everywhere I think that you can't wear every hat

in every room and when I'm on social media I am often talking about these things but not every single conversation I have with my friends is work we might spend I am often talking about these things but not every single conversation I have with my friends is woke we might spend half an hour talking about why do people bleach their bum holes like do you know what I mean you can't always be switched on and I think I think that awareness I think the fact that you're looking around your office and going do you know what this could do with a shake-up is great because it's harking back to exactly what Shah said like why are people not noticing so I think the noticing is the first step. I think the action is the second step.

But I don't think the action has to happen all the time. Do you know what I mean? Should we take one last question? At the top. Oh, sorry. Okay, go. So it's a bit about what you were talking about earlier. So I've spoken about privilege with a bit of my family before

and I find it quite a difficult conversation because some of my like direct parents won't accept that they've come from a position of privilege and that I've come from a position of privilege because it's sort of what you were talking about before they're very much working class like granddad's a coal miner so absolutely clear you have absolutely zero privilege but that's completely not true and obviously my privilege is that i grew up with these parents that have made me go to work really hard to go to school but also that i'm a white cisgendered woman that's been brought up with my parents and i think that it's really really difficult to um get them to acknowledge it so how do really difficult to get them to acknowledge it. So how do you sort of get them to acknowledge

that when they've worked so hard to come from one place where they're not privileged? It's sort of what you were talking about earlier. So they've worked really hard to get out of, like, not having any money to where they've got money now. But how do you make them recognise the rest of their privilege that they've actually just been born into? Is this, like, socioeconomic privilege as in their class?

Yeah, exactly, yeah. Well, bring them to my show. There's this great line in it which I love, which when I perform to Northern audiences, I say, and just because you've got a Northern accent doesn't make you work in class. And the whole room goes, huh? That's so part of our identity.

But, yeah, yeah. But also also I do come from the school of four but the bed that you were born in and the environment that you grew up in is the class that you retained for your life I don't think you I think you can your children can transcend the class that you are um but and you can gain capital like I've got cultural capital I've now started to get a bit of financial capital that I can pay my bills um but I will always be a working class person the first 30 years of my life that I lived in social housing that happened you know I've got working class teeth the way that I talk you know I mean these things don't like suddenly dissipate um so in some respects perhaps your

parents there is there's a there is a rightness there that they are working class uh or they might feel it but um yeah bring them to my show I also I just want to add one thing because I think this is what we all struggle with which is basically sometimes we talk about something whether it's race or class or privilege and we take it so personally but it's not really necessarily so you can struggle you could be the richest poshest most lucky person in the world but you could have the most awful things happen to you and you could face the biggest atrocities neither of those things cancel out each other and I think sometimes when we talk about privilege people feel like what you're saying is your whole life has been perfect and you're so lucky that you shouldn't complain.

It's not. It's about how systemically do you fit into this model. Even the fact that we're all sat in London, so much privilege, can afford these tickets, so much privilege. Born in the UK. All of these things. You could bring it wider and wider and you can take it as wide as you need it to go before they click and recognize that it's not an attack, it's not you telling them that they're wrong or that anything they do is wrong. It's just rejigging your understanding of the world so you have a tiny bit more nuance to it. And I think that we've got to recognize that your privilege and your systemic and whatever parts are here and then your life that you live can be just as fantastic or just as awful, no matter what your starting place is.

Would you agree with that? Yeah, I think when people say the word privilege, they get the wrong end of the stick a lot. And they don't think about the fact that most of the time when we talk about privilege, it's systemic privilege. So I think just it's kind of like what you were saying earlier is that sometimes there needs to be more of a middle ground for people that are not in the echo chamber and also people that just don't want to learn about it so for example like um I think there should be more stuff on you know like when Monroe goes on the tv it's like people that wouldn't normally see a transgender woman or that kind of thing would get a fresh understanding and the way that she talks about things is so that it's not dumbing it down but it's just not so complicated and I think there needs to be more talk surrounding privilege that

is easier to understand and just takes away the fact that it doesn't mean that like you're rich like it literally doesn't mean that you're rich it just means that systemically you are higher like and you get more opportunities I was just gonna say perhaps you could get your parents to watch two films one of them which is Peterloo which is a Mike Lee film that looks at the Peterloo massacre that happened in Manchester and is a very historic piece of work and then Ken Loach's new film Sorry That We Missed You which looks at the gig economy and what's happening now and that's definitely framed a difference of class in my head as somebody who's not part of the gig economy,

that's not trying to stay awake whilst delivering the ASOS delivery that's likely to come into my door and made me really recognise the people that are coming to my door that I just see as a service and not as a human. So those could be... I know you sort of asked there for sort of tangible things. So I thought, oh, I'll try and give you something tangible. Amazing.

I'll put those in the show notes of the episode as well. Okay, I think we're coming to a close now. Thank you so much for being such a lovely audience. I just wanted to ask you guys, do you have anything you want to plug and where may people find you online or IRL if you have any shows or anything? My personal Instagram is Elise Shaw and girls

will be boys underscore and we have t-shirts they're cute watch our films um yeah just check me out on Instagram cool have you got any panels or anything that people can come to coming up um like Google calendar is my life so if it's not in front of my face I don't know what's going on tomorrow honestly like I think I'm doing a radio show next week but everything is on my Instagram and my website is gwbb.com

Amazing, thank you. Scotty? I'm Scotty as Fat on the internet just to like really put it out there. Hi guys, this is who I am and my show Class will be touring the UK The internet, just to really put it out there. Hi, guys. This is who I am. And my show, Class, will be touring the UK and Canada from February onwards. And there are lots of different events that sit around that and lots of stuff, digital stuff,

that happens around that show as well. And you've also got your mural, which I need to come and see. Yeah. So we just did an occupation of my council estate. I still call it my council estate um I still call it my council estate I don't live there my nan lives there and I grew up there um and I left there a couple of years ago where we worked with a bunch of working-class queer folk to create an occupation um so 30 foot long 30 meter long wall where we create a political mural which looks beyond queerness and asks communities

that go past that every day about unity and togetherness and how that might be achieved. So that is in North London currently. Amazing. Thank you so much, guys. Please make sure to register to vote if you have not and make it a good one.

I am going to probably pop out for a little drink afterwards, but I'm going to go and de-sweat a little bit. So I might see outside if you want to. But thank you so much for coming. Thank you. We'll be right back. With every spin and a guaranteed winner by 11 p.m. every day.