Media Storm - Mina Smallman: Misogynoir, survival, and A Better Tomorrow

Episode Date: July 11, 2024

Warning: Strong language “Race is always seen as Black men's issue, gender is always seen as white women's issue. So Black women always fall through the cracks.” Preferential acceptance rates for White women applying to UK police forces have given a false impression of gender equality, hiding acute discrimination against Black women, Media Storm data shows. This reveals the importance of understanding intersectional discrimination - and one version in particular. ‘Misogynoir’: the ingrained prejudice against Black women. This episode heroes Black women speaking about the particular prejudices they face. In a long-form interview, Mina Smallman - teacher, pastor and mother of Bibaa Henry and Nicole Smallman, whose murders exposed racist police neglect and abuse - shares the pain, passion and learnings that went into her new book, A Better Tomorrow: Life Lessons in Hope and Strength. The episode is hosted by Mathilda Mallinson (@mathildamall) and Helena Wadia (@helenawadia). The music is by Samfire (@soundofsamfire). Speakers: Dr Marina Hasan, criminologist Marcia Ore, Diversity, Equality and Inclusion consultant & former West Midlands Police Officer Mina Smallman, pastor & author Resources: Order Mina Smallman’s book, A Better Tomorrow Request Media Storm’s policing data  Support Media Storm on Patreon Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Visit square.ca to get started. A woman of colour, a girl of colour. We are the last to be considered. Hello listeners. A few weeks ago on Media Storm, I talked about misogyny and mistrust in the Met Police with Coca-Kan, Dr Leila Hussain and Patsy Stevenson. Last year, we dug into this, finding evidence of racist discrimination in police recruitment, with the process of elimination for ethnic minority.

applicants hoping to change the force from the inside. But after Media Storm released its investigation, we were contacted by a group of black female police officers who said the situation would be even worse if we looked at it at an intersectional level. In other words, if we paired race with gender. Caught on camera, a rare opportunity for black women in policing to come together.

Marcia Orr and Karen Gettys were all, Organising a nationwide policing conference by and for black women. Because this had never been done, nor had any research been done to prove that they were dealing with layers upon layers of targeted discrimination. But they had experienced it, so they knew it was there. They asked us to find the numbers on gender and race together. Months of research later, we had the proof they needed. One in five white women who applied got it.

Only one in 14 Black women did. And the higher up you get, the worse it looks. In the 189 years of Metropolitan Police Service existing, there has only been one woman of colour who has actually achieved the rank of Keith Superintendent. Black women were less likely the women of any other ethnic minority to get in, they were less likely than black men to get in, and there are no diversity and inclusion pathways

that acknowledge the particular discrimination they face. So today, we'll hear from black women about their specific experiences of misogyn noir, the ingrained prejudice against black women, and we'll hear from one black woman in particular. While I was presenting Media Storm's Data at the Women in the Shade conference in January, I met Mina Smallman, the keynote speaker whose words blew away every single person sitting in that room. Mina Smallman is a teacher, pastor and mother whose two daughters, Bieber Henry and Nicole Smolman, was stabbed to death in London in 2020.

Met police officers were slow to respond to reports of them missing and then two officers took selfies with their bodies for which they were later criminally sentenced. Since then, Mina has campaigned about racism and sexism in police and society and today she has a book coming out. So here she is on a better. tomorrow, life lessons in hope and strength. Beba Henry and Nicole Smallman were murdered, but it was their loved ones who found their

bodies because the Met Police failed to respond. Admitted publicly that his force is institutionally racist, sexist, misogynistic. Do you accept that there is still institutional racism? I don't find it a helpful label. Welcome to MediaStorm, the news podcast that starts with the people who are normally asked last. I'm Matilda Malinson and I'm Helm. Helena Woodia, this week's special episode, Minas Smallman, on misogynua, survival and a better tomorrow. What is intersectional discrimination?

When someone suffer different layers of discrimination as a result of their race, of their gender, disability, their religion. I put the question to Dr. Marina Hassan, criminologist, and former intelligence employee of the police. Race is always seen as black men's issue, whereas gender is always seen as white women's issue. So black women always falls through the cracks. Today we're going to look at a specific type of intersectional discrimination experienced by black women.

As some call it misogynoa. Why so specific? Because anything else is misleading, because what our data showed was if you don't look at discrimination intersectionally, what you see is a lie. If we looked at the numbers on gender, we saw equal pass rates for men and women applying to join the police. In reality, positive hiring rates for white women were disguising discriminatory hiring rates for women of colour. and above all, black women. Marina investigates this intersectional discrimination within the police and is building on our data in future research.

She has spent years documenting what women of colour deal with in the police force. I found evidence of subordination, sexualisation of black female, a distrust, you know, of their accounts. Stereotyping is a very, very big issue for them. disparity in disciplinary and misconduct hearings and things like that. Bullies are being rewarded, promoted, where the victims are always suppressed. And you have done some research yourself, Matilda. So even looking at all the data that you have gathered through your Freedom of Information

request, it's quite clear that something is wrong, isn't it? Then there is this question that if they fail to protect their own people, within the organisation. You know, how are they going to protect the public? We love that Marina is building on our data and we want to make it available for anyone else trying to help. So for any researchers or die-hard reformists keen on the full data set,

you can request it via the link in our show notes. But while numbers are needed to get voices heard, it is personal experience that really speaks. And that is what Media Storm is all about. I think constantly, even at my age, of the spaces I go into. I do a environmental scan to see, is there anybody else who look like me, and feel the air? I think about where I'm holidaying. Will it be safe for me?

Will it be safe for me as a black gay woman? Will it be safe for me as a black woman? I think about what I'm wearing to go through security at the airport. because I'm never not stopped. That's our reality. Some people will say, oh, it's not that bad. But when you're constantly on hyper-alert going, I've got to think about this, I've got to think about that.

How am I going to be received in this space? It's hard. Marcia Orr, one of the organisers of Women in the Shade, the conference where I met everyone speaking in this episode, served as a police officer for 30 years. So in I went in November 1982, I wanted to do 30 years and I wanted to be an inspector and I got ridiculed about it and I shut up. I didn't want anyone to say she only got promoted because she was black and guess what happened when I got promoted? Someone said to me I only got

promoted because I was a black woman. That was disheartening because all the things that I'd done all the experience counted for nothing. So meritocracy for me is a word that people use. doesn't seem to apply to people that look like us that are different because automatically when we're in a room or in a space it's because of our identity not about our capability. You know, I went on TV

and said I hadn't experienced racism in the police I was going through hell at the time but there was a price to pay for being honest the black women don't feel safe to share their reality because they're consequences. So you decided to co-found women in the shade as a forum for black women in policing specifically. How did that go?

What kind of response did you get? It's an uncomfortable conversation for people to have when you say, I just want to talk about black women because they say, oh, you're not being inclusive. And we actually had some pushback from brown women, women of colour, about the conference. And that really surprised me. That's what drove it.

It was about getting black women's voices heard. We're absolutely unplegic about that. Grouping women of colour together is a real catch-all, but it's like the gender agenda. The gender agenda actually really benefited white women. It didn't really benefit black or women of colour because you viewed as an homogenous group. And if they tick their boxes in terms of recruitment or progression, They didn't look any further. Yourself, Matilda, the data you presented, that shocked me.

And I know it shocked the room because there were gasps about the data. You know, something that struck me when I was at the conference, I did notice when I was there that really the vast majority of people who attended were police officers of colour, mostly black police officers. And I wondered whether that was the intention or whether you'd been hoping for more uptake from white colleagues. Yes, it's interesting, isn't it? Because nowhere did we say in any of the marketing material

that white people weren't welcome. What we said was it was a focus about black women. We wrote to the police federation. We wrote to all these police organisations. We wrote to all the universities that are delivering policing degrees. And it was like tumbleweed. it's lonely

we're just looking to widen our network and support each other and we're not excluding our white colleagues black men white men or anybody else because we cannot do this alone if we want to make improvements in terms of equality and diversity and equity

then it has to be everyone pitching in Intersectional discrimination is often treated like a marginal issue for people in the margins. But actually, it undermines the most fundamental principles of our democratic and humanitarian society. So the question we see here is how to show everyone it matters to them. Speaking at women in the shade, one woman made that case. I'm okay. I'm okay, thank you. I'm okay. Thank you. I'm okay. So here she is, Mina Smallman. Mina, I'm so glad we're finally doing this interview. You are quite a hard woman to pin down. Very busy.

It's really amazing, though, that we have you here. I'll try not to take up any more of your precious time than is necessary. You just take as long as you need, because what I felt when we met, for the first time, that was so ironic was you were the minority, a white woman in a room full of black people, which is what my husband does often now. You know, most white people don't have that experience. When you got up and you showed your studies, I thought she's amazing. You're the kind of person I want to continue in the world where it's not about divides, it's just about truth. Gosh, Mina, that means so much. I'm really glad that our listeners can hear the impact of the work that they support. We have such an amazing

community of listeners who are people who really try to get to the heart of the story and find out how they can help as well. You know, that's what we're doing here at Media Storm. We are trying to work out how to be good people and how to participate in bettering society. So thank you for acknowledging that. It's going back to the measure of what it is to be a whole, and rounded human being.

Sometimes, if you can't hear, you have to feel. I thought I was someone who loved everyone. Actually, it wasn't until I was in the feels part of it, that I understood. The mum whose son was murdered, he was with his white girlfriend, at the bus stop and two guys came along and killed him with, I think it was a hammer

and at the end of the trial the mum stood on the steps and one of the journalists said to her do you forgive them and she said I do because that's what my faith tells me to do the following Sunday

I preached bearing in mind I'm a vicar and I said this is a real testament of faith because I am a priest and I'm telling you the woman, the mother, the priest that I am, I don't think I could do that. Who knew that fast forward I would be in a similar situation? And it wasn't until I was being interviewed by Michelle Hussein, who asked me that question, have you forgiven the killer? No one asked that. I didn't even thought of it.

When she asked that question, I looked inside myself and I was able to say, yeah, I feel nothing. He doesn't even exist in my mind. It was a gift from God. I just think he decided to cut me some slack. He didn't want me to carry that. You know, I speak the language of a Christian. However, my husband, who is not a signed-up Christian, step back further since the girls were murdered

because he can't get it. You know, he's watched my journey and he just thinks, how could God take our goals? So I learn every day about my pain, my philosophy, about my journey, who I am now, who I want to be, changes every day. Wow, it's amazing that you have forgiven the man who did that. And at the same time, it's true that you have for years now been railing against the system, being vocal about the wider problems that contributed to him doing what he did. So my question for you then is you may have forgiven him, but have you forgiven the system?

No, no. Interestingly, I was asked by Richard Madeley on GMB. He couldn't, he was aghast. He was saying, so just to understand, you've forgiven the murderer, but you haven't forgiven the police officers. And I said no. Bad interviewing. He should have followed up and asked me why. so I'd love it if you put that in there because if he really cared about the answer he would have said why and I came away and I thought about that the issue is it's not fully resolved in the Met there are huge problems and I think God hasn't given me that gift of freedom from that because he needs me to have that fire in my belly. And what I'm doing now, it's not spiteful. I'm just trying to shine a light on the brokenness of institutions that are failing and feel it's appropriate to cover up truth.

what's going on with politics now if you're put in place to govern a country your responsibility is to take care and support everyone but what we need to remember is that when my two daughters were murdered, I received no condolences from anyone. However, when Sarah Everard was murdered, the PM, Priti Patel, even Princess Catherine went to lay flowers and also Sadiq Khan. We had none of that. Two daughters murdered on the same day. And I don't put this out there lightly, but I really feel it's important. The reason I believe we didn't receive condolences was because all of their advisors would have said to them, this is two black women in Wembley.

We don't know whether they were prostitutes. or part of a gang ring or whatever, I've got no proof that that conversation happened, but I know that conversation happened. And the Everards, they've all been invited to meet with the PM and the Home Secretary. None of them will meet me. I've never had that invite What you're describing

is a system that is all about politics and not about people Is that a problem you see in our society? I'm going back to your stats. When I saw them, I said, if you remember, if ever we needed to know that the car system is alive and well in the UK, here we go. How can it be that nurses are having to go to food banks?

How can it be that children are going to school hungry? And I could go on and on and on, you know, women who've been let down by the police. It is bleak. So I hear you talking about the suffering of other people that you see, and yet you yourself have gone through a lot of suffering. We sat down to talk about issues of racism and sexism built into the most powerful institutions in our country. Some people might see a podcast to do with sexism and racism and policing

and think, oh, that's a bit of a niche issue. So can you explain why these issues are relevant for everyone? This affects all of us. All of us were born from a woman. All of us have female members. in our family. We're all invested in the safety of women and girls. That's my only agenda. I don't want any sides. I don't think we need sides. You can have your political leanings. I've deliberately stepped away from making this political. I elected to broaden my brush.

from just women and girls of colour to all women. Because I need to model what it is to be a good human being. But I need to say that my sisters are the lowest on the run, be it health, be it work, be it whatever. they are my people I can only be the human being I want to be but I want it to be that a woman of colour

a girl of colour we are the last to be considered the last to be taken care of the last in every aspect of this world Now, Meena, today you are putting out your own book. It's called A Better Tomorrow Life Lessons in Hope and Strength.

Tell us, what was it that you decided to write this book for? The truth is, way before the girls were murdered, I wanted to write a book because my life has been extraordinary. I'm a survivor of child neglect and abuse. I'm a survivor of domestic violence. But the process, what it is to put a book together, that first of all, you have interviews with publishers, then you do this, then you do that. I felt physically sick.

But how I'm received, when I do speak in engagements or TV is, how does she manage to do what she's doing given all that she's been through? And I thought, do you know, I'd like to answer that. That was the impetus for the book. How does this woman, in this unimaginable emotional pain, how does she do this? The book is about how, when you've lived a life of various kinds of torment and abuse,

you have two options it can break you or it can build you it's about how i have found inner strength because of it but also the book includes the damage it has done to me emotionally it's not possible to be a survivor without war wounds, I refer to myself as a walking wounded. So I'm here and I'm fighting, but I am broken. I do the best I can. That's what the book is about. Is it a book for other people who are wounded? Yeah, and this is important for women to hear.

We are so good. at putting a brave face on things. Why would a black mother want to say to their black children, you can never just be good. You are going to have to be better than good if you are going to find a place in this world. Why would you want to put that burden on your child? But If you don't prepare your child, they're not prepared. This is the dilemma and now we've got these layers. If you're a woman, I used to tell my girls, make sure when you go home, you're not alone. Make sure you've got someone with you.

Well, Bieber had someone with her and it didn't keep her safe. And this is only a glimpse of my story. Because it covers my story as a teacher, as a new priest, as all of those things. And mum, it's very open. I dug deep. Meena, you said the thought of writing a book made you feel physically sick. In the end, was it as hard as you'd expected? To be honest, it was really... painful to go through all of the stuff I did.

I'm very anxious about its release because it's me being honest. It's like when you do something really strange with your hair, you cut it all off. And it felt great at that time. But it's not until, it's not until, you see your mates and they say oh it looks great that you can exhale at the moment I'm breathing in and if you don't like it don't tell me it's been such a pleasure talking to

you meaner before I lose you do you have a closing message that you would like to share with our listeners. It's really difficult to try and explain to people how racism works if you're not black. Some people think that unless you shout out or say very racist things, you nigger, you black person, you coom, whatever, then it doesn't exist. But the truth is, marginalisation, can be non-verbal as well as verbal. So I'm saying to all white women, look, you don't know what it is to be black, but you know what it is to have misogyny.

Lend your voice. We have an opportunity for everyone to now understand what it is to be marginalised. A moment in time where police officers now have first-hand experience of what it feels to be a black person because they now know what it feels like to be under unfair scrutiny, not trusted.

Everyone's watching you. Everyone's deciding whether you are good or bad. This could be the pivotal point where we deliver best support and be the best human beings we can be. Thank you for listening. Your support is the reason we're able to chase neglected stories. and give time to in-depth investigative research when people come to us with their stories. Listeners who can support us on Patreon, which funds this kind of reporting. If you would like to contribute, please follow the link in our show notes.

For now, I'm off to get married, and while I'm honeymooning, we'll serve you up some of the best of our back catalogue. Then Helena and I will be back, as usual, bringing you headlines and real lines. lives from August. See you then. Follow MediaStorm wherever you get your podcast so that you can get access to new episodes as soon as they drop. If you like what you hear, share this episode with someone and leave us a five-star rating and a review. It really helps more people discover the podcast and our aim is to have as many people as possible hear these voices. MediaStorm is an award-winning podcast produced by Helena Wadia and Matilda Manningson. The music is by Samfair. You can follow us on social

media at Matilda Mal at Helena Warrior and follow the show via at MediaStormPod. Listen and hit follow on Spotify.