Suggestible - Season of the Witch

Episode Date: June 22, 2023

Suggestible things to watch, read and listen to. Hosted by James Clement @mrsundaymovies and Claire Tonti @clairetonti.All Dates and Tickets for Claire Tonti’s UK & Ireland Tour this July 2023 available via https://www.clairetonti.com/eventsThis week’s Suggestibles:06:20 She Said13:36 BBC's 'Witch' Podcast33:35 Huckleberry AppSend your recommendations to [e-mail], we’d love to hear them.You can also follow the show on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook @suggestiblepod and join our ‘Planet Broadcasting Great Mates OFFICIAL’ Facebook Group. So many things. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

We can wait for clean water solutions, or we can engineer access to clean water. We can acknowledge indigenous cultures, or we can learn from indigenous voices. We can demand more from the earth, or we can demand more from ourselves. At York University, we work together to create positive change for a better tomorrow. Join us at yorku.ca slash write the future. Oh, I was trying not to interrupt. Oh, is that what was happening? And then I went and found a moment to jump in, but it was not the right moment. Oh, no. Well, anyway.

It's a metaphor for life. It is. The way this show. Never shoot your shot. Can I just get my words out? This is the problem. This is what I was trying to help you with. Oh, I see.

I'm going to stop. Okay. So how this show works if you're new here is that we are married. We recommend things to each other, usually to each. We sometimes debate. We sometimes argue. We have a jolly good time. Yep. And then we finish. It's usually around half an hour. Nice, short, sharp, quick, jolly good time for all. They can see that probably in the amount of time that this is probably.

Correct. Exactly. Okay. Well, and just to kick off before we kick off, I should say, James is a YouTuber and a podcaster. He's Mr. Sunday Movies. I mean, I know. What does that got to do with- You're like scoffing because I'm just talking about you so I can hear you talking about me. I'm scoffing because I'm like, who cares? But let's- What do people care? And he also has a podcast called The Weekly Planet that has a few views. It's got a few views. A few views with the old Nicholas Mason who came over yesterday.

He loves a winter outfit, Nick Mason. And you in front of my good friend Nick Mason accused me of being a cereal gum chewer, which is just absolutely not true. You came up with the word cereal gum chewer. I just said you often like to chew gum. You do. I don't. Because our son does too now.

I don't. Why else would we have a stash of extra flavoured like I don't know pink flavour We get a packet of gum every now and then for him There's nothing wrong with that Claire No it's definitely you It's you It's not me

You passed it on to our son I'm not Even he said in all the years that he's known me Which is also longer than I've known you You haven't known me much That he's never known me to be a dumb chewer. How many extra years? A couple?

Three? Four? Like six. All right. Why don't you marry your boy Mason then? Maybe I will. It's your upper marriage, your work marriage. Yeah.

All right. And so Mason doesn't have to put up with any of your shit. No, he does. It's just intense. It's like a two-hour blast of it. Yeah. Anyway, do your dates. Excuse my swearing. Because this is our second last episode before you go away. It is. It is. It is-hour blast of it. Anyways, do your dates. Excuse my swearing.

Because this is our second last episode before you go away. It is, it is, it is, it is. Okay, so I am also a musician. I've written an album called Matrescence. It's indie folk and a bit experimental, electronic sounds. Super fun. And also not. It's quite heartbreaking at spots.

Anyway, I am coming to the UK and Ireland in July, and these are my dates. I'm going to London on the 2 in July and these are my dates. I'm going to London on the 2nd of July, 2pm, the Space UK with Amy Taylor-Kabaz and the UK poet Holly McNish. It's going to be awesome. I'm so excited. All these events are seeded, by the way, just letting everyone know. Tuesday, 4th July, I'll be in Exeter, 10am at the Hall Exeter.

Babes in Arms are welcome at both of those events. Thursday, 6th of July, I'm going to be in Dublin. 8 p.m. at the Bello Bar. Actually, Collings and Maisie are coming to that show. Oh, my goodness. I'm so excited. I'm actually going to meet them in person. I'm real excited.

And so that is on the 6th of July. Then I'm heading to Glasgow on the 8th of July. I'm playing at Kingsborough Sanctuary at 2 p.m. Then I'm heading on Sunday, 9th of July to Edinburgh, 2 p.m., the caves in Old Town. That gig is going to be with Mama Circles. So this woman called Roberta who's coming to do some folk storytelling and stuff.

It's going to be real fun. It's in a cave, underground, candlelight, all the things. I'm really excited about that one. Actually, I'm excited about all of them. Tuesday, 11th of July, I will be in Manchester. I've been playing at the Eagle Inn at 8 p.m. I'm going to be supported by two awesome local artists. One is Matthew Carey, a folk singer-songwriter,

and the second is Vov Vov Voce, who are a string quartet of four feminist amazing women. They're going to be awesome. And then I'm going to be playing my album through Thursday, the 13th of July. I will be in Petersfield at the Petersfield Museum and Art Gallery. That show is at 7.30 p.m. And that is with Michelle Norton-Hughes from Fly Mama,

which is an incredible organization that have created an online platform for women to find more resources through their pregnancy and postpartum care. And then on Sunday, the 15th of July, is that correct? I don't know. Is it? Yes. Sunday, the 15th of July, I will be in Basingstoke, 3 p.m., Willow's Coffeehouse with author Lucy Jones. Very excited about that one. Lucy has just released a book called Matress, since I talked about it on the show last week. Coincidentally, a lot of the sort of writing in her book mirrors some of the lyrics in my songs. And we live on opposite sides of the world and had never met each other until, well, never met in person, but didn't know of each other until

about a month ago. And her work is just life-changing. And the reviews of her book that have come out have just been incredible. So I'm not the only one. It's incredible. It's such a great read. It's really gripping and accessible reading as well as being steeped in incredible research and just mind-blowing facts about this monumental transition that is matrescence, equivalent to adolescence, that we just don't get told about as women and people who give birth. And we end up just completely alone and flawed and thinking we're the only ones that feel so discombobulated when actually it's a natural part of the evolution of a person that creates life.

It's good because for years you were saying the exact opposite. I'm glad you finally come on board to my way of thinking. All right. Good. Anyway, so exact opposite. I'm glad you finally come on board to my way of thinking. All right. Good. Anyway, so that's where I'm going to be. You can find all of the details and tickets and everything at claretonte.com forward slash events. And, yes, I am so excited to come.

Please bring your mates. Please come along. Grab tickets. It doesn't sound like there's a lot of time left either. No, I know. There's not a lot of time and I would really love to. If you're thinking about it, you really should do it. It's going to be great. My first show ended in a standing ovation, not to toot my own horn,

but it was pretty great. And then my second show sold out in Melbourne completely. So I had lots of lovely reviews and beautiful letters from lots of people around the place. So you can check out my album on Spotify. That's enough self-promotion. I agree. On with the show.

What have you got this week, Jimbo? Claire, I've got a couple of things to recommend. One is pretty grim. One's a light-hearted, fun, good time. Oh, great. Let's do the grim one. Jump on in. Just something different for you.

This is called, it's a movie called She Said based on the 2019 book of the same name. It's a movie that like Said based on the 2019 book of the same name. It's a movie that critically did well but nobody saw. Maybe it was too woke, some are saying. I don't think so. Let's find out. So it's directed by Maria Schrader and with a screenplay by Rebecca Lenkiewicz. I'm sorry, I definitely pronounced that wrong.

I really tried though. It stars Carrie Mulligan who you might know from Promising Young Woman. It stars Zoe Kazan, who you might know from The Big Sick. It stars Patricia Clarkson, who you might know from The Green Mile, but also more recent things. It stars Ashley Judd, who you might know as Ashley Judd. She's always doing a thriller and being like, where's my family or whatever.

Love Ashley Judd. And Andre Brauher, who you might know as the police chief from Brooklyn Nine-Nine. She's always doing a thriller and being like, where's my family or whatever. Love Ashley Judd. And Andre Brauher, who you might know as the police chief from Brooklyn Nine-Nine. I do remember him. He's great. He is and he's great in this. Well, they all are. Here's the synopsis, Claire.

The New York Times journalists Megan Toohey and Jodie Cantor publish a report that exposes sexual abuse allegations against powerful Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein. The shocking story also serves as a launching pad for the Me Too movement, shattering decades of silence around the subject of sexual assault and harassment. So this is a true story, as mentioned, based on the book and based on the reporting done against Harvey Weinstein, basically trying to prove or at the very least bring a whole lot of allegations to light of

these things that he's been doing for 30 plus years and how deep it goes and how many people knew and were protecting him. Because the thing about Harvey Weinstein is like, everybody knows, has always known that he's an absolute piece of shit. Like that is like the general consensus in the world. Like everybody knew that, but nobody knew like this side of things. Like this is the stuff that, you know, that he was suppressing and threatening people about. So it actually starts with them doing a story on Trump and the multiple allegations against him. But it was kind of disheartening because nobody seemed to care because he just became president anyway, you know? So, and you know, he's a horrible person. all know etc and so forth so it's kind of like

if you're going to go after after a person like harvey weinstein does anybody even care he's not as he's not as powerful as trump you know he's not as well known as trump will anybody care that this hollywood producer is is doing this you know does anyone even really know who he is in kind of the broader you know spectrum so the thing about this is as well, it's them realizing that this is a story that does need to be told. And so they end up speaking to all these different women about their experiences. And it's not just doing that. It's also trying to get them to, to go on record and kind of the, the idea is that it's hard to get one person to come forward, but if you get multiple people, cause that like, he'll just, he'll attack like a singular individual. But if

you get multiple people, then that's less likely that he's going to be there's going to be court cases and litigation all that kind of thing but but you know often we've found when people come forward in particular women obviously they're discouraged because of the way their names are dragged through the mud and either like well this is clearly just next this is how the industry works or maybe you know you were asking for it or you, you're a liar and whatever, all these different things that, you know, believe all women but this one sounds a bit sus, you know, that kind of thing. Yeah.

You see those comments literally every time something like this happens. So as mentioned, like all of these allegations go back to the 90s and he's produced some like incredible movies over the years through his company. But again, there's been like multiple allegations and payoffs and silencing. And as this story is kind of unfolding, Harvey Weinstein gets wind, and this again happened in real life, of that they're coming after him, that they're speaking to people.

So he starts going on the attack and, you know, ringing around and trying to find out who they're speaking to. And one of the women they're speaking to is Gwyneth Paltrow, who doesn't want to go on the record. So he's like, keeps demanding that they tell him if it's Gwyneth Paltrow, who's, you know, making, who's the major actor, you know, making allegations. But one of the people in it who I mentioned, Ashley Judd, plays real life Ashley Judd, because she was a victim of Harvey Weinstein.

And, you know, she's told this story before and it's kind of like so her perspective is in this as well. And that's kind of really fascinating to see like an actor playing themselves in a story like this. Does that make sense? Yeah. Like it's really, yeah, it's great. It's just really, you know, cool that she did that.

It's incredible and I imagine incredibly difficult. Oh, absolutely. You have to access all of that emotion again. And you've got to go through and then you've got to act. We wouldn't be pretending because these things happen, but then you've got to like really. Yeah, I mean you have to like access all of that trauma and all of the emotions that you're going through.

So you're basically reliving some one of like I would suggest probably the hardest things that she's been through. And one of the things that happened, like the things that happened to her, which I'm not going to get into, that's not even like the half of it. Like there were so many things that are much worse. Yeah. Not to downplay what happened to her. No, but no, absolutely.

Yeah, and incredible just like being able to come forward. The amount of women in particular, and I know it happens to other people too, but particularly for women who never had big careers like Ashley Judd but who were promised things and had their life and their career taken from them or stopped early because of the trauma of what they experienced or just the exploitation. Like they were never going to be given opportunities but promised things.

No. And they must be in the thousands. I mean, I don't know, honestly. Like there's a number that come forward in this. I don't know if that would be like possible to be in, I mean for him in particular. No, not for him, but I just mean industry-wide. Oh, yeah, 100%.

And this is just like this industry, you know. This isn't even like. It's a music industry. It's any industry. Yeah. You know, it's anything, you know. So it's, you know, it all culmin even like. It's a music industry. It's any industry. You know, it's anything, you know. So it's, you know, it all culminated and people would know this,

that like this article did come out and the knock-on effect of that is that, and this is public knowledge, that he's in jail probably forever, probably for the rest of his life. Like his whole company is like collapsed in on itself, you know, as it should. But it's obviously one of those situations where you don't see any of the things that describe, but things are described in graphic detail. It is women, like, recounting things that happened in real life.

So obviously it ranges from, like, very, you know, uncomfortable to, like, to really triggering. So, you know, bear that in mind if you're going in to watch that. But it's just a really beautifully acted like interesting stories that are being told by you know multiple women across decades and you know it comes out like later on in the movie that you know this isn't something that happened in the 90s like this it kept happening you know he didn't stop doing it and he would make promises that i'm not going to do this again and you have my word that this is something i'm working on and blah. I know that I can be a bit too much.

And he would just do that like again and again and get away with it. But in particular, the two leads, Carrie Mulligan and Zoe Kazan, are great, really, really good as like the head reporters, you know, doing all of this work. It is on Netflix, in Australia at least, but it's available to watch wherever you are. Yeah, wow. in Australia at least, but it's available to watch wherever you are.

We can wait for clean water solutions. Or we can engineer access to clean water. We can acknowledge indigenous cultures. Or we can learn from indigenous voices. We can demand more from the earth. Or we can demand more from ourselves. At York University, we work together to create positive change for a better tomorrow. Join us at yorku.ca slash write the future. It's on streaming. It's so interesting you've brought that today because I've got something

that kind of dovetails into it in a totally different way. So I've been listening to a podcast called Witch that's being produced by the BBC Sounds. Well, by the BBC, but there's a program called the BBC Sounds. It's also available on Apple Podcasts, wherever you can get your podcasts from. It's presented by Indira Ruckusen, who's the creator of the podcast 28-ish Days Later. And she's on a journey to discover more about witches and witchcraft

and its historical place, but also personally in her own life, the draw that she has to witchcraft and magic. And it's so interesting. She's got such an atmospheric way of presenting. The show itself kind of opens with the crackle of a fire and immediately it kind of draws you into the woods. And for me, draws me back into the feeling that I had as a child of everything being possible, of the movie, The Craft, of, you know, practical magic and so much of this show I've been fascinated by because it talks about how the roots of the word witch even were a label given to people as a way of kind of singling women out,

women particularly, out as dangerous, as wild, as, you know, tearing down structures and patriarchy and evil. It's easy to be like this is a demon. Correct, exactly, and obviously the witch burnings and theyarchy and evil. It's easy to be like, this is a demon. Correct, exactly. And obviously the witch burnings and they were incredibly persecuted. And it's often women who were really knowledgeable about their bodies and themselves and the natural world. And there's a real deep connection.

The second episode is called Natural Magic, which is so interesting because it talks about why witchcraft and witches are centred in the natural world. And as I've become more and more aware of the healing properties of herbs, and I know, I think because of the way I was raised in a really deeply Catholic home, I think I kind of internalized, I've always been fascinated by witches, but I've kind of internalized the idea that that's like hocus pocus and a bit evil and a bit dangerous or something. Sure.

But also my mum even has always been fascinated by the natural world and like she takes photos of really intricate photos of the inside of flowers and plants. Yeah, your mum's an amazing photographer. Yeah, she's obsessed with the moon and what I've come to discover. She does love the moon. She loves the moon. I'm indifferent to the moon. No, mum loves the moon and is drawn've come to discover. She does love the moon. She loves the moon. I'm indifferent to the moon.

No, mum loves the moon and is drawn to it and so am I in so many ways. And when I was writing my music, so much of it I think it was reflected from the women's circle that I started going to at the beginning of last year. Yeah. And I can't explain it other than that it felt like coming home, sitting in a circle of women with candles, sharing our lives, sharing our stories, meditating on our place in the world and our feet on the earth and our deep connection to it. And that's what witchcraft is at its core.

It's about really articulating and moving with the seasons, with the way time works for us as human beings. I mean, witches are present in all cultures all over the world. And even that word, which I have real issues with, because I think you label something and you can kind of take out the depth of meaning in it. You just put it in a box as a particular thing. And it's always, not always, but there is often also like a negative connotation with that. Yeah, or just like all the history of like pointy hats and broomsticks and stuff. Whereas actually this unpacks that so much of it was about taking power away from women and autonomy over their bodies and picking at the social fabric of community. And because of the work I'm doing in Matrescence, I found that there's actually an episode where

they look at that too. Yeah. It's about understanding our bodies and what happens to us. And without that knowledge, women are hampered. We are traumatized. We are confused. We're disconnected from each other and disconnected from community because we don't understand what's really happening for us and to us. And so I think there's been a real rise, as I say in the podcast, of fascination with witchcraft and magic. But I actually think what it is is at its core a deep yearning

for those natural rhythms, for really deeply understanding the power of herbs and plants, food, being in nature and the seasons. Even now this week here in Australia it's winter solstice. Starting to celebrate that though because at the moment in my cultural heritage it was Catholic so we celebrate Christmas and Easter but here Easter is supposed to be a time of spring, right, but actually here it's autumn. Yeah.

So none of the symbolism even matches up with the time of year. No. And Christmas is super hot. It's like 40 degrees so it doesn even matches up with the time of year. And Christmas is super hot, like 40 degrees, so it doesn't match up with what was a really ancient pagan time of the cold and the solstice. And so to me matching our lives up with those rhythms of the season only can be a good thing, I think, and it feels good because we are also then acting out our lives in

a way that is more connected to the way the rhythms of the earth work. So in winter, we should be more closed. We should be in deep rest. We should be doing big dreaming without actually being really energetic and out there because everything's closed down because the world needs rest. The earth needs rest, as do we. Anyway, all that is to say. I find that really interesting as well and just that idea of educating young people and not just women, anybody, about like how these things work and how your body works and what changes, you know, are expected that you go through

because there is this kind of push that you label up, like that's been labelled like grooming, whereas I see it and, you know, we've worked in schools that, you know, the run programs. Do you mean in terms of like sexuality as well? Everything. Yeah. Because it's not all necessarily like sexuality based. It's how does your body work.

Yeah. And it's also like what is appropriate for other people, you know, in relation to you and setting up boundaries. And when you actually do talk about these things, and obviously there are levels, so you're not going to bombard like a four-year-old with like every piece of information about their cycle or what's going to happen to them during puberty or whatever, like all of that.

You know, obviously, you know, you build up to it. Yeah, but it's normalising the fact that we are creatures with bodily functions that aren't weird or strange. No. They're a natural part of the order. And then when it happens, you're not like, am I dying? Like, you know what I mean? Yeah.

Is this strange? Exactly. Like, is this cancer or whatever? Because often people who are alone who are not taught these things, these are the things that go through their mind. So when you actually teach people about this stuff, it is literally like the opposite of grooming. It is giving them the tools.

It's power. It's power, exactly. And when you take that stuff away, that opens the door for people to take advantage of it when you leave people in the dark. And it just fucking, it's everywhere at the moment and it just makes me fucking furious. But that I could say there's a huge, as I'm learning, and I'm not an expert in this, but as I've started to look more

and more into birth and matrescence and I fell into that because of my story and the music I've created. But in terms of midwifery and the power and knowledge that women had about their bodies, the medical profession sort of came in and as understanding of medicine grew and it became a very male-dominated field, they kind of took it away from midwives. And that meant that so much of the innate kind of practical stuff around birth, around the much of the innate kind of practical stuff around birth,

around the placement of the baby, around even washing your hands, there were like reports of like women getting sepsis because male doctors were examining cadavers and then delivering babies. And that kind of power was taken from those communities of women because the other reports, the high rates of birth trauma in Australia, it's like one in three, one of the major indicators of birth trauma is early intervention. And that can happen because it's necessary, but often it's unnecessary because hospital systems have, you know, numbers they need to hit. And if you go over two days,

they're like, well, it's dangerous now and all of that stuff. But also having women with you, a person, but usually a woman who's been through birth herself, who understands what's going on for your body and is a person that you trust and who you love often, or who at least you trust really deeply and knows you, having them with you through your pregnancy and then through your birth is so pivotal in giving you the best possible chance of your body doing what it needs to do. And it doesn't mean you're not going to have a violent birth or that it isn't going to be brutal, but it means that you've got more power and autonomy over the choices that happen during it and you've got more of a chance of giving birth

without too much intervention which can lead to so many problems down the line. Yeah. And I would say as well as I talked about last week, knowledge like I didn't realise some women just don't have enough mammary glands to produce milk. No one ever said that to me. If I'd known that, I could have looked at it and seen

whether that was why I didn't produce enough breast milk. But instead women are left alone and shamed and isolated for all different reasons. And it's absolutely about taking away their autonomy and power. And the result is a whole generation in Western culture of women, I think, who are often isolated and traumatized through becoming mothers. And then they're kind of thinking they have to look perfect and be pushed back into the workforce and it's exhausting. It's exhausting and damaging for everyone and it's that kind of idea of capitalism connects into it about us being.

You need two people in the like two working, two incomes. Yeah, none of it works. None of it works and interestingly in this podcast, something I've been exploring, I'm going to do a show in Edinburgh and I've been really drawn there and I don't know, I was trying to think why because we don't really have a huge audience in Edinburgh but I've always wanted to go. And I didn't know until I listened to this podcast

that Edinburgh is one of the places that has a huge population of persecuted witches. So like something close to 4,000 if not more, primarily women, let's say mostly women, were murdered, persecuted for witchcraft and being a witch from the 16th to I think it was the 14th to the 16th century. Yeah. And even Edinburgh Castle was seen to be one of the worst places

for that, for the burning. So they were often strangled and then burnt. And there's barely any monuments. And one of the interesting episodes they do on this particular phenomenon talks about two women and their names are Claire Mitchell, who's a lawyer, and Zoe Venditazzi. They both live in Edinburgh in Scotland and they've started a campaign to bring justice for the women who were burnt and persecuted for witchcraft

because Claire said she was standing in one of the parks, which is a common thing across the world, and looking at all these monuments to all these men and realising that there were like basically no monuments to women who fought in the war or even really any great clerks kind of articulating what happened at Edinburgh Castle to these thousands and thousands of people. Well, history is like written by the victors, you know, so that's why you got statues of lunatics.

Yeah, and sorry, I'll just correct that. It was the 16th to the 18th century. Okay, cool. Yeah. Which isn't that long ago. It's really not. It's really not. And so I just... It's like a handful of generations back, you know? Yeah. It's really not that long ago. And I think the repercussions of that are still being felt. She said, even in Edinburgh, there's quite a lot of controversy around that. And there is still some kind of belief that those witches were evil

and that's why they were murdered. That's an insane thing to like. I know. But she said but it's like. Like what would that even mean? Like why evil? Like what specifically? Like intentionally creating magic to harm people.

But that's obviously like that's lunacy. Or heretics or devil worshippers or, you know, all of those things. Even if it was that. Against the church, all of that stuff. It's not like that's not a thing. You know what I mean? Like they're not giving people heart attacks with lightning strikes. You know, it's ridiculous.

What is interesting though is I think we can't underestimate the seeds of that idea that women are evil. Yeah, sure. I'd believe that. That kind of sit below the surface, the idea that women's pain is less believed. Like you only have to look at the medical profession in general and see that that story in the Bible of Eve eating the apple and that she was cursed with pain in childbirth. And you can see that women's pain, there's so many studies to show this, is just less

believed, less acknowledged, less researched. And in particular, women of color as well. pain, there's so many studies to show this, is just less believed. Yeah. Less acknowledged. It's true. Less researched. And in particular women of colour as well. Yeah, it's even worse. Yeah.

Exactly. And not just by male professionals but it's also women in the space too have been affected by that kind of undercurrent of misogyny. Yeah. That kind of ripples through. So I just, the more I look at it, I realise like most of my heritage is from the UK and Ireland. Yeah. And I'm so excited to be going because I just, I feel drawn there.

I know that sounds, whatever that sounds, woo-woo, whatever. You want to do some damage. You want to kill some men with lightning. I just want to go back to my heritage because I reckon I had some witches out there in my heritage. But I don't even like that word. I had some witches out there in my heritage. But I don't even like that word. I think I just had women in my heritage who were powerful and interesting and strange and connected to the world and paid attention to the seasons.

That Adam and Eve story is so wild. Like first of all, like it's obviously like a fable. It's not true. It's a metaphor for fucking nonsense or whatever. But like I mean it's interesting as an historical story. It's not true. It's a metaphor for fucking nonsense or whatever. But like, I mean, it's interesting as an historical story. It's so fascinating. The Bible's fascinating. Yeah, of course it is.

As like a historical document. Yeah. Weird stuff, right? But obviously it's of a certain time. But this is the idea that like the test was donate this apple, then a snake who was the devil told you it's an apple, then you ate an apple. And you fell out of the garden of Eden.

Who cares? So everything would have been perfect. What a ridiculous story. I guess apples were like, I don't know, were they harder to get? They would have been at that time. Yeah, I guess so. It is interesting. I'm eating three apples a day, Claire.

I know. I mean even the fact that a woman is made from a man's rib and then she's the one that brings him down or something. It's just a fear. It's a deep-seated fear of women, I guess, or feminine power and energy. And we need both. We need both, like masculine and feminine energy, the yin and the yang. Everything you see in the patterns of nature all feed into each other.

And we can have more or less of that. It doesn't matter whether we were born with a particular body. We all have those kind of energies present within us. It's just, I know the more I look at our culture and it's just really interesting because I also have realized that in my life, and I think I've talked about this before on the show, being raised Catholic, I love the rituals of so much of that. I felt like some of it was familiar, but none of it really felt real to me enough, or there was something underneath it. And probably the fact that I could never, I always wanted to be a priest and get up there and like, right, do a ceremony and could never do that. Was never allowed to do that. Tell the jokes around

the bulletin and like light the candles. The closest I got was to be an altar girl. And I always thought that was so fucking wrong. And I just, the more I see it, the more I realize so much of those ceremonies that I grew up with and the pageantry of that is present in pagan rituals. Absolutely. A lot of that was borrowed. In women's circles.

It was borrowed. Like even the idea of an altar, like the first Christian churches were people all sitting in a circle all on one level. No one was higher than each other and they were there to discuss and talk about what they believed to be a good way of living, about their issues, about their connection with God, and it was equal. Yeah. And that to me seems so much like what is in these ancient circles of women.

And in a patriarchal society, I just think they've been broken. But I just feel like there's a rise of it coming. I can just feel it, this like feminine energy kind of rising. And anyway, I'm just really. And it's also, I think, you know, there might be people that hear this and probably not like in this with our audience, but it's not about like dominating or destroying men. It's just about giving everybody a voice.

I saw a really interesting tweet about this actually that said that some men really fear this because in their head they're like, well, equality or like women rising up would mean that we would do what they did to us. So like they see it as us taking all their power away as like and not just us. I should say, you know, that idea of like, well, women being equal, that means that they'll take away our reproductive rights

or like education about our bodies and dominate. But overall, that's not what when you speak to most women we want at all. Actually, equality is about being, you know, overall the dreams and wants and needs of women in general and not all women but generally in non-binary people and people of minorities, people of colour, communities. Actually, it's a vision for a world that fits everyone. Yeah.

Really, which I found so interesting to reflect on and maybe that's where the fear comes from. Well, I find it boring. Anyway, and that's, wow, that's like a clear thought, a real rant. Thanks a lot, Claire. You took up the whole episode. And anyway, that podcast is called Witch and you can find it on all podcast apps or through BBC Sounds.

The presenter is Indira Rakusan. See, this is what men are worried about. You come on to the podcast, you dominate the space, and now I don't have time for my second recommendation. Oh, I'm so sorry. No, it's good. It means for next week I've got something. All right, okay, yeah, because I've got a second one too.

So we'll save it for next week. That'll be the last one before I go. And then we're hopefully going to try and do suggestible and the city. Yeah. I heard Sarah Jessica Parker on a podcast saying she can never remember if it's sex in the city or sex and the city. She should know. That's disrespectful, quite frankly.

Yeah, I think it's and. Is it? Hang on. It's and. It is and, right? Sex in the city. I think it's and. It got in my head.

It's and. It's definitely and. Right? It's just it's through. It is and, right? Sex in the City. I think it's and. It got in my head. It's and. It's definitely and, right? It says it's through. Sex through the city. I never know. It's Sex and the City. Sex on the City. Sex on the City.

Sex under the City. Oh, my God. That's just like women having sex with the rats. And the Ninja Turtles. Yeah. Totally. Anyways, maybe you like this show. Maybe you don't.

Either way, here's something you can do for fun. You can review the show on your app of choice. And if you give us five stars, I will read out your review, unless it's super weird. In which case, but if it's good weird, I will read it out. Does that make sense? That makes total sense. I hope I've defined my boundaries clear enough because it's important

to know boundaries and to set your own boundaries. Great. So this is from Young Field Mouse who says, five stars by the way, thank you so much, love to listen, great show and great people. That's all you need to do or you write a long weird one. Whatever you want. It's up to you.

Thank you, Young Field Mouse. Thank you, Young Field Mouse. You're not going to live long because you're a mouse and you live in a field but I hope you're okay. Life seems hard. Unless you're that mouse. Is it that story of the mouse who, like, collected all the nuts over summer and then, like, stepped?

Isn't that like a ferret in a rat or something? Wasn't there a fable about a city and a country mouse or something? Yeah, I don't know. I don't know. Anyway, be the mouse that collects all the nuts over summer. Yeah, the city mouse is like, ah, I just want to watch TV, and the country mouse is like, well, I want to chop wood. Right.

And they killed each other. Oh, God. Yeah. That's very brutal. All right. Nature is harsh. Okay. So I have an email.

If you would like to write into the show with comments or suggestions, we would love to hear your suggestions. You can write to the show at suggestiblepod at gmail.com, just like Emerald has. Hi, Claire and James, big fan. But I'm really writing to thank you for suggesting your friend's motherhood journey. I just had baby girl number two in April with a C-section and my mother hasn't been so emotionally supportive. She says I'm doing

so many things wrong because I'm not producing enough milk and she's compared me to women that overproduce. Baby Peaches is sleeping through the night now, but my mother is of the belief that I should be waking her up to feed and she's criticized me for not soothing my baby enough. No, that's not true. I know. All I know is that since she's been gone, I've actually been able to instinctively care for my baby with an app called Huckleberry, which is my suggestion, recommended to me by my daughter's godmother, who is a new mother herself. This is great for people who are sticklers for having baby on a schedule for feeding and changing and whatever else you can think of. It ties me to my phone, which is a little bit annoying, but it's easier and more convenient

than paper and pen. And you can remember it because it's like all that. Yeah, exactly. And I use it for my toddler too. I had no idea of its existence when she was a baby, but we survived anyway. Sorry for all the words. I'm the only parent my girls have and I'm trying my best. I'm just relieved to hear there's a practical reason for my low production. Love suggestible and suggestible in the city and the weekly planet. Tell me so I said hi. Miss Emerald. Thank you. Oh, that's awesome. And it sounds like

also, I guess like the biggest piece of advice is to just do whatever works for you. Like you'll get a bunch of advice and some of it might work for other people and it doesn't work for you. I'm speaking out of turn here, obviously, because Claire is dominating the podcasting sphere, as we know. But it sounds like you're doing it, you know, and you're doing what works for you and your baby is fed and healthy and sleeping. So fuck all the noise. Like if this is what's working for you, that's great. You're doing the right thing. Totally. And it can be really tricky when the person that's giving you a criticism is within your own family as well, which I've heard from friends has been incredibly challenging. Totally. It happens. You see it happen all the

time. Yeah, exactly. So I've been really lucky with the support within our family, but yeah, you do it because they love you and they want the best for you and people do it in all different ways. But, yeah, it can be incredibly challenging. So hold on because you're doing an amazing job and your kids are super lucky to have you, Emerald. And you know what's wild about being a parent, and this is at any point in your life, like it could be up until forever,

is that you've never been a parent at that point before. So when you become a parent, it's all new. Like even now, like we have a seven-year-old. I've never parented a seven-year-old before. Yeah. And I've even told, you know, our son that and our daughter that as well, not as much her because, you know, she's a little bit younger. But just like this is new to me.

I'm not an expert on any of this. I'm just trying, you know. I'm kind of – I'm not, you know, I'm kind of, I'm not, you know, I'm making it up as I go a lot of the time, you know, and that's just, that's part of it. You've never done it before. No, exactly. And we, sometimes we get it wrong and we try, but I think as Carly McGoran, oh gosh, we better go. Well, I'll just say this quickly. Carly McGoran, who, as I've talked about before, I interviewed on my podcast, gave me the best parenting advice, which was that it's okay, whatever's happened,

the most important thing you can do is the repair after the fight or after the thing you've said wrong or after things have gone pear-shaped, you go back in and you repair and you mend and you talk and you connect. All right. We've been special podcast. As always. Remember when you leave the hospital and they're like, here's your baby.

And you're like, what? I think you're mistaken. That baby lives here. I just remember saying, isn't someone going to like check that we put them in the car, right? Someone should do a scan on us or something. Yeah, exactly. Anyway, you can write to the show at jessalapodajima.com. Thank you as always to Royal Collings for editing this week's episode.

Thank you also to Maisie for running our social. Two incredible people. Two incredible people. That you can meet at that show in. In Dublin on the 6th of July. Very exciting. All of the details are at Claire20.com forward slash events to buy tickets and see where I'm adventuring to.

I would love to come and say hello after the show. And that's it. We've been suggestible. We'll talk to you next week. See you next week. Bye. Bye. Bye.

We can wait for you next week. Bye. and demand more from ourselves. At York University, we work together to create positive change for a better tomorrow. Join us at yorku.ca slash write the future.