Woman's Hour - Anniversary of the death of Mahsa Amini, Comedian and author London Hughes, Dr Elise Inglis memorial, The Knock discussion

Episode Date: September 15, 2023

It’s been one year since the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini sparked protests and outrage across the world. Anita Rani is joined by author Arash Azizi and human rights researcher Azade Pourzand to take a look at where women in Iran stand now, and the long-term impact that’s still being felt.Dr Elsie Inglis was a Scottish woman known as the ‘Serbian Mother from Scotland’, who founded four Scottish Women’s Hospitals in Serbia during World War One. Together with more than 1,000 woman from Britain and the Commonwealth, she helped to save the lives of allied and enemy soldiers alike. To find out more about her and why she isn’t better known in the UK, Anita speaks to three women who are in Serbia to honour her memory at a special ceremony: Carole Powell, Dr Iram Kamran Qureshi and Caroline Ferguson.This week, in a new series called The Knock, we’ve heard the stories of two women whose lives were changed when they were told that a loved one had been arrested for sexual offences against children. Anita talks to Deborah Denis, Chief Executive of the Lucy Faithfull Foundation, and Rachel Armitage, Professor of Criminology the University of Huddersfield about the impact of 'the knock' on the families and friends of men arrested for these crimes. They’ll discuss what support families need, and what they are calling for.The comedian London Hughes has written a memoir, Living My Best Life, Hun. In it, she details her decision to leave the UK, where she experienced bullying and rejection, and go to live in LA, where she quickly became a star. She joins Anita to talk about writing her memoir, turning rejection into opportunity and romanticising her life.Presenter: Anita Rani Producer: Lottie Garton

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BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Hello, I'm Anita Rani and welcome to Woman's Hour from BBC Radio 4. A very good morning and welcome to Friday's Woman's Hour. Today I'll be joined by actor, comedian, writer London Hughes, who since upping sticks and moving to America, after having enough of trying to make it in the UK, has become a huge success stateside. She's had a Netflix series, is writing her own show.

She's setting up a production company with Kevin Hart. She celebrated her 32nd birthday at Dave Chappelle's house and has just published her first book, a memoir about her incredible story. Well, London made a very conscious decision about her career and it's paid off. But how about any of you? I'd like to know about any bold and brave career moves

you've made and why. Was the corporate life ruining your life and you're now whittling wood in a forest? Was the mundanity of your job sapping your energy and your life force and you're now selling spaghetti from the back of a van? Or maybe you just decided to make a small change at work to get what you want. How did you empower yourself to get it? Or did you simply decide you wanted to do something else?

It takes a lot of courage of conviction to take a risk and make a change. This morning, I'm welcoming your texts, emails, tweets, WhatsApp stories about the moment you stepped into a different phase in your job and look at you now. The text number 84844. You can go to our website if you want to email me and that WhatsApp number is 03700 100 444. Also today we celebrate a heroine of World War I, Elsie Inglis, founded Scottish Women's Hospitals in Serbia during the First World War I. Elsie Inglis founded Scottish Women's Hospitals in Serbia during the First World War. Plus, we continue our conversation around the knock.

That's what they call it when someone is told out of the blue that a loved one is being arrested for sexual offences against children. We'll hear what help and support friends and family say they need. That text number once again, 84844. Already thanking you for your stories. Now, tomorrow marks one year since the death of Masa Amini, the 22-year-old Iranian

woman who died three days after she was detained by Iran's morality police for allegedly violating rules requiring women to cover their hair with a hijab. Her death sparked a wave of anti-government protests in Iran, with women taking to the streets, setting fire to their headscarves and chanting, women, life, freedom. At the time, Iranian officials denied any mistreatment and said that Masa Amini died of natural causes. At the time of the protests following her death, there were reports of violence against the protesters and hundreds of arrests.

The Iranian intelligence services issued a lengthy statement blaming the protests on foreign agents and terrorists. After several months, the regime succeeded in crushing the protests, but every day, young women are still carrying out daily acts of defiance. Well, Arash Azizi was born and grew up in Iran and is a historian and specialist in Islamist movements there. He's written a book, What Iranians Want, Women, Life, Freedom, in which he writes about the impact of Masa Amini's death.

We'll speak to him in just a moment. But first, we are also joined by Nagin Shirayaye, the founder of Azadi Network, an advocacy group for women, life, freedom, who is in close contact with Iranian activists on the ground. Nagin, very good morning. Welcome to the program. What can you tell us about the situation currently in Iran? Good morning, Anita, and to your audiences. So I've been talking to people, as you mentioned, I've been in close contact with activists on the ground. And for the last two months, we've seen another wave of oppression, arrest, intimidation that's been going on. I talked to someone in preparation for this meeting. I was like counting how many people I contacted in the last two weeks.

I talked to 12 people directly. And out of those 12 people, 11 of them received some sort of intimidation from the government. One of them is fleeing, you know, it's in hiding at the moment because they went to his house to arrest him. The other 10 are either been called in for questioning in the last two weeks or received a text message warning them if they participate in any sort of activity during this you know anniversary days they're going to be arrested so it's quite dire and we've heard a lot of other things from the news that like professor universities have been out of their job or arrested and intimidated and there are a lot of different tactics and techniques you know kind of to create fear in the heart of people not to take to the streets during this time. Yeah and so they're

obviously preparing they're expecting people to take to the streets what stories have you been told about what might be happening to mark the anniversary? There are so many call to actions. I receive quite regularly different calls to action from different groups, especially the younger generation, you know, the youth in their 20s. They have a sort of decentralized, and I should put it out there, it's a decentralized movement. So people in their own neighborhoods or, you know, younger generation in their school They have a sort of decentralized, and I should put it out there, it's a decentralized movement.

So people in their own neighborhoods or, you know, younger generation in their school, mobilizing and organizing around the movement. So there is an eagerness inside the younger generation to take to the streets or show their kind of disobedience in a way during this time. The more prominent activists are much more, in a sense, controlled by the government and, you know, by interrogators, also the case officers putting pressure on them. But still, I received a couple of calls to protest for tomorrow and the day after from even those more most prominent and you know known Iranian activists as well so there is that eagerness to take to the streets and show something because it's been a while for people you know since the last time everyone managed to go to their streets

and protest so people want to create hope by doing, or at least that's what they say when I talk to them. Why do you want to take to the streets? That's what comes up. But I think there's also this understanding that protest is not enough. What people are asking for, especially on the ground, is a system change. And that system change needs to be organized. People need to, you know, create the stages of, different stages of, and strategize around it to be able to topple the Islamic Republic. And that understanding I can see exists, but at the same time, they're looking for some kind, and they know it's a long way to go to create that kind of organization. But there's also this kind of hope by going to the protest and seeing each

other, you know, that solidarity would give movement more hope and energy. And we've spoken to a few Iranian women in the last year about how things are changing and the lives of women and how young women are protesting protesting and that they are choosing to walk down the streets without their hijab and they are wearing jeans and t-shirts. But what are the actual real consequences? What's the risk? What is happening to women when they do take this risk? Oh my God, every time you're talking about this, I still get goosebumps from their bravery of, you know, doing this simple act of being themselves on the streets in the social environment. They get arrested, they get beaten up. If they're in a car, their car gets confiscated.

And that means they have to pay a fee for it. It's important to understand that Iran, in the past 20 years, the economy in Iran and the financial issue was mounting up towards a lot of, you know, wiping out the middle class in the country. So the simple fact that they can't go to the work with their own car for lengthy times means that they don't have any means to provide for their families. So it's a really immense risk that they're taking. There were a period of time that even banks wouldn't give them services,

but defiantly they continue to do this on a daily basis. I'm going to bring Arash Azizi in now. Arash, welcome to Woman's Hour. Why was the death of Marcemini such a pivotal starting point for your book? It's great to be with you. I think, you know, I think the death of Mahsa Amini mattered because millions of Iranians could really sympathize with her as a fellow Iranian. And the innocence of her killing was really felt so keenly. You know, now there are many other, there are many Iranians who might observe the hijab rule themselves.

But the fact that, but you know, they would have still cousins or sisters or someone they knew who might not observe the hijab, and now they could see, they could be killed for it. So Mahsa was a, you know, 22-year-old woman just about shy of a couple of days before her 22-year-old birthday who had come to Tehran, the capital, to have some fun. And she was effectively killed just because she wasn't covering her hair like the government wanted to. I think this really affected me. And I started the book there because that's what led to this magnificent movement magnificent

movement that broke out last year and brought out you know hundreds of thousands of Iranians out. And what made it so unique why did the Islamic Republic see those the protests that have happened last year as a particular threat because Iran has a history of protests. Of course and there's been this Iran has a history of protests. Of course, and there's been this sort of a wave of protests since 2017, particularly. I think what really made this process special were two things. First of all, as Nagin also said, they really demanded a change in the regime,

an overthrow of the system from very early on. They were very clear. And that's not because the Iranians haven't tried reform. In fact, they've tried different sorts of reform for a very long time, but they've come to the conclusion that Ayatollah Khamenei is effectively one-man personal dictatorship, and this regime needs to change. And this was very boring. From the beginning, this was the demand.

There was no programmatic demand, if you will. I mean, there was a programmatic demand, but it effectively needed over-throw of the regime. The second, it's what I call it's sort of geographical and demographic dispersion. Now, Mahsa was a young Kurdish woman from western Iran, and, you know, a lot of people could sympathize that, you know, that she wasn't just someone from central Iran. She had come to the capital like people come from all over. So you really had movements quite

quickly all over the country, you know, in Tehran, in Isfahan cities of central Iran, in northwestern Iran, Azerbaijan, in southeastern Iran, the Baluch people and the Baluchistan. So you really had people from everywhere, which was made distinct from previous movements in 2009, 2017, which had often been either centered in one part or not really spreading. But our city is this time, you had them all together. So that's what made it this. And in your book, you explain that Masamini's mother chose to have on her daughter's gravestone, your name will become a sign, which is in the original Kurdish language. Why is that so significant? I think it became, you know, and the sign, you know, it's like I translate that sign

sometimes as signal or even quote this word. I mean, I think it's because it became, you know, it really spoke to Iranians across the country and it really became like a signal for them to unite. As I said, the innocent death of Mahsa really became a signal for everybody. And actually in the years, in the months to come, Mahsa's mother and her father have also called her daughter of Iran, which I also think it's a powerful statement, which really speaks to the fact that, of us, myself included, we could see ourselves and our families and our struggles in her. Not because she had wanted to, it's very important to emphasize, and as I say in the book,

she wasn't trying to be a hero, she wasn't trying to be a revolutionary, she wasn't trying to do anything. She just was the young one trying to have some fun in the capital. And now she's become a symbol for Iranian women. Nagin, do women in Iran still have hope for change? Oh, I think they realize, and this is a really fundamental change in the culture, that the change will come from them. And the women are the agents of change. And they're not going to give up. When you hear, like I've been listening to the podcast of like, you know, the ordinary housewives, like going around and giving interviews and talking about what the demands are. And it's really basic women's right.

I want to be equal in the society. I want the demands are. And it's really basic women's right. I want to be equal in the society. I want the last change. And they know that the Islamic Republic is not gonna give it to them. And when you listen to them, the hope for change is coming through their own lived experience of pain. And they know they have to change this wound

to the scar and create a movement. So I think it's impossible to kill that hope that exists in their heart and they're going to push until they achieve the change. I would like to thank you both very much for speaking to me this morning on the one-year anniversary of Masa Amini's death. That was Arash Azizi and Negin Shirayaye. 84844 is the number to text if you would like to get in touch with me about anything you hear on the programme this morning. Or indeed, if you want to tell me about the time you decided to make a change about your career.

And that's because London Hughes will be here to tell me about how her life completely changed when she left the UK for the US of A. Next, I'm joined by two women who are going to tell us about a heroine of World War One that I'm fairly sure you'll know nothing about. My guests are all in Mladenovac in Serbia to honour the memory of Dr Elsie Inglis, who founded four Scottish women's hospitals during World War One. They're attending an annual ceremony held to remember Dr Inglis, who was known as the Serbian mother from Scotland, as well as the work of more than a thousand women from Britain and the Commonwealth who worked in the hospitals and treated allies, allied and enemy soldiers alike, as well as civilians.

Carol Powell's grandfather was a British soldier fighting in Serbia on what was known as the Salonika Front. He's buried in a war cemetery there. And Caroline Ferguson is the wife of the new ambassador to Serbia, who will be laying a wreath at the ceremony. Welcome both of you to Woman's Hour. Caroline, I'm going to come to you first. Can you tell us a bit more about Dr. Elsie Inglis? Yes, I can. Hello and thank you very much for having us today. I'm a Woman's Hour avid listener, so it's a real pleasure and an honour to join you.

So, Doctor, and you'll have to leave me I'm not a historian so there might be other people who know far better than I do about Dr Inglis. Dr L.T. Inglis was a medic she was one of the first female medics who graduated from medical school in Edinburgh she was then a. And she was a woman's advocate. She believed in improving the lives of women and babies in the poorest parts of the city, and she set up a hospice in order to help poor women in Edinburgh and Scotland. And so when, in 1864, she was 50 when the first world war started.

And she went to the war office and said, what can I do to help? And she was told, my dear lady, go home and sit still. And the person who said that clearly massively underestimated this indomitable woman. And so a few, sometime later when Serbia, which had been ravaged by recent wars, called on its allies to help, Dr. Inglis, some people say Ingles, but I'll say Inglis because it's easier if people want to Google her afterwards, I-N-G-L-I-S. So Dr. Elsie settled for France in December 1914. Early in 1915, she arrived in Serbia. And I think there were several things here to say. One is that she empowered other women.

So she brought with her from and set up the Scottish Women's Hospitals and brought with her medics, nurses, orderlies, cleaners, cooks, all women. And so she almost in some ways created a female solution to the male problem of war, which I think is strong in itself. It's also worth stressing that the conditions that she arrived in when she got to Valle Bojan and Kravujadas here in Serbia were horrendous. So it wasn't just the fact that there was the war raging, but it was also they were in the middle of a typhus epidemic, which took out the lives of huge numbers of the Serbian population.

And it's because, how was she able to afford to do all this? So she raised in today's money about, I think, £53 million worth of equivalent in today's money. And she did huge amounts of fundraising in order to sort of bring supplies. And there are other women who also came with Dr. Inglis. We're talking about her today because we're in Mladenovac, essentially to Learreath at the fountain, which was built during her lifetime by the soldiers whose lives she saved. So she's known in Serbia, but we don't know about her here. She's really well known in Serbia.

So there is Dr. Inglis, there's Dr. Elizabeth Ross, Dr. Catherine Macphail. There's this whole group of Scottish doctors and nurses who essentially came and helped Serbia during the war and who are still celebrated here today. So we're in Mladenovac today, just outside Belgrade, where my husband, the British ambassador, will lay a wreath at a fountain which was essentially built by the soldiers whose lives she saved during her lifetime in September 1915

essentially as a thank you to call it a memorial is actually wrong because it's really a sort of a thank you fountain to say to say thank you to this amazing woman. So there is a monument there's a monument for a British woman in Serbia. Not that many in the UK, but there's one in Serbia. Correct, correct. And it's a travesty to my mind that in the UK, I'm the mother of two daughters and one son and always trying to find strong female role models.

And we have this woman who essentially empowered other women. She traveled across Europe in a time when people didn't travel as much. She went into the eye of the storm by essentially going to not just a war zone, but one where the typhus epidemic was killing hundreds, thousands, millions of people. And she injected hope into a hopeless situation. So your previous speaker said that it was impossible to kill hope when it's in the heart.

I mean, this is exactly what Dr Inglis did. She injected hope into a hopeless situation. She was 50 at this age, so she wasn't a spring chicken, but she didn't see the barriers of language, of war, of disease. Yeah, just the confidence of her conviction. I'm going to bring Carol in here because, Carol, you have a very personal connection to the ceremony, don't you? Tell us about your great-grandfather.

Right, well, this story starts when I was 12 years old. My grandma got a tin of photographs out and she said, this is my father. And there was a man who stood very upright in a First World War uniform with his large um truck behind him and then in the next hand she handed me a photograph and this is his grave um and it was newly dog and one of his brothers had gone out immediately after he died um and um photographed it for them and then she told me the most tragic story he got all the way through it

was in the royal army service corps probably because he could drive he got all the way through the war without a scratch and then um he volunteered to help refugees across the river caught typhus fever and died two days after his wife's birthday and two days before I was going to come home on the 24th of February, 1919. And my grandma said, I've always, always wanted to lay flowers on his grave, but I never had the opportunity. So this happened when she was 12.

And I promised her, Grandma, one day I will do that for you. And apparently she stood at the end of the road for months and months refusing to believe he'd come home. It absolutely devastated her. She said he was the gentlest, kindest, most wonderful man. And he gave his life up for strangers, so yes, he must have been. What was his name?

It's Lance Corporal Thomas Bexton. So how do you feel today being there, being able to lay that wreath i we've had a long journey uh we've been up i only came on this trip because someone from scotland said does anybody want to go because i belong to the notching women's history group yes yeah so it's going to be it's going to be quite an emotional day for you. Oh, absolutely. Yes, very emotional. So on this journey, I've actually been to my great-grandfather's grave,

which is in Nis, Serbia, and to where he actually died in Varanja. And I've become so invested in the Scottish Women's Hospital because the nurse that nursed him died three weeks later and was buried in the grave next to him. So I've become so invested in what these women did. The conditions here were absolutely horrendous. Yes, as we've just been hearing, and it was your great-grandfather that suffered from the typhus

that Caroline had just been telling us. Carol, it's going to be, like I just said, quite an emotional day, but also quite beautiful in a way that you're able to come full circle and lay that wreath of flowers. Very quickly, Caroline, tell us what will be happening today. It's starting in just under an hour's time, isn't it? It is, yes.

So essentially, I'd say the whole town of Mladenovac still remembers Dr Inglis and her colleagues, from the drivers to the cooks all the way up through the chain. And they will celebrate this little Scottish woman who, as you in your introduction called, the Serbian mother from Scotland, and there will be various speeches, and the mayor will speak about her, and essentially keep the memory alive of a human who didn't see difference, who saw only what unites her, and sought to help. And it's interesting also to note that she didn't just look after, they didn't, Scottish Women's Hospitals, there were four in Serbia, they didn't just look after the injured soldiers, they

also looked after civilians. And I think that is testament to what they stood for. They believed in helping others. It's been great to hear her story this morning and I'm sure it's been lots of food for thought and remembering her.

Thank you both, Carol and Caroline for speaking to me on that this morning. So many of you getting in touch about Elsie Inglis. Here we go. We've got I was born in the Elsie Inglis Hospital in 1952 in Edinburgh. The only males in the hospital were babies. Run at the height of efficiency according to my mother.

Someone else said I was born at the Elsie Inglis Hospital in Edinburgh which is no more in the 50s and never knew of her significance. Thank you from Sue. The amazing staff at Elsie Inglis Hospital

in Edinburgh now closed saved my life and that of my daughter back in 1986 after a huge hemorrhage when I was 31 weeks pregnant. It was a wonderful, caring hospital

and I will always be grateful to the staff there and for Elsie's legacy and that's from Debbie in Norwich. And those of you getting in touch about big life change moments, Teresa says, at the age of 50 I changed from being the staff there and for Elsie's legacy and that's from Debbie in Norwich and those of you getting in touch about big life change moments Teresa says at the age of 50 I changed from being an

exhausted teacher of 10 years with no time for myself or my family to a gardener I've retrained renewed my energy levels I'm digging my way through my perimenopausal state and revived I've got back to me it's the best thing I've ever done. Back to deadheading the roses. Thank you for these messages. Thanks, Teresa. Keep them coming in. 84844 is the number to text. Now, on Tuesday and Wednesday this week, we heard from two women who've experienced the knock. That's what they call it when they're told out of the blue that a loved one is being arrested for sexual offences against children.

A woman we're calling Anne told our reporter Jo Morris about how her life fell apart because of her husband's crime. After many years of a happy marriage, she had to reassess everything and all the while feeling afraid of the judgement of others online and in real life. The whole world was getting to know about this before I'd even had a chance to even understand it myself. And they'd all decided that he was guilty. It's something I don't think anybody should have to go through. And then they all seem to work together to make sure it spreads far and wide.

What sort of things were they saying about you? To be honest, a lot of it I've just like numbed out. People saying I must have known that was the one that hurt me the most that people thought I knew that and I was going along with it and I didn't know because I love children and actually I would say that's one of the things that really impacted me very hard was I felt guilty even looking at children after that it was a really weird thing I've got godchildren with their own children and I felt I didn't want to be around them I didn't feel I could touch them because I felt like I was as guilty as he was even though I had nothing to do with any of it it's a horrible thing

that you're left with that scar and you think everybody's looking at you and judging and yeah it took me a long time to get over that, to be honest, to actually hold another child and have them on my knee. And then on Wednesday, we heard how another woman we're calling Evie had to come to terms with the fact that her brother is a sex offender. She too is worried about the judgment of others, especially because she decided to continue to support him. That decision cost her dearly, as you'll hear in this clip,

which has been voiced by an actor. I think that for him, one of the triggers was intense loneliness and depression. So if I'm supporting him to be less lonely and less depressed, then I'm reducing the risk of him re-offending. It's just so taboo to say I still love him. For some people, it's easier to just cut off all connections and I totally get that I feel like whatever decision somebody makes it's really important to respect that and to appreciate that there's no easy decision you can't say to anybody I'm really upset because my brother's a sex offender but I still love him

yeah my brother's a sex offender but I still love him. Yeah. I remember once I felt really upset and I felt like I wanted to speak to somebody and I was tempted to phone the Samaritans but I didn't phone them because I felt like it would take away from the real victims. Like that was a support service for real victims, not me.

So I felt like I didn't deserve it. Evie there, not her real name. And you can hear both of those very powerful interviews in full on BBC Sounds. The programmes were on the 12th and 13th of September. Well, the Lucy Faithful Foundation are a child sexual abuse prevention helpline and campaign, and I'm joined by their CEO, Deborah Dennis, and also by Rachel Armitage, Professor of Criminology at the University of Huddersfield. Welcome to both of you. As I just said, very powerful interviews. We got a huge

response from our listeners, actually, and I will read some of those out. But Rachel, first to you. What struck you from what you heard from those two women? Yeah, so thank you for having me on today. And thank you for talking about this subject today. And I also wanted to say thanks to Anne and Evie for sharing those stories, which are absolutely heartbreaking and reflect the hundreds and hundreds of stories that I hear every week and Deborah hears as well. So loads of things struck me, I could talk for ages about it but a couple of things from those clips that really struck me was the first one really, both Anne and Evie sort of having an apprehension or apologizing for bringing their own situation to the attention of yourself and society really and just constantly saying that they're not the real victim

you know I didn't call Samaritans because I don't want to take away from the real victim the children in the images are the real victims so both you know gave this message right through and I think another one that's really important that I would really like people to to realize is that these two people reflect a lot of other people in this situation in saying and constantly reiterating that they didn't know I'm feeling the need to say that and to clarify that I think I think you've heard both saying I racked my brain brains to think if I'd missed something, I'm not a stupid woman. People saying I must have known

and I think Anne said I must have, I didn't know, but I love children and that she felt the need to say that over again is just, it's really, really sad and it's a constant message that we hear. Deborah, I'll tell you what stood out for me deborah was when um we had to say she felt as guilty as he was yeah that's certainly uh something that we hear quite frequently from women actually and part of this yeah what's that about well part

of this is around the perceptions actually of non-offending family members. When something like this happens, the society view and the shame and the stigma is so powerfully felt by these women that they look back thinking they must have done something wrong. Or they look back thinking, where could I have seen this behavior? How could I have intervened? And the reality is that they weren't complicit. Yet they feel like they were they feel like society puts on them that they have been complicit so we need to move from a an environment in a society where that complicity is shifted into actually these are secondary victims themselves the trauma that they're going through is very very real what happens at the first stage of the knock doesn't go away.

The impact continues months, years. We hear these stories from hundreds of women, thousands. A thousand women call our helpline every year talking about the impact that they've had. And some of that is, what could I have done? And the answer is, it's not a woman's job to police their husband or their brother or their father or whoever it is that has committed the offences. And they shouldn't feel that way. But society almost perpetuates it for them, sadly. Do they feel guilty for not knowing? Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Go on. Sorry. I'll get you both. get you both agreeing let's let's hear from you rachel yeah i'd say i'd say absolutely they do and i think that's um something that people are made to feel as well um sometimes by agencies by family and by friends um you know you should have spotted the signs what um you know is that something that you let him down in terms of your sexual relationship etc so I think it isn't just a feeling this is is actually a reality that people um almost make families feel feel this. Deborah? Yeah well I'd agree um we see so we have a family and friends forum 40,000 people visit that every year 2,000 are posting supporting each other and that is one

of the key themes that we see them talking about actually is should I have known what could I have done and what's great about the forum is people can jump in and say well actually I've been through this and I've looked back and I can't identify a point anywhere where I could have known or intervened and actually you're it's not your to. So there's sort of peer support going on to help people think that through. So is that why you are saying they should be recognised as secondary victims because of the huge stigma that they're having to deal with and the societal judgment? Absolutely. We need to shift that approach from this idea that in some way family members have been complicit into a place of actually

these are secondary victims also and the tragic fact is that given the scale of online offending given the scale that police are arresting 900 people a month it's almost inevitable that at some point soon all of us will know somebody who has been affected in this way it's almost inevitable that the scale is that big that it's going to happen to us all at some point we will know somebody and and we need society to catch up and make it okay to talk about make it okay for women to get help make it okay for them one of the things can i just can i just just because you've just dropped a figure there that i think is quite shocking you get 900 calls a month no sorry 900 arrests so

police police figures um will show that we have 900 people being arrested each month and that that and then you think that it's also young people and it's getting to the point where we will all know somebody because i think this is one of those crimes where it happens over there over there and of course we'd love to believe that child sexual abuse is abhorrent. And we would love to believe that it happens to somebody else and it's not going to be involved in our circle or our family or our friends network. But the reality is there are 900 people being arrested a month and that is the tip of the iceberg. So inevitably, at some point, we will become touched by this issue. Yes, Rachel, please do. Yes, so in terms of that number,

it's quite difficult to get the statistics, but we've done some work on this. And of that 900 to 1,000 a month, we've estimated that about 35% to 40% of those will have children living at the home at the time of the knock or the warrant. So basically that's 10 families with children a day going through this and Anne said something in one of the clips saying that there'll

be a family being destroyed by this every day but actually you know we're looking at about 10 with children so that's just those families with children, many more where there aren't children living at the home but really the repercussions are unbelievable in that situation and we've talked a lot about men and you mentioned um young men being arrested as well uh deborah but what are women ever arrested for these crimes it's it's not unheard of but it is it is absolutely the minority so if we look at our helpline data from from people who are concerned about their own thoughts and behavior towards children including those who have offended online 98 percent are male we do get calls from females and we do through our assessments and interventions work um assess females who have

engaged in behavior but it is without doubt the minority and rachel you're talking about the research that you've done there for the lucy faithful foundation tell us a bit more about that what what did you find were the high levels of post-traumatic stress? Yeah, yeah. So basically, Deborah and her team commissioned this research, which actually was originally to look at the forum that Deborah mentioned. And it's a friends and family forum where people can make comments and support each other. And really, it was about looking at whether or not that was helping and how it was helping. But as part of that it became much clearer that we needed to talk about the harms that these families were experiencing. So it kind of went off at a tangent really there and absolutely one of the key findings as you've

alluded to there was of our survey of 126 family members we found that 70% of those had symptoms that would be indicative of post-traumatic stress and 65% so severe that PTSD that it would be impacting their immune system functioning so hair loss, fibromyalgia, irritable bowel syndrome and that was just just one of the findings from it and just to say that that really relates to the knock itself the actual knock on the door yeah yeah and the hyper vigilance and the humiliation and the how that impacts people going forward of remembering and flashing back to to that moment and what happens at that point so you know get the knock at the door the children might be in what will be in um it will be in what support is in place what happens next so yeah just to clarify um you know one of the policies is

that if children live at the address the knock will happen between 6 and 8 a.m when the children are in as a safeguarding measure um and um in terms of i that the two ladies who gave you know wonderful interviews hadn't been signposted to any any charity and they're left in isolation and this is traditionally how it has been but I would like to say that you know we are getting better now and police forces we've been doing training to encourage them to do the not more sympathetically and to make sure that they auto automatically refer families to support agencies of which there are now and obviously weren't when an an

EV went through what they went through but there's a we set up a charity called talking forward and and there are police forces now that will take the name of the family and give that to Talking Forward who will ring within 48 hours and ensure that that family feels supported and invite them to peer support. There's some wonderful work going on in Thames Valley with a charity called Family Matters that act as an advocacy for families right from the knock through the criminal justice system. Another police force, Lincolnshire Police Force, have employed the equivalent of a family liaison officer,

so an indirect victim support officer who holds the hand of the family right through. So things are changing. Things are changing and so there are different things in place. I'm going to read out a couple of reactions from our listeners because um people have been getting in touch with the program and did off the back of the interviews um someone said i just wanted to say how much these interviews resonated deeply with me i found myself in this position some time ago and i'm still recovering from the absolute devastation it caused in my life and for my family i try hard to stay and support my partner but

ultimately left as it was making me ill. Goes to what you were saying there, Rachel. I now think there's a very definite before and after. I'm a completely different person following this awful period in my life. I will probably never forgive my ex-partner and remain as angry now as I was in the immediate aftermath. I would like to remain anonymous

as there are still people in my life who don't know exactly why we divorced. All I ever say is that it was a huge, it was huge betrayal of trust and immense hurt and i couldn't forgive i mean these are very very powerful um emotional messages we've had but you know deborah actually we heard from evie the second interview where she talks about supporting her brother and somebody's messaging to say thank you evie for being so brave and honest this is still a taboo subject with tears which tears so many tears so many families apart social services need to help these families too I worked as a social worker for many years the offenses do do not always completely define the offender um what do you think about that because she's you

know it's obvious do do do you find that people do support their families do they is there a right way a wrong way what should people do well first off there there absolutely isn't ever any right way or wrong way and everyone's situation is different and everyone's relationship with the person who's committed the harm will be different what we hear from from families uh wives partners parents brothers sisters all all the people around is that any direction they look and any decision they have to make there is not a good outcome if you leave there are bad outcomes if you stay there are bad outcomes there is there is no good decision making to be done so what we try to do as an organization is help people think that through

and we don't make judgments and i would I would urge everybody not to judge somebody for their actions Evie was very clear she had her own reasons for wanting to support her brother everyone will have their own reasons for the decision they make and no decision would be a bad decision if it's right for them that's the first thing what we do see particularly with our wives is about a 50- 50 split so half will stay and half will leave what i want to make clear really though is once that decision has been made it's not a final decision so as described your your message just then she she attempted to stay it didn't work out she felt she had to leave so things change as well and situations move on and and trauma is not static so that that will evolve over time.

What we will stress, though, is that no family member or wife should feel responsible for policing the behaviour of their loved one. If they choose to support them, as Evie described, to reduce loneliness, to help with depression, to try and keep him safe, that's admirable, but it's not the relative's job to do that. So they shouldn't feel responsible for their loved one's behaviour. Giving support is one thing, but feeling responsible would be a different thing.

We did actually get another reaction to Evie's email interview that says, the woman talking about her brother who was convicted of sexual offences, she should be congratulated on such a mature, empathetic, wise and compassionate response to her current situation. To think of the potential future victims of sexual abuse by supporting her brother is to be hugely congratulated. I can't imagine how hard her situation is. All love and power to her.

Sending a massive hug. Her children are so lucky to have such a wonderful mother. I really hope she heard that. I hope so too. And very quickly, because we've run out of time on this, to both of you, if there is someone listening who is struggling to deal with a family member who has been accused or found guilty of a sexual against a child

and the chances are there will be, what advice would you give them? Rachel? So I'd say you don't need to be going through it alone. You mentioned in the text there about the secrecy and Evie was the same, not telling anybody. And that's really common, the isolation. So you don't need to go through it alone. As Deborah said, Lucy Faithful online forum, there's Talking Forward, which is a peer support group people can come to. And, you know, they just don't need to feel alone anymore. And we'll put some links up on our website. And Deborah,

from you very quickly, what do you want to see change what needs to be in place goodness um so much actually but really quickly this perception of the families and the society stigma if i could change one thing it would be that because that is what prohibits women from really coming forward and it's also what holds back our agencies who are working with the families, do better in how they treat them, how they behave with them. Some Evie described children's services. We are working hard to increase the support for families.

But I think if I could change one thing, it would be the potential perceptions of non-offending family members and making it okay to talk about these issues. So less societal judgment. Thank you both very much for speaking to me about that deborah dennis and rachel armitage and just for anybody who is listening who does want to reach out the links uh to some of the charities that were spoken about there are on our website so please head to the woman's our website thank you both. Lots of you getting in touch

about how you have changed your lives around. I have done the very opposite in my life as an artist from childhood through to my 63 years. I'd like to think there is bravery in actually having the conviction and tenacity to stick it through bad and good times. And the life of an artist is very challenging one. So just a little shout out to the brave creatives

who trudge through life and stay true to their calling. Talking of brave creatives, on to my final guest. I'm thrilled that she's here, even if she's a bit jet lagged. She'll be all right. We'll wake her up. Stand-up comic, writer, actor,

London Hughes was born here in the UK in London, but almost four years ago, only four years ago, she left the UK and moved to LA to forge her career. Since being over in the US, she's become a household name and done a string of TV shows, including a comedy about her sex life called To Catch a Dick, which was shown in 194 countries across the UK. She's now written a memoir, Living My Best Life, Hun. In her own words, it's basically Beyonce in book form. And it tells her story of how she went from being bullied in the UK to a star in the US.

It's just been released. And I am delighted to say she jumped off a flight and was delivered straight to the Woman's Hour studio. Welcome. Hey, babes. How is life in LA treating you? Oh, Anita, It's amazing. I don't even want to be here right now. What are you saying? We gave you a nice cup of tea. I didn't actually had water but yes you didn't have Earl Grey here. She's changed. I've changed. I need my Earl Grey. No I am I'm very jet lagged but very happy to be here. And the weather's been nice, hasn't it?

The sun's actually shining. What have you missed about the UK? I know America, you're having a brilliant time. We're going to find out about that. I've missed sea salt and Chardonnay wine vinegar crisps from Co-op. Other places to buy crisps are available. It's the BBC. But I miss them and my family and friends.

Congratulations on the book. Thank you. Do you like it? Yeah. You are a very very very talented uh woman and i just and to write a memoir and to be that honest yeah it's not easy yeah um and you speak very honestly about your experience why did you want to write it i've always had a book in me i've been i'm that type of person that like is obsessed with reading obsessed with writing ever

since i was a kid i used to like pretend to write before I could even spell words I would do zigzag lines on a piece of paper to make it look like I was writing and I used to pretend that I had different lives and write them down back before it was called fan fiction I just used to write myself into my favorite tv shows for fun it was just a Thursday night for me but that's just how I used to just escape and so when you Oprah's niece yes you read it oh you did read the book yeah I yeah I pretended like my real life I was like bullied at school I was a nerd I was I was unpopular but in my like stories I would write for myself I would be like Oprah's niece and I would be dog sitting in her mansion in Bel Air and throwing wild parties and that's just how I that's what I did for fun and then you find yourself at the age of 32 at uh celebrating

your birthday at the dave chappelle's house yeah why did you start the book there do you know what i'm the type of person when i'm reading a book i need to be pulled in i don't like this in the beginning i was born in 1980 no i don't like that I want to be gripped. Like, and I was thinking, how do I start this book? And I actually lived that experience. I, Dave Chappelle, the comedian, had a party for me at his house in Ohio. And he had this massive, he had this massive. He had a party for me in his house in Ohio.

You just said that sentence. I know, that was so. It's wild. This is my life now, Anita no it's amazing and we will we love it for you but yeah he um we were drunk and uh and he had uh marijuana infused macaroni cheese and which is legal in that which is legal in la i didn't know it was marijuana infused macaroni cheese i just thought it was macaroni cheese so i'm eating this macaroni cheese very high on life and he grabbed me and he was like, London, tonight's the night we celebrate.

You're going to write about this in your book one day. And he didn't even know I was writing a book. It was just something that came to him. I can hear him saying it as well in that voice. And I was like, yeah, this is a great opening for the book. But you said that if you'd written it in 2018, it wouldn't have had a happy ending. No, because in 2018, I wasn't this queen you see before you and you do can i say you look incredible do i yeah like i look like no no no look at you look you're radiant

thank you beautiful so are you honey um yeah in 2018 the book would have ended with me like one day hoping to achieve everything i've achieved because all the dreams i had about having like a netflix special or my own tv show or working with my comedy heroes in America hadn't happened in 2018 all that happened in 2020 so yeah this book would have been cute in 2018 but definitely to be continued um in the acknowledgements yeah you thank every single British comedy exec who rejected you. And I bet they're listening to this now. Yeah. Look at me now, honey. How much has that rejection been a motivating factor?

Oh, it's amazing. The best revenge is success. Oh, it warms me. I love it. Do you know what it is? It sounds cheeky in the book, right? Like I'm putting my middle finger up. But truthfully, thank you.

If you're listening, all you middle class white men that listen to Women's Hour, there's a lot of you that thought I was a niche or a tick box or the audience wouldn't understand me or just thought I was too loud or too black or too female for British comedy. I'm living my best life now. And I want to thank you because the rejection made me work harder. All of my wins have come from failure and rejection. And so for them to look at me and say, no, that no is what I needed to get a yes. So truthfully, I'm not being cheeky.

I'm genuinely grateful for all the no's. It is, yeah, because you're a comedian and it's hilarious. We are laughing along with you, but part of me is really upset. Yeah. Okay, there's a big part of me that feels the pain. Yes. So how,

when did you decide enough's enough? I'm moving to LA because that is where, this is what we're talking about this morning. We've asked all our listeners. Yeah. Have they done something similar? Yeah. It's a huge decision to make about your life and the courage it takes to make a decision,

not just your life, your career. This is about your career. Yes. Well, the thing is I've always kind of known, I think being black British and watching America, growing up on America, watching American TV in Britain, all the shows in America aired in the UK.

And the first black person I saw on TV was actually American, was Aunt Viv in The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. So that, as a young black girl from Croydon. First Aunt Viv or second Aunt Viv? First Aunt Viv, the original Janet Hu Bel-Air. So that, as a young black girl from Croydon. First Aunt Viv or second Aunt Viv? First Aunt Viv, the original Janet Hubert. Amazing. That does a lot for you as a young black girl because you go, okay, I see me on TV,

but they're American. So I remember being a kid and thinking the only way to get on TV is to go to America. And that was a plan I had in my head from when I was like seven. I told my mum I didn't want any kids until I had a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame when I was like seven eight so I knew you know this is what I wanted but the when it clicked was when I I remember telling you about this the last time I was here the Whoopi Goldberg

thing yes I tried to make a show of Whoopi Goldberg happen Whoopi Goldberg suggested being on the show but no British TV channel wanted it and I remember thinking, you've been doing this now for 10 years. I was at the height of my career in the UK. I'd just done Celebs Go Dating, a popular E4 show, and I was a hit. I'd just done Mock the Week and all these panel shows were calling my name. I had an entertainment show on ITV2 called Donate the Players. I had been nominated for a Royal Television Society Award. I was at the height of my career and Whoopi Goldberg has agreed to do a show with me and still nobody wanted it. So I was like, well, I really tried. I was at the height of my career and Whoopi Goldberg has agreed to do a show with me and still nobody wanted it so I was like well I really tried I was here for 10 years and America is a place I've always wanted to go let me just see I just wanted to see and I just went out there to see what would happen and they welcomed me with their giant arms and

they loved on me and they treated me the way i wished britain always treated me and it's really interesting isn't it because a lot of our talent in uh acting and tv talent goes of color go to the states yeah it's such an overtly racist country and yet yeah and yet their arts yeah is very different do you know why why? Systemically, obviously, America is a country that is so racist. Don't ever get it twisted. But despite it being a racist country, you can still have a Beyonce or Oprah or a Whoopi Goldberg.

There are no British Oprahs. There are no British Whoopi Goldbergs. There are no British Beyonce's. And so despite, you know, like America's faults, when it comes to talent and the capitalism out there talent talks money talks so regardless of whether you're black white yellow fat thin whatever you can make it out there in a different way where Britain kind of holds you back do you feel like

you could be yourself more there yeah which is crazy and yeah what what is that i feel like i'm just this happy positive confident stunning gorgeous yes beautiful sexy black women all of you and i think britain's as british people i love us but we're so moody and miserable our motto right is keep calm and carry on right that is that is our humility and humbleness and i hate the word humble the word humble is such a horrible word the fact that we've associated associated that to be a good thing. Being humble is not a good thing. Particularly when your experience is that of a child of a migrant. Exactly.

Being told to be humble has a different context. And also the definition of humble is believing that you're of low worth. Why would I ever believe I'm of low worth? I'm a queen. I hope everyone's daughters are listening to this. Please don't ever. Women, stop calling us humble. Let's just, let's kill that right now.

How hard was it going back to some of those traumatic experiences? I mean, it's a really funny book, writing about them. Because you talk about being bullies as a kid. Yeah. You know what? The one thing that, I mean, it's just an incident that you kind of write about and pass off. But it was huge. It was about a makeup artist who.

Oh, yeah. There wasn't, she didn't have the right color for you. Yes. And so she used cocoa powder. Yes, when I was on CBBC. So how hard was it? How hard was it to write about those experiences? Do you know what?

It was, as a comedian, what we do is we take our trauma, we make it funny. And so I'm so used to talking about something that might be triggering or might be, maybe was upsetting for me at the time I'm so used to making it funny and making a joke the book was hard to do because it's not always supposed to be funny so when I was writing about being bullied in because I got bullied in primary school secondary school and university so when I was talking about that I kept wanting to add a joke and I had to be like no this is what happened this is how you felt there's no punchline here this is just real life and so that was the hardest part just really being vulnerable and just being raw and just saying what happened as is and I was crying through writing those chapters but uh the the chapter about me getting cocoa powder put on

my face by a makeup artist who didn't have makeup for black people that was funny I enjoyed writing that because at the time I remember thinking no one's going to believe that this is my reality like I was working at CBBC the makeup artist genuinely um I mean I know and it was a different time but the makeup artist just didn't have makeup for black people in 2012 it's a different time but I know these things may may still happen around you know microaggressions um gosh we're running out of time i just yeah what how do you look after yourself you are so confident you're so brilliant you also have the capacity to be really vulnerable as well so where do you make space for you and how do you make space for you i love on me i treat me like i am my best friend i treat me like i'm my

husband that i don't have i'm still looking by the way um I treat I just treat me so well um and I think that's really important world is hard enough we shouldn't be hard on ourselves um London Hughes more power to you thanks babe read the book it will give you all the confidence to do my best life harness out in all stores and next time because you are going to be back um straight off the plane from LA because it's just quicker to get here from Heathrow. Yeah. Bring Kevin Hart with you and we will talk about you

setting up your production company with him. Oh, thank you. Yes, let's do that. And don't forget, I have a show this Friday, the 22nd of September at the Bloomsbury Theatre.

Go and get your tickets. Do that. I'll have the plug. Thank you so much, London Hughes. That's all from me. Thank you, everyone who got in touch. I'm sorry we didn't get around

to reading all your messages, but join me tomorrow for Weekend Woman's Hour. That's all for today's Woman's Hour. Join us again next time. What if I told you that death may not be inevitable? Is it possible that a fundamental of existence that we've always had as a species, that we will all inevitably die?

Is that still true? And that there are technologists promising everlasting life. We can and should use technology to enhance and expand and augment human capacities. Who's behind the modern movement for immortality? Where else do you find the promise of living longer or forever? It's just like religion and Silicon Valley. I'm Alex Kretosky. Find out on Intrigue, The Immortals from BBC Radio 4.

Listen on BBC Sounds. I'm Sarah Treleaven, and for over a year, I've been working on one of the most complex stories I've ever covered. There was somebody out there who's faking pregnancies. I started, like, warning everybody. Every doula that I know. It was somebody out there who's faking pregnancies. I started like warning everybody. Every doula that I know. It was fake.

No pregnancy. And the deeper I dig, the more questions I unearth. How long has she been doing this? What does she have to gain from this? From CBC and the BBC World Service, The Con, Caitlin's Baby. It's a long story, settle in.

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