Woman's Hour - Emma Gannon on her new book (Dis)connected, Virginia Giuffre US civil case, Helen Pankhurst

Episode Date: January 13, 2022

How can we have a healthier relationship with tech, the internet and social media? In her new book Disconnected, podcaster Emma Gannon looks at how we can take back control, set boundaries, and unlearn bad habits from doomscrolling to having opinions for opinion’s sake. She also reflects on whether a constructive call-out culture is more beneficial than cancel culture online.Helen Pankhurst, the granddaughter and the great-granddaughter of Suffragettes, Sylvia and Emmeline Pankhurst talks about the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill which the House of Lords will debate on Monday. Helen argues our right to protest which is a fundamental part of democracy, is under threat. Reflecting on historical and global parallels, she argues that protest is both a safety valve and catalyst for change in the fight for equality, including women’s rights, race, disability, social inequality and climate.Plus can theatre be used as a health and wellbeing tool to support women’s understanding of their relationship with sex? A Play About Sex partners academic research with creative practice to find out. Independent theatre producer, Hannah Farley-Hills explains how.Prince Andrew is to face a civil case in the US over allegations he sexually assaulted a woman when she was 17, after his legal bid to have it thrown out failed. To help us understand the detail of why it was unsuccessful we hear from Dominic Casciani our Home and Legal Affairs Correspondent. Plus Georgina Calvert-Lee, an employment and equality lawyer at McAlister Olivarius, an expert on NDAs and settlements looks at what justice might look like from Virginia Giuffre's positionPresenter Emma Barnett Producer Beverley Purcell

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. I'm Natalia Melman-Petrozzella, and from the BBC, this is Extreme Peak Danger. The most beautiful mountain in the world. If you die on the mountain, you stay on the mountain. This is the story of what happened when 11 climbers died on one of the world's deadliest mountains, K2, and of the risks we'll take to feel truly alive. If I tell all the details, you won't believe it anymore. Extreme, peak danger. Listen wherever you get your podcasts.

BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Hello, I'm Emma Barnett and welcome to Woman's Hour from BBC Radio 4. Protest forms a theme of our discussions today, ahead of a bill being debated in the House of Lords on Monday that if passed would see significant changes to the laws that govern protesting in this country. Of course, it's in the air, not least within the Conservative Party, as the Prime Minister tries to quell protests and opposition in his own ranks after his apology and admission in the House of Commons yesterday

that he did attend a Downing Street party in May 2020 while the rest of the country was locked down, believing he was at a work event. While many Cabinet ministers have come out to support him, other high-profile Conservatives have called for his resignation, not least the leader of the Scottish Tories. Protest comes in many forms, and one of my guests today says her grandmother, Sylvia Pankhurst, suffragette

and daughter of the suffragette leader, Emmeline, would be turning in her grave over this government's proposed law changes to control it. And yet others will welcome such proposals, which we'll go through shortly, remembering the disruption caused by certain protests last year and the desire for the police to have greater powers to act. For some of you, protest will mean exactly that, taking to the streets and disrupting the rhythms of our daily lives. For others, it will mean peaceful marching, hunger strikes in specific locations,

I don't know, signing a petition, or even your vote in local and general elections. Of course, damage to statues and memorials have also been in the news with the acquittal of the so-called Colston Four last week, which saw four people, three men and one woman, Rhian Graham, who I spoke to on Tuesday's programme, after pulling a statue of the slave trader Edward Colston down in Bristol. Yesterday, a man on the front of this very building I'm sitting in and broadcasting in now, talking to you, scaled it for several hours and used a hammer to damage a prominent statue by Eric Gill, as another man shouted about the artist's history of paedophilia.

What forms of protest do you value and why? Protest is a rich and important part of history, women's history, past and present. What does it and should it mean to you? Text me here at Women's Hour on 84844. Text will be charged at your standard message rate. On social media, we're at BBC Women's Hour or email me through the Women's Hour website. Also coming up on today's programme, a play about sex that you can help write. And how to keep our humanity

while living our lives on our phones and online. The author, Emma Gannon, is on hand. But first, yesterday afternoon we did learn Prince Andrew is to face a civil case in the US over allegations he sexually assaulted a woman when she was 17 after his legal bid to have that case thrown out failed. Virginia Dufresne is suing the prince, claiming he abused her in 2001.

His lawyers said the complaint should be dismissed, citing a 2009 deal she signed with convicted sex offender and paedophile Jeffrey Epstein. But he lost. The prince has consistently denied the claims, and Buckingham Palace said yesterday it would not comment on an ongoing legal matter. We thought it important to understand the detail of why Prince Andrew's case was thrown out and this case is now proceeding and also understand what could constitute justice in such a case. Let's start with Dominic Casciani, Home and Legal

Affairs Correspondent for the BBC. Dominic, good morning. Morning, Emma. Hi. Could you start by explaining why the judge threw this case out and gave the green light for a civil case? Yeah, the judge, Lewis Kaplan, who sits in the Southern District of New York, which is a federal court in Manhattan, he didn't just throw this case out, this motion to dismiss yesterday, he did it in a pretty emphatic way. And if you forgive me lapsing into sporting metaphor for a moment, there's a great phrase from American football,

which is called the Hail Mary Pass. And it's when one team is losing so badly in the dying moments, they desperately throw the ball to the other end, trying to get a goal, knowing they're probably going to miss. And when you read this judgment yesterday, it reads like that. It reads that the judge literally took all of the prince's arguments presented by his lawyers, basically chucked them out the window, saying they were worthless.

Now, at the heart of what he was trying to argue before the judge or other lawyers for him was there were three reasons why this case brought by Virginia Jeffrey should be stopped. Now, the first was that she had a 2009 settlement with Jeffrey Epstein, the now dead abuser, and that settlement barred her from suing anyone. The second was that her allegations against the prince were basically vague and just effectively too difficult to present to a jury for decision. And the third was that his rights as a defendant before a US court were being somehow breached because of the legal route she'd used to bring her case to court. Now, in each of these categories, Judge Kaplan threw the dismissal out,

saying, in effect, the arguments were worthless. Now, the most important of those, Emma, was this 2009 settlement with Jeffrey Epstein, because for weeks we'd been hearing that this previously confidential settlement in which Epstein paid Virginia Jeffrey half a million dollars to settle her claim against him more than 10 years ago somehow gave Prince Andrew a trump card against some future damages claim. Now, when we got the wording of that settlement at the beginning of this month, it did indeed say that she would not bring any future case against other potential defendants. Now, the Prince's team argued that meant he was a potential defendant and therefore the case couldn't be brought. But Judge Kaplan yesterday ruled that, to be perfectly frank, nobody really knows what a potential defendant would have been back in 2009. And the law prevented him from speculating about what Epstein and Mr. Jeffrey intended when they signed up to those words. So in essence, we had a situation where he was trying to rely on an agreement involving a convicted and now dead pededophile to stop this case.

And the judge said, quite simply, he wasn't having it. More importantly, on top of this, and I think this is important, when the question of whether or not he can appeal comes up, the judge said that the various examples he used from other areas of US law about why he had rights as a third party to this agreement, so somebody who was affected by the secret agreement but not previously aware of it. When Judge Kaplan looked at those, he was, to be frank, he was so unimpressed that he declared they had been of no assistance to his decision-making,

and that's basically judge speak for wasting his time. Now, he then went through the other two elements. So he looked at this issue about whether or not her allegations were vague. Judge Kaplan said not at all. He said that at this stage all she had to show was the case was plausible and then the detail would be analysed by a jury and the court following a presentation of evidence and he said that Mr. Frey had made a very clear and plausible case that she in one example had been forced to sit on Prince Andrew's lap while he touched her she didn't have to say what that touching amounted to at this at this moment but

it was sufficient in US law to be a claim for battery and you know it would be then for a jury to decide whether or not it met the legal test that she was effectively abused. Sorry, just to come in at that point. At that point, the New York Child Victims Act was cited. For those not familiar with that, this links to what you were saying about plausibility. That's right. And so the New York State Child Victims Act is a really interesting law because it effectively allowed victims of historical abuse to bring claims years after they would have been previously allowed to do so. In essence, it recognizes the fact that some victims of abuse or alleged victims of abuse need time to get themselves into the right place to consider bringing a damages claim against somebody else. Now, Ms. Geoffrey has exercised her right to use the short window that that law provides to bring this 20-year-old claim against the Duke of York.

And on that, the Prince's lawyers were saying, well, this is a breach of his rights under the US Constitution as a defendant, because this claim is effectively out of time. It's 20 years old. Judge Kaplan was having none of that. He made very clear that this this argument had already been looked at by both New York and federal courts in the U.S. And in each case, this had been challenged. Judges had already thrown it out. So he wasn't going to stop it on those grounds either. So, you know, in totality, you know, he didn't score a point at all. Dominic, stay with us. Dominic Casciani, Home and Legal Affairs correspondent for the BBC.

In terms of what's going to happen next, Virginia Giuffre's lawyer, David Boyes, on Newsnight last night said he doesn't think his client would accept a purely financial settlement in the case. I think it's very important to Virginia Dufresne that this matter be resolved in a way that vindicates her and vindicates the other victims. I don't think she has a firm view as to exactly what resolution should be. Doesn't have a to exactly what the resolution should be. Doesn't have a firm view what a resolution should be. Let's talk about justice then and what justice could look like from Virginia Giuffre's position at this point. But while also, of course, reminding ourselves of the fact that the Prince has consistently denied these claims,

but also just to get a sense of when cases are at this sort of junction, what can happen. Georgina Calvert-Lee, an employment and equality lawyer at McAllister Olivarius, and an expert on non-disclosure agreements and settlements. Georgina, good morning. Oh, good morning. We get a steer there that there's not a decision whether there'll be a settlement or a desire for a court case. But what would you say to Virginia Dufresne? I recognise you're not across all of the details here at this junction to do, because a lot of the discussion seems to be centring around a settlement versus a court case. Yes, this is the decision yesterday was a significant win for her,

because essentially it means that unless Prince Andrew can overturn this decision on appeal which seems highly unlikely for the reasons Dominic has just outlined this this case is heading to litigation unless it's settled there are basically two avenues for justice and what justice looks like to a particular claimant or plaintiff is a very personal thing. Settlement can seem like a vindication in itself. In fact, all the court rules and pressures are on litigants, both plaintiffs and defendants, to settle. Only about 5% of cases that are filed in court ever reach a final trial. That's a statistic people may be surprised by because they may feel because of the way court cases are covered, that's often the resolution. But as you say, settlement far more common in the sense of is there a sense here about this woman taking on a prince, a prince defending his reputation and always consistently denying these allegations?

And she's defending her reputation and her record of events. Is there a sense here of what would represent justice for her? I mean, we got a hint there from her lawyer. Well, it sounds like Virginia Dufresne would be open to settlement. I thought it was consistent. It sounds like her primary motivation is to be vindicated. And there is, when people bring claims of sexual abuse or sexual violence, we do have a culture of victim blaming. And so sometimes it's thought that the only way of really getting vindication is to go to a final trial and have a fair-minded trial of fact,

whether it's a jury, as it would be in New York, or a judge. Desai would be a judge in the UK, look at all the evidence and then decide. That's not to say that they can't be miscarriages of justice, but that would be a real vindication. However, because there is such pressure to enter a settlement, and by pressure, I mean, it takes a huge emotional toil on any litigant to go to court. Cross-examination is an unpleasant thing, even if you're just saying the truth. A very clever cross-examiner can make it seem like you're not. So it's not a pleasant experience. And if you are already suffering stress from the underlying allegations, then it's probably going to be even tougher for you to go through with it.

Well, of course, I mean, there's also this side of if you are the accused, you may not also wish to go to court for similar reasons. I mean, that's the other side of it. Of course, people then, not talking about this case in specifics, but people obviously draw their own conclusions when there is a settlement. Yes. Well, people, yes, they draw the conclusions that someone would not enter, an accused would not enter a settlement unless they felt that they had something to hide. So that's the implication. But it's worth noting that David Boyes, Virginia Geoffrey's lawyer, suggested that she would not

enter, his client would not enter a settlement without an admission of liability. And that would be a really unusual thing to get in a settlement, because what a defendant is buying in a settlement is really the opportunity not to be taken to court, not to run the risk that they'll be found to have done the things they're accused of. So to make the issue go away in its totality. Yeah, make the issue go away, but also not to have it on their record. If they go to court and a case is found against them, it will be on their record that they did those things. So that's what they're buying with a settlement.

A settlement, though, can often include some form of apology, an apology that doesn't admit legal liability, so may admit some of the facts. And there can be a lot of wrangling and discussion over the exact wording of an apology. But that is something that can give vindication and justice to a victim. Just to talk, Georgina, more generally for a moment, stepping away from this case, what is your experience and what have you seen with women who are in this position about going forward to court versus taking a settlement?

Because, of course, there has been commentary in recent years, not just with women, of course, it could be men as well, but it's largely been women in this particular sort of situation, that if they do go to court, then other people come forward as well on this. But then on the other side, sometimes, you know, years down the line, they wish they hadn't as well. I mean, it's what can you say about other people's experiences from what you've seen? Well, I think people I think it's very important that people that have brought complaints of sexual discrimination,

sex discrimination or sexual harassment or violence are able to speak about it. I think traditionally settlements have come with non-disclosure agreements or confidentiality clauses or gagging clauses which essentially... You've written a few of them haven't you in your time or you've certainly been across them? I've participated, I think any lawyer working in this area will have participated in either putting them into agreements for their clients, because some clients do want them, or resisting them for other clients. And it's a matter of contract at the moment. often agree them at a time when they are at their lowest ebb and they're not really able to make a properly informed decision about whether this will be good for their recovery in the long term and so I would welcome legislation that prohibits defendants from insisting that there is a

confidentiality clause that would seek to stop someone talking about an allegation of sexual violence, because then that covers it up. It usually means that other victims don't get the support of this victim as a corroborating witness, which is very important if anyone wants to bring a claim of sexual harassment. And just also a view from the legal community, is there a consensus about settlement versus court case and what delivers more justice? It's interesting that all of the pressures on lawyers and litigants is to settle, because if you can imagine only 5% are going to court now,

if there were even 20% going to final trial, it would be hugely burdensome on the judicial system. It would just take years to get these cases to trial. So often settlement provides real justice and there's no sense in which settlement is not a form of good resolution of the case because it can be brought about much more swiftly, it can be more creative, a judgment can only give damages, money damages. A settlement can create a charity, it can create a revision of say an employer's or a defendant's policies, you can get an apology. All of these more creative and perhaps more constructive elements can be included in a settlement beyond just money. Thank you very much. Georgina Calvert-Lean,

Employment and Equality Lawyer at Macalester Oliverius and also an expert on non-disclosure agreements and settlements. Dominic Casciani, you have been following this case, Home and Legal Affairs correspondent for the BBC, kindly stayed with us just for a few more moments. In terms of the next steps, do we know when we may hear anything or is it now on the schedule of each legal team? Well, I mean, notwithstanding all those very complicated and challenging points that Georgina set out there about how both sides have to assess what they want if they're going to go for a settlement, We have a very tight timetable now set in this case. It's pretty aggressive by civil claim terms. In the coming days, the court may decide to start asking for assistance

from a British court in the gathering of evidence. That's not unusual. It's part and parcel of some transatlantic actions. By the middle of May, both sides need to have declared who their witnesses are going to be if they're going to go to trial they've got to get on now with providing evidence to each other that's really important because virginia geoffrey is asking those key questions around the woking pizza express episode and and the whole issue about whether or not prince andrew

could or could not sweat 20 years ago, as he talks about in his Newsnight interview. And by the middle of July, Judge Kaplan wants all of the evidence exchanged and the deposition completed. That's where witnesses have been recorded under oath, giving their side of the story. And that's really the date by which the whites of everyone's eyes, you've got that moment where everyone's got to really decide what they want to do with that case. If there's no settlement by then, it's likely that it trundles along towards trial in September or so. Now, this could still be a very late settlement. But the fact is, then we're into this very difficult period where Prince Andrew's had to give evidence that has has Virginia Dufresne.

And that becomes a very, very difficult process for both sides. Dominic Casciani, Home and Legal Affairs correspondent for the BBC, a bit more on the timetable about what's going on now between Prince Andrew, those legal proceedings, and Virginia Dufresne, the woman, who's now able to go forward with the next stage of that case. Prince Andrew has consistently denied the claims and Buckingham Palace has not provided any further comment

on what they say is an ongoing legal matter. Now, you've been getting in touch while I've been having that insight and getting those insights rather with regards to that case about protest and what protest means to you. I'll come back to some of those messages very shortly. The reason is the police crime sentencing and courts bill, a mammoth piece of legislation includes major government proposals on crime and justice in England and Wales is going to be debated at the House of Lords on Monday. And an eye-catching part of the bill covers changes to protests, which will be the focus of Monday's debate. And as it stands, if the police want to place restrictions on a protest, they generally have to show it may result in, quote, serious public disorder, serious damage to property or serious disruption to the life of the community. They can impose specific measures on the routes of marches but if this bill goes through police chiefs will be able to put more conditions on static protests. For instance they'll be able to

impose a start and finish time, set noise limits and then apply these rules to a demonstration by just one person. A person can be fined up to two and a half thousand pounds if they refuse to follow police directions over how they should conduct their protest. These changes have made my next guest, the great granddaughter of the suffragette leader Emmeline Pankhurst and an activist herself, Dr Helen Pankhurst, well, they've made a protest against them. Good morning. Good morning. Yes, well, there's this article that you penned this week in The Times about our fundamental democratic right to protest. And you also mentioned in that article that your grandmother, the daughter of Emmeline, Sylvia Pankhurst, would be turning in her grave right now. What bit of it or is it all of it?

So she would be turning in her grave because she was a campaigner and activist on so many issues. And just briefly looking at some of those, she was a suffragette working in the East End of London, trying to campaign to ensure that working class women got the vote. This was at a time when working people, non-property people, didn't have the right to vote and all women didn't have the right to vote. And she had to use, after more than 50 years of quiet campaigning, the suffragettes ramped up the demands and were much more out there in terms of their protesting mechanisms. So those were issues that changed in society because of that kind of civil voice. Other issues that she campaigned on included resistance to the World War I because of this sense that it was the war machinery and the entitled people that would benefit, and it was poorer people that would suffer the cost of it. So it felt like an unjust

war to her. So she campaigned against that. She campaigned against home rule, against the empire in India, against fascism. She campaigned against Mussolini's invasion of Ethiopia. So all sorts of issues, one person saying, look, the world as I see it is problematic and I will use my voice. I will be loud. I will work with others to try and change those things. So the reason why it's, I feel that she would be turning in her grave is because she used campaigning to try and make the world a better place and as have so many other people because that's how a lot of change happens.

Are you picking her as opposed to Emmeline? I'm not meaning to make you air your family laundry in public here, but are you picking her because you're more aligned with the way she did it? Because of course, you know, I want to get to the modern day, but the suffragettes for some were the terrorists of their time, you know, putting, smashing windows, whether it was

putting explosives, you know, in post boxes, going on hunger strike, all those sorts of public damage that we are also talking about, in part with this. So there is the issue of the differences between Sylvia and Emmeline's way of campaigning. And The reason I started with Sylvia is because I think she took campaigning to different mechanisms and different issues in the way, whereas Emmeline just had one key issue, really, which was women's right to vote, although she did support the government in terms of the World War One. And actually there you mentioned the issue of dirty laundries. They had very different ideas about what to protest on and how to protest. Did they differ in how they protested as opposed to the cause?

Yes, in that Sylvia was much more in terms of democratic voice and felt that noise through lots of people was more important than single acts of militancy. Emmeline was more keen on single acts. And I think that really, when we think about protest, it's interesting that the government uses the words of not wanting too much noise and not wanting to cause unrest. And I would argue that by definition, protest of either form, either through numbers or through the acts of militancy has to do that. And it's successful when it does just that. But to bring it to the modern day and to quote this, you know, the proposed law includes an offence of intentionally or recklessly causing public nuisance. Again, you may say that's the definition of protest, but it goes on.

This is designed to stop people occupying public spaces, hanging off bridges, gluing themselves to windows or employing other protest tactics to make themselves both seen and heard. Even though, of course, our right to protest is enshrined in the Human Rights Act, which the Home Office insists its proposals will still respect, some would argue that right is not absolute, and protests can be limited by police if they believe they have good reason to impose restrictions in an event to ensure public safety or prevent crime. Can you see that line that they are trying to tread? Do you have any sympathy with that? I can and I do, but only up to a point. And that is because fundamentally we need checks and

balances on the system. And our concern is what this is doing is it's increasing the powers of the establishments, the executive and the police in ways that are fundamentally very, very dangerous. And, you know, we started off with that concept, you know, we're talking about the suffragettes. The suffragettes did just that. They challenged the system in militant ways. But how did they get there? I mean, firstly, you know, the suffragettes are now looked at heroes. And in 100 years time, is it those acts of Extinction Rebellion or Sisters Uncut? Is it their acts of trying to raise awareness about an issue that will be seen to be shameful? Or is it the acts of those of government that didn't address issues such as climate change, race relations, equality, etc. And, you know, so we need to look at not just the damage caused by those acts, but the damage

caused by the inaction of those in power that have the power to make the change. But do you need to block a motorway when somebody is trying to get there with their sick mother? To a hospital? Lifting up? What about whole countries that are being decimated by floods, by fire, by the whole world in crisis, whole generations in crisis? I personally have some problem with some of the militant acts by some of the groups. But I defend their rights to do so. Go on, go on.

I was going to say, just on that point, though, because I'm not making that up. You know, that happened last October. A distressed woman, you know, was begging insulate Britain campaigners, as it was reported, to let her pass through their roadblock outside the Blackwall Tunnel. She was seen pleading with activists so she could follow an ambulance, rushing her 81-year-old mother to hospital. Is that the sort of thing you don't defend? It's really difficult.

I personally wouldn't use that mechanism of social action and voice because rather like Sylvia, I would go for the mass activism, the mass noise, which is equally stopped by this kind of legislation. But I would defend the right of people to choose the way that they want to campaign because I think those people would be saying you can't see all the millions of people who are affected and it's by some of these more eye-catching approaches that we can really shift and demand action. Going back to the suffragettes again, Emmeline used to talk about you know if you have a crying

baby and a quiet baby it's a crying baby that gets attention from the mother. And likewise, in terms of policy change. However, also back to the suffragettes, they were incredibly clever about using lateral thinking and ways that we sometimes don't talk about. alienate people and they tried to bring people on through humor through you know putting flags in the holes of golf courses popping up dressing up all sorts of things and also remember we're focusing on the acts of these in a way the the victims or those people trying to change things we really need to focus on the acts of those in power you know the police that's and the way that it is unaccountable the executive the way it's making certain decisions. At the time, it was force feeding. It was the Cat and Mouse Act. Do we really want to return to a situation in which we give more power,

more unaccountable power, and stop people from making a noise and being obstructed? Do you think, though, that it would stop that? I suppose that's what's important to test it. We have so many messages. Actually, I have to say, some of the longest messages we've received because people are then sending in the detail of the particular process that they've been part of and how it works. And I will come to those, I promise. And thank you for sending them. But do you think it would stop people from carrying out their civic right to protest and be heard, but will prevent large scale disruption, enabling, you talk about silence there and those you can't hear and see, the Home Office statement says, enabling the silent majority to get on with their lives. Do we want a democracy in which citizens don't engage, are silent, are quiet, are passive? You're not necessarily passive if you don't go and protest, are you?

Or do we want one in which citizens feel that they have the right to challenge, to question? They don't have to give the time of where they're going to be and how long they're going to be, the beginning and end of a march. They're allowed to demonstrate near Parliament. At the moment, in that bill, there's additional restrictions to demonstrating around Parliament, because in essence, what the bill does is it's like building a wall of where people can't protest. I shared, by the way, some of these issues with a friend of mine who comes from South Africa. And she said it reminded her of anti-apartheid South Africa, where there were laws about riotous assembly, which was defined as three people gathering on a street corner. And she said it felt to her like some of the issues that were being covered were similarly concerning, worrying. You know, we've seen autocratic countries where you're not allowed to do this, you're not allowed to do that. But for some people, that comparison is moot. You know,

that does not ring true. It doesn't ring true with how they live in this country. You could say this is why you're warning against it. But their view of these changes, whichever form of it goes through or not, wouldn't detract those who are going to go out anyway. They get ready often to be arrested, especially if they're going to be doing disruptive acts. And this might just be a different way of being apprehended or apprehended early. What I'm trying to understand is, do you think of the protesters and activists you know, it would actually stop them from going out? I think it criminalises. It means more people will be worried about it.

And then fundamentally, Emma, whose voice is not being heard? It's the voice of those that are disenfranchised, most marginalized, most feeling that the current status quo is problematic, and that those are the people that you're stopping from allowing to have a voice. And surely a rich democracy, surely a powerful one allows dissent. It allows voice. It creates opportunity for discussion. It doesn't increasingly say only my way and be quiet otherwise. But you could also say that there, as the Home Office statement refers to, there's a silent majority who don't like this. The polls show otherwise. So two thirds of a poll done in 2021 showed concern about the criminalisation

of protests. Interestingly, though, that was the other point I was going to bring to you. I mean, so many points to put to you this morning, Helen Pankhurst. But I was going to say, I have read certain columnists who are very aggrieved about this, certain journalists and activists who are saying, why don't more people care? Why are more people not realising that they need to protest the changes potentially to the laws around protests? And I suppose obviously part of your role as an activist will always be to raise the profile of things you think are important. But do you think, you know, putting it on the other side, coming more to where you're coming at this from, do you think there is a danger of sleepwalking into this, that people are not necessarily aware of some of the changes?

Of course, I've tried to lay them out this morning. And I know you believe that, you know, especially for women, this is a key part of their voice. Absolutely. I mean, look at the legislation. It's 300 plus pages. It's very complex, but it's scary. I saw an early version. Somebody shared me some of the information and I do feel we are sleepwalking into something. So please, if you feel likewise, make a noise on social media and let's try and show the House of Lords that it's really important that they can stop this. And there is a chance that they might, at least some of the amendments. The current government is not exactly popular in terms of the sense that it's accountable. So maybe this is the time when we can

show that really this is just a step too far. I mean, Catherine's written and say mass noisy protest is needed against this bill. If passed, it will have huge sweeping effects on even the most peaceful demonstrations. But Lizzie's got in touch to say, hang on, Woman's Hour, what about Greenham Common? That was a successful, peaceful protest. It works from Lizzie's point of view. Peaceful, direct action. And I suppose there's a few other examples of what people consider to be protest, which is different to the types of things we're talking about with reference to this bill. I'm minded of the fact, he was only with

me in the studio a couple of weeks ago, a few weeks ago, to mention at this point Richard Ratcliffe, of course, the husband and now campaigner, to try and free his wife, the British Iranian, Nazanin Zaghari Ratcliffe. He completed that, he set out to do a hunger

strike. He did it for 21 days outside the Foreign Office at the end of last year. And of course, people thinking about Nazanin this morning, because it emerged yesterday that a British Council employee, a British Iranian woman, Aras Amiri, has been released from an Iranian prison. And Richard's hoping that's a good sign for Nazanin, just to bring people up to date on that. But because she's been returned back to the UK. But do you think that that protest, that sort of peaceful protest, is also going to be harmed by these sorts of things? Or are you OK with that?

Well, for example, the Greenham Common would definitely not be allowed. So an individual probably would be allowed. I'm not sure, not 100% sure, but definitely the Greenham Common Tide approach specifically would not be allowed because of the holding each other right across the area. So it could be stopped under these rules, you think? Absolutely. Final question, because we did start this by talking about your grandmother turning in her grave, if I may just return to that, because also you have been in the news

with regards to the grave of Emmeline Pankhurst, your great-grandmother, excuse me, you're the great-granddaughter. And this is because her headstone is now barely readable and a military grave restorer, I believe Steve Davis, wanted to try and restore it

and has said this is a national disgrace. What's the latest on that? It's still not being allowed. From my point of view, either it does need attention or it doesn't. It seems obvious that it needs attention. If it does need attention, either the Royal Parks do something about it or they allow a volunteer who knows what he's doing, who can show them that he knows what he's doing, to do it it so it just seems to me unbelievable that that's not happening. Where

is she buried? Brompton Cemetery. Brompton okay and this gentleman's offered it for free and they've said no because they're worried it will damage it? Yeah and they think that it should be a professional person doing it not somebody who's a volunteer even although he's been doing it on many other graves and can show his abilities or otherwise. Yes, well, it's for you to perhaps complete this sentence, but can you imagine if it was one of our best-known men and their graves? There we go. Has that gone through your mind? It sure has.

Dr Helen Pankhurst, thank you very much for talking to us this morning. More messages coming in about what protest means to you. Mary says, at nearly 70, I've become a protester for the first time in my life. I like peace and quiet and I look forward to the retirement of relaxation, reading, gardening and socialising, but that lovely grandchildren, I joined Extinction Rebellion after seeing its first London protest and I forced myself to go to protests against the inequalities and destruction wrought by our way of life. I'd rather take it easy, but how can we keep awareness alive without constant protests? Environmentalists have been trying for 50 years to make change and still emissions are rising

and people in the global south suffer the consequences of our comfortable lives. Sadly, the world at its present needs protests. I still long for my peaceful retirement, but it seems I'll never get that. It's sad and very frightening. More messages, as I say, with lots of detail about what you've been up to and where you've been protesting. A message here from Jay says, regarding the right to protest,

hello to Emma and the Women's Hour team, governments need to be mindful and this change is at their peril. here from Jay says regarding the right to protest hello to Emma and the women's our team governments need to be mindful and this change is at their peril the right to protest is like a valve which in a democracy can act as a gauge to society's issues and concerns and indeed as with the police we are being governed by consent and so they still keep flooding in a lot of views on this and a lot of opinions and based on some of your own protests or lack thereof 84844 is the number you need to get involved and women's protest women's voices and a key part of keen part of our present and past do let us know what protest means to you

now our next discussion for many including myself is all about a daily battle how to manage phone use and stop being interrupted by social media, endless news streams, conversations that perhaps don't include you or require your presence, but you can't help yourself from looking at online. It's a new year. Can we crack it? My next guest, Emma Gannon, the author and podcaster of Control Alt Delete, who's encouraging us to find a happy medium in a new book called Disconnected, How to Stay Human

in an Online World. Emma, good morning. Good morning, Emma. Thanks for having me. I believe you wrote this book to understand who you are outside of the internet. I find this rather ironic because I've known you and I've known your work for quite some time and you are Miss Internet in many ways. Yes, well, in my 20s, I wrote a book called Control Alt Delete. It was about my love affair with the internet. I very giddy I could earn money from home I felt very empowered and I'm now in my 30s and I'm kind of reflecting on that from the you know two years in a pandemic to be honest being reduced to my digital self more than ever and I think that is you know a lot of us are going through that so I'm looking at how much I'm addicted, how much of my personality is probably my virtual self.

I'm trying to get myself back in many ways and have a discussion, more importantly. Have you come to a conclusion about, I don't know, reclaiming some of yourself and your humanity? Well, I've been looking at how the algorithms have formed so much of my taste over the last few years, even, you know, Spotify playlist, Amazon recommendations, buying clothes because bloggers are recommending them. We're just we are trapped in a world of advertising. And I'm trying to take a step back, also hold platforms to account and try and get a happy medium because I'm not a massive fan of digital detoxes. I think we've been made to become reliant on the tools. And then apparently we're now meant to be able to take a month off and go into a cabin and not need it when we've got parents and we've got friends. Some of us have got children. So my book is a middle ground. How do we take mini detoxes every day?

How do we be happier? How do we talk to each other? Because you don't think just, you know, saying, well, I'm going to lock it up from seven o'clock at night. Because I mean, that is what some people try and do. They also have been buying alarm clocks. So the phone's not their alarm clock. So it's not the first thing they look at in the morning. You know, there have been various suggestions over the years. I suppose if you're saying we can't do that, what are you saying we can do? I'm saying that we don't have to be made to feel guilty all the time that we can't do the thing that we've been made and pushed in a corner to do. We need our tools. We need to,

if you're a single mother with three children, I'm sure that you're probably on your phone a lot because you're doing the groceries and you're doing doctor's appointments, you're doing all sorts. So it's more about how do we have moments in the day for ourselves. Some of it is quite obvious in the book, because I had to go back to basics. You know, there was someone on the TV the other day saying, sit by a window and have some brightness from the sky, or a box that tell us to drink more water. Like we are really suffering at the moment, I think during this pandemic and beyond. So going for walks, you know, going to the cinema, turning your phone off, meeting up with a friend, reaching out to people you haven't spoken to for ages and getting off Twitter. I mean, but, you know, I suppose that whole kind of getting off Twitter when media people say that, you know, is almost a bit of

a media bubble itself. There are obviously other platforms that can be filled in. But do you think that we have, I always hoped our online selves and our offline selves would meet, that the two could be quite similar. You know, that if you weren't going to abuse somebody in the street, you wouldn't then do it, for instance, online. But do you think they've come together, those versions of ourselves, or we just have two versions of ourselves? And then actually how we're treated online, can it really impact how we feel about ourselves in real life? Well, I think online life is life. And I think if we separate them out, we're treated online can it really impact how we feel about ourselves in real life well i think online life is life and i think if we separate them out we're not really telling the truth of what our lives have become the online world is life so if you're getting a death threat

online your your physical body as well thinks it's real because it is real it's a message and you'll go into fight or flight mode it's as if someone said it to you in the pub it's really, really scary. And I don't think platforms take that as seriously. You know, when we see the amount of abuse that women and trans women and women of colour get, it's really bad and not enough has been done. So I think we need to understand

that we do need to be better online citizens like we would in real life. This is real life. I suppose what I'm trying to understand also then, if you're trying to kind of reclaim parts of yourself and talk about that with others and have this conversation, you know, you've got quite a significant social media profile. You pour a lot into that. That's a lot of where you have your conversations, where you find things out. Are you not also, then, part of the problem because you're giving people the content that they want to look at and engaging with it?

I mean, how do you balance that out? Well, I think if I was if it was the 90s now, I would be writing in magazines. I'd be doing all sorts of things to kind of tell my story or get my point across or write books. It just so happens that we live in this world and I want to connect with people. And the book really is about reconnecting with each other and making sure that's a part of our lives and not cancelling each other, not shutting each other out all the time and listening and not just broadcasting. I actually have a private Instagram account that I have around 100 people on there of my close friends and family. I use that so differently. And actually,

that's made me feel so much more connected because I can just be myself. And sometimes we can't be our full selves on the internet. I think that's the point, really. That's more connected because I can just be myself and and sometimes we can't be our full selves on the internet I think that's the point really that's interesting because I think the other thing that people have I mean people do still have work phones or whatever they do for a living they may not require that but let's say you do but actually a lot of people have everything on their own personal device there are no boundaries there are no separations so you can just get a work message or a message from a colleague at the same time as you you don't want to get rid of your phone because you'll also be looking for a message from a friend about what you're doing that weekend. What have you come to around some of those boundaries?

Well, it's interesting in the book, there's a poll in there around what we missed from 10 years ago. And I know I sound like a really old millennial now because I'm like harking back to the good old days. But I do miss some of that stuff. The fact that we didn't have work emails on our phone. We could just switch off and go home that was good for our mental health you know our working day has increased tenfold because of our phones people miss using online tools to kind of say oh um meet me down the pub in 10 minutes that's actually how twitter was first used by most people and not just the media and also yeah this way of sort of separating out ourselves and not just using it for for everything so I think we can be nostalgic we don't have to look back to the past too much but what can we

incorporate from the past that we loved into the future and slow down a bit as well have you made any decent friends through these connections online not your personal Instagram but sort of how you've connected with people on social media yes I've made so many friends over the years on social media. And I think if you're someone with niche interests or not even niche interests, just interests, you want to find other people like you. Sometimes at university, for example, you're living in a house share with people you have nothing in common with. And you probably have nothing to talk about with these people. And then actually go online and you find you find your people. And that is the good side of the Internet. And the book is not negative about the internet by the way it's um it's a

positive thing i i think we can change things turn things around and it just to tell tell me what's your tell us all what's your routine then if it's not locking it away what have you changed since researching this with with your own use well i i don't want to sound too much like a meditation expert or anything so I'm absolutely not but I definitely try and regulate my breathing and my sort of my my my state of mind before I reach for my phone I'm really kind of trying to not just suddenly kind of go into that that circus straight away I like to have a really long well not that long maybe a half an hour walk at lunchtime it's huge and that's something that's come out of the lockdown actually and then uh in the evening I

yeah I try not to go on it too much in the evening but but this isn't a book of sort of you know I'm perfect and I do these amazing things no no it's just learning you've looked into it and and people are always listening to to try and figure out if they can change things or how things can be. And I think, you know, also you touch on, you know, think about who you follow. Think about the things that you do put in front of yourself all of the time. I mean, it's a bit like you hopefully pick what's on the walls of where you live. If you do have anything on the walls, you could be a bit more conscious, couldn't you, about some of the people that perhaps or some of the, you know, the accounts, whether it's news or or otherwise that you don't need to always be having in your eye your eye line do you? Absolutely and it's amazing how much you can change that the minute you mute something that's

been bothering you or hide something you know it really is gone it's out of sight out of mind you can reshape how you the relationship with your phone and it was interesting some of the statistics in the book around a third of adults have fallen out with someone after misreading a text we've got to make sure we do talk to people and have more phone calls leave more voice notes whatever it is but also the the fact that people found their friends annoying on social media during the pandemic found that really interesting and quite funny that we sort of eye roll at our friends or whoever we know because they're different online and I just think we need to sort of be a bit kinder to each other and not just um take it at face value I

think that's a whole other chat we could have at some point Emma you know I love my friend in real life but I can't stand her social media profile I'm sure people say about me but it's the thing I suppose I think that's really interesting about having a private one though because if you have one that is for your work thing you are are there to predominantly promote, I suppose, what you're doing, which isn't how you'd be if you walked in the pub like, hey, I just did this. I did that. Come check out this. Come buy this. It is a completely different sell, sell, sell vibe. Or, you know, if people do share very personal things, it'll only be the good things often. And we know how that makes people feel.

Emma Gannon, what's called uh disconnected how to stay human in an online world thank you for talking to us thank you so much today thank you um some messages actually on that regarding your digital life grow up just turn off notifications and then you can own what you look like look at excuse me read this message if you can't say it to their face don't say it at all with regards to our discourse and another one here um just from joe which says wanted to say as a chronically ill housebound person who lives alone, Twitter and the internet are my lifeline. Very important part of this indeed. And still your messages come in about protests. Karen in Bristol, silence does not definitely infer people being happy with the status quo. Silence could just

as easily mean that the vast majority of people who feel hopeless, helpless and disenfranchised and marginalised feel that doing anything other than keeping quiet and carrying on is futile. Indeed, never infer anything, I suppose, from the silence. But we also have to, I suppose, represent those who might not be talking in the same way about the concerns to the changes to this bill. Daisy from Manchester, to quote Emmeline Pankhurst, we are not here to become lawbreakers. We are here in our efforts to become lawmakers.

I thought this was relevant to your discussion on what a protest should look like. We are not here to become lawbreakers. We are here in our efforts to become lawmakers. I thought this was relevant to your discussion on what a protest should look like. Protests shouldn't fall in line with the law. Daisy, thank you very much indeed for reminding us of that quote. I was indeed reading that last night. Now, four questions about sex to end our time together on the programme today. That's what a group of academics and a theatre producer are asking of women in a bid to create a play about sex reflecting the female experience. They are, what do you think about your knowledge of sex?

What do you feel when you talk about or have sexual experiences? How are the first two questions influenced or shaped by your background, i.e. your religion, age, education? And could a play be used as a tool to benefit women's relationship with sex? Those are the questions presently out there. Hannah Farley-Hills is the independent theatre producer behind this. Hannah, good morning. Hi Emma, hi. Hello. So at the moment you've got these questions out there. Which academics are you working with? I'm working with some independent researchers from Manchester Metropolitan

University. Very good. And so this is out there, people can go and look this up. What's it billed as? What's it called as? So we've got a working title at the moment, which is a play about sex. So it is what it says on the tin. Exactly. It's pretty literal there. And what I want to understand was, when you of course, you're going to get these responses in, I imagine they're coming in at the moment. Maybe more people will do it after this, more women will get in touch. But why did you want to ask these questions? I think it stemmed from my personal experience originally. About two years, I realised I had a bit of a negative relationship with sex. I found that I couldn't talk about it openly. I didn't know what I wanted from my relationship with sex.

And that turned into a feeling of a lack of control over it and when reflecting on it I realised that lots of the women in my immediate network were feeling the same and lots of my friends would only talk about sex in hushed corners of pubs after a drink, they would still bring a lot of embarrassment and shame to that conversation and it was only my very close female friends that I would talk about uh sex with and so I thought okay maybe maybe there's something in this there seems to be a general lack of confidence a general lack of knowledge maybe I can make a play about it and when you say lack of knowledge do you mean about what what women want yes partly I would say uh a lack of knowledge in terms of

the only narrative that women feel that they've been given uh i'm basing this on on some results that i've had from a pre-survey that i have run um the only narrative that women feel has predominantly been given historically is that of a very heteronormative non-disabled penetrative sex like the physical act of sex, but not the psychological aspect of sex. It hasn't really championed their enjoyment, their pleasure, or to an extent, their safety or their confidence. So yeah, I think that's caused a lack of confidence and a lack of knowledge in women. And in terms of, do you have any insight into any of the results yet? Any early stares? Yes. I'm conscious not to dip into the data too much yet because the survey is still running until Sunday.

And I don't want to skew the way that we're talking about it by already getting an idea of the bias. And this project is truly community responsive. So it's not my opinion. It's the opinion of the women that respond to the survey but we did a pre-survey as i mentioned and uh some of the results from that was that 70 of women said that they wanted more support to talk about um sex in general 20 of women felt that they couldn't talk about it at all and um 100 of women said that more representation in mainstream media such as a play uh would help their relationship with sex and so are you gonna have write this from, are you the writer as well, from these responses? No, I'm not the writer. And I'm not even sure if there will be a writer, to be honest. I don't know exactly what the finished shiny product will look like. I only know the process. So what will happen next is we'll analyse what women have been saying on the survey. We'll get some focus groups and some workshops to have more intimate conversations with women who are interacting with the survey.

Then we want to bring in some knowledge and authority into it because I'm not a scientist. So we're going to have interviews with experts, sexologists, psychologists, academics. And then together with these community women in the conversation, the whole way will start to form creative responses to their stories. And with a professional team of theatre makers that might include a writer, but it might be a devised process. I'm not sure. We will create something that will act as a platform to represent these women's stories back to them all around the country. How do women submit their answers if they'd like to be a part of it? So you can go to www.aplayaboutsex.com and the survey is there and we're running a lovely giveaway at the moment if you submit your response. All right and get it in before Sunday of course and in terms of then

why you you said your personal take on this but why you think still a proportion of women can't talk at all about this? I mean, it'd be interesting to know if that's similar with men or they talk about it in a different way. I don't know if you've got any comparison sets. But why do you think there is that silence? Well, I totally acknowledge that I'm sure men do have their own issues with their relationships with sex and things that they would like to talk about more with their relationships with sex as well. But I don't think it can be denied that historically society, so in terms of education, household discussions, mainstream media, has underrepresented women's

perspectives on many things, but including sex. So no wonder there is this lack of confidence, this lack of knowledge, and in turn, a feeling of a lack of control around a relationship with sex so I think that has led to led to a silence also there is there is the element of safety and sex with women which is seen countless times across the media especially recently I think that brings an element of silence to women in terms of sex and for all of the reasons that I previously mentioned it makes it a taboo subject I think think at the moment, people only having these conversations in hushed, quiet corners until something is done and this topic becomes conversational, until you can ask your granddad over Sunday lunch for some sex tips or sex advice or about his sex

life and your sex life. I don't think we're going to be in the position that we should be. I like that's your litmus test. Have you tried that? I don't know if you have those sorts of conversations. I haven't been brave enough yet, but I'm going to get there, Emma. That's where you're trying to get to. Right, good. Okay, I always like a goal.

You'll have to come back and tell us if that was where you got to. But I suppose that the other thing is, I mean, there have been, of course, with social media, we were just discussing that, you know, rise of of kind of sex positivity bloggers people talking more openly about what they like women's pleasure I suppose you could argue it's quite nascent still and people perhaps haven't haven't found those but they also I remember doing this last year we had a whole um discussion on the language of sex and people lacking language to talk about, especially women, what they would like, you know, not necessarily even knowing what they wanted, first of all,

but actually when it came to it, how to describe it. So I wonder if that'll be one of the themes that also comes up, which will give your writer, if you get one, quite a challenge for perhaps to find the language of it for a play. Yeah, absolutely. I think people are, one of the narratives of the pre-survey was that people learn about the physical act of sex. They learn how to put a condom on and they learn what physically needs to happen. But they didn't learn about pleasure and this narrative of enjoying sex. So the next step of that, of them being able to ask your partner or whoever you're having sex with of what you would like in that moment. That's a very tricky conversation to navigate. And I do agree with you that conversation is getting better on on social media we're definitely and and in media

to an extent we are going in the right direction but i think we've just opened pandora's box without having yet dived into it hannah farley hills all the best to you thank you very much indeed barbara says a lot of very sexually active people can't even say the word sex they always use euphemisms like doing it even even married couples. After 66 years and limited sexual experience, I find it was not worth it. Still, if not, I'd be wondering

what all the fuss was about. We know there are people who haven't had it and are no different from the rest. Barbara, thank you so much for that message there and for your candor

and for using the word sex. We always appreciate that. I certainly do. I like it when women are candid and everyone else do. Thanks for your company today. That's all for today's Woman's Hour. Thank you so much for your time. Join us again for the next one. I'm Sarah Treleaven, and for over a year, I've been working on one of the most complex stories I've ever covered.

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