Woman's Hour - Female Astronauts, Second Chances, Jackie Weaver, Celebs and the male gaze

Episode Date: May 12, 2021

A total of 65 women have been into space - compared with 501 men. The last time the European Space Agency recruited for their Class of 2009, only 16% of applications came from women. That process led to Just one - Samantha Cristoforetti of Italy - being chosen. In a break from training for a 2022 mission to the International Space Station, Samantha joins Emma to discuss why so few women apply to be astronauts, the skills needed to make it in space, and how women can put themselves forward for ESA's latest recruitment drive.Jackie Weaver of local council zoom meeting fame talks about her night at the BRITS.Our series Second Chances continues. This time we hear how a mother's addiction and domestic violence are often factors in a child's removal. The reporter and DJ Milly Chowles became a mum last year, she’s in long term recovery from addiction and had lots of chances to change. Having a baby after getting into recovery made her realise that other mothers aren't getting the help they need or that they just aren't able to take it when it's offered. And after Taylor Swift talked about the challenges of being a woman in the public eye at the BRITS last night, we ask if women really can be anything they want? Can they change their image and wear and do what they want? We talk to Emily Clarkson and Dr. Jacki Willson.Presenter: Emma Barnett Producer: Lisa Jenkinson Studio Engineers: Nigel Dix & Donald MacDonald.

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. Good morning. Today we're talking about women, ambition and proving critics wrong, defying the expectations that people may have of you. While an excellent night for women at the Brit Awards, who stormed the board at those music awards, there was a theme of women talking about how important it was to claim their space, use their voice and prevail over forces around them. From Leanne Pinnock of Little Mix, who made history becoming the first all-female group to win the Best British Group Award, she said, It's not easy being a female in the UK pop industry. We've seen white, male dominance, misogyny, sexism and lack of diversity.

We're proud of how we stuck together, stood our ground, surrounded ourselves with strong women and are now using our voices more than ever. To Taylor Swift, who won the Global Icon Award, who had this to say. We live in a world where anyone has the right to say anything that they want about you at any time. But just please remember that you have the right to prove them wrong. You have the right, but can you? Have you? Do you identify with that?

Do you believe you can defy expectations put on you by those around you, potentially because you're a woman or otherwise? How have you proved people wrong? Or are you listening to that thinking, that's about as far from my life as it gets? Or maybe things have changed for you lately or in ways you didn't expect. Tell us what it means to you to prove people wrong. Maybe you're in the process of doing it right now. Text me here at Woman's Hour on 84844. They'll be charged at your standard message rate. On social media, we're at BBC Woman's Hour or email us through our website. And keeping with the theme of going for it,

have you ever thought of being an astronaut? We'll tell you shortly why now. Could be your big chance. And talking of chances, the latest from our series, Second Chances, on how women are rebuilding their lives after addiction. But first, the ultimate British story in defying expectations. Three months ago, our first guest was facilitating a parish council meeting.

That facilitation was a theme of great debate, in fact. Now she's opening the Brits. It can only be Jackie Weaver. Remember this? We'll start the meeting, and I want to repeat what I said at the beginning of the last meeting, that this meeting has not been called according to the law. The law has been broken. The meeting has been properly called. Will you please let the chairman speak?

This is with a place. If you disrupt this meeting, I will have to remove you from it. You can't. It's only the chairman who can remove people from a meeting. You have no authority here Jackie Weaver no authority at all seems like she does now that Hanforth parish council meeting you'll remember and if you don't do go and look it up in full I think it's around 26 minutes if not more of brilliant but Jackie Weaver's now opening the Brits good morning. Good morning to you. How has that happened, first of all?

By the magic of the internet and an email that just said, how would you like to be involved? And I thought, why not? Why not indeed? And you didn't even have to leave home. No, I didn't. They were awfully kind. They did, in fact, invite me down to London.

And I know this sounds, I don't know They were awfully kind. They did, in fact, invite me down to London. And I know this sounds I don't know how it sounds, but I genuinely hadn't got time to go. So they emailed me back and said, is there nothing we can do to tempt you? And I said, I'm really sorry, but there isn't. And blimey, they sent a lovely young man with enough equipment to, I don't know, launch a satellite probably up to record it by Zoom. It was amazing. And for those who haven't seen it, you are opening the Brits by telling everyone off, really? A little, yeah. You and the Line of Duty cast stars. So you've kicked Jack Whitehall, the host, out of the meeting.

Indeed. Not ruining anything. It's all gone out there. We're talking about defying expectations and it may be the weirdest year of your life, but you've now become a kind of superstar in all of this. How are you feeling about that and how does that work with your life at the moment? It's a really interesting question because when you talk about Jackie Weaver, for me, you're talking about somebody else. It is very strange because I still work here

for the Cheshire Association of Local Councils in Cheshire with my parish councils. And we are still a huge family for which none of this has has any impact at all. So it's kind of like a moment of drama or flash or glitz or something and then grounded again into, you know, the everyday stuff that that is what sustains me. I mean, how how you how you make that leap into saying, right, now I'm a superstar and I'm going to behave like one, I think is terrifying.

I mean, how would you ever know what reality was? No, well, it's funny because we're, of course, taking some messages from those superstars. We're talking about some of those music stars who have millions of fans the world over had to say last night. And there was a lot to be said from the women. I wonder what you make of some of those messages around, you know, you don't have to let anybody put you off your course,

defy expectations, all of those messages that we've just put together. I think it's a double-edged sword. I mean, if you've read any of the stuff that I write or kind of listen to me on, you know, I'm talking about democracy and things like that. I guess that one of the things that I feel important is that we can't all be superstars. And actually, the world needs a lot of ordinary people. And I am an ordinary person making the wheels turn. We really rely on them.

We can't all be superstars. And it's absolutely okay. It's fine not to be a superstar. And I do worry that we kind of keep giving this message that we all have to be special. And actually, in my opinion, we all have to be ordinary in many ways for society to work. And, but I suppose still taking that message, because I am getting a lot of messages about how people have proved people wrong, you know, in those quite ordinary but extraordinary ways for their life. Did you ever feel in any way held back by your life to this point? Or are you now looking at this in a slightly different way? Because you've had this very random moment of going viral and becoming a person that you say you don't recognise yourself. Yeah I mean I had a career before I married. I'm married to a lovely man at my wedding anniversary today 37 years. Congratulations.

Thank you. He probably needs to congratulate. It's not me. All right, well, pass it on. He's done a sterling job. And I've got three lovely children. And I guess for me, I kind of feel that I fulfilled in many ways what I set out to do. And it's almost like I got my validation from that. I then got involved with town and parish councils and they became a kind of almost a cause for me because it frustrated the hell out of me

the way I could see the fabulous stuff they do. But we could never get anybody interested in showing that off. So again, when the press knocked on the door three months ago, it was like heaven sent. You know, here are people actually asking me to talk about town and parish councils. Now, is it true you're going to go and strictly come dancing? Well, you know, even if it was, I couldn't say, could I? Jackie Weaver, I have the authority here and I demand an answer.

Between you and me, I have made Anton a solemn promise that I will not do strictly. So at least he's in with a chance this year of winning. OK, we'll see. We'll watch this space. Jackie Weaver, thank you very much for talking to us and not kicking me off the call. I try to have the authority there and we'll see how that goes for the rest of the programme. Good to have you back on, Women's Hour. Messages coming in about defying expectations and what people said to you. Heidi says, being told at 16 I should drop out of sixth form because I wasn't academic enough for A-levels.

I passed my PhD of either last month. Another one from Tony who says, basically, I was told I was too old to propose a book to publishers who otherwise loved it. It's coming out next month anyway and getting rave pre-launch reviews. Keep those messages coming in. And there's someone else just in shock that the parish council meeting was three months ago. We are slightly living in a time warp at the moment.

But I promised you the job advert that you might have been waiting for. If you've ever thought of becoming an astronaut, listen up. The European Space Agency are recruiting and they want more women to apply. The last time they did it was in 2008 when just 16% of applications came from women. And of those, only one, Samantha

Cristoforetti, excuse me, made it through. She has now the honour of being one of just 65 women ever to go into space compared to over 500 men. Is it sexism that's kept womankind mostly here on Earth or is it something else? And if you fancy commuting by rocket, what skills do you need to get you there?

Who better to ask than Samantha Cristoforetti herself, Italy's first female astronaut. She's currently training in Houston for her second mission to the International Space Station in 2022. Her first trip involved a temporarily record-breaking 200 days off the planet. She told me why she started on this incredible journey. Oh, it was my dream since I was a child. I mean, I was just fascinated by the idea of, you know,

flying into space already as a child. I mean, I was just fascinated by the idea of, you know, flying into space already as a child. And then as I grew up, all my passions and interests kind of kept me on that path. I was interested in science and technology, but also the human aspect of things and, you know, I enjoyed living in different countries, learning different languages. Outreach is important to me, being able to communicate to people. And all of that is part of this job. So what I find amazing about this job is that you have that very broad, diverse set of activities and tasks that you're trained for, that you're expected to do. And that's very, very interesting. It keeps the days very interesting, I think. Do you believe, though, that people from a variety of backgrounds can and should apply?

Well, for now, we are indeed looking for people with a STEM or aviation background. So, you know, science, engineering, math, or a solid aviation background or mix. I was kind of like a mix, right? I had a background in engineering from college and then I was a military pilot when I was selected. So I guess I had a little bit of a mixed background. Is there anything specific do you think that being a woman brings to going to space, being an astronaut, the role really?

You know, I don't like to, to you know put people in a box i think anybody man or woman has a right to be the way they are so if you're a woman but you have more typical male traits you know go for it and vice versa if you're a guy and have more typical female traits then go for it what i think is important to underline is that um the stereotypical image of astronauts that we kind of have you you know, that kind of bright stuff, it is a little bit of a macho stereotype, but it does not reflect reality at all. I mean, what we are really looking for, you know, in astronauts when we select them, but also what we really appreciate in our colleagues is how good they are in terms of teamwork.

Are they team player? Are they going to support the team? How do they communicate? Are they effective in communicating? Are they good in taking care of themselves and the rest of the team? And so if we want to talk stereotype, I would say those are more stereotypically female traits. So I really don't like when, you know, they paint that picture of the macho astronaut, because that's really just not the reality. Maybe it was. I'm not even sure that it was in the past, to be honest. It's certainly not in the present. Well, no, I mean, of course, you don't feel like this and you've had this opportunity.

You've held the record for a while for the longest continuous stay in space. But for a while, women's identity was held almost against them in lots of walks of life, not least also in space. Just even the idea that it was thought because women had periods, they shouldn't go to space. That's what some people thought. I know. And, you know, I guess it's fun to repeat those anecdotes and those stories.

But again, let's not paint the wrong picture. Because it's changed, is your experience? A lot. I don't bring it up because I think it's fun. I think it's important to remember. I think it was shocking. And I think it says something we've seen in the military, you know, women being given whatever it is,

one size fits all bras, this idea that, you know, women are a certain way. You know, for a long time, women weren't allowed onto submarines because of all these concerns about our cycles. Interestingly, the menstrual cycle I was just reading by someone who's a specialist in this area stays the same when you're out there. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it stays the same. I will say, you know, for disclosure, most women do suppress it, actually, just for convenience. It's not a problem at all. But it's interesting, right, that you mentioned, you know,

you know, maybe in the past, you know, the one graphics all and so on. I mean, that's really one of the reasons why I think it's important that, you know, we get more women into this business. It's not about, you know, what does a specific woman bring to the program by virtue of being a woman, obviously more relevant to females. And I think if we have more female in the program, as we shape space for the future, you know, women are going to be in the position to contribute to shaping that, you know, otherwise we will find ourselves in hindsight, you know, 10, 20, 30 years down the line. It's like, oh my gosh, this whole space, space has been shaped just with a male perspective. And we're like, well, guess what?

You know, we didn't have enough women part of it. That's why I think it's important that hopefully this time, this new astronaut selection that is running, we get a lot of female applicants. Why do we need to make space more of our life? You said that as you see that as the trend continuing. That's what we hear in various parts of space exploration, especially as it, as you say, economically sustainable to, let's say, you know, use it as a normal space of social and economic activities,

then people do. You know, why not? You know, some people work, I don't know, out in open seas, some people work in cities, some people work up in the mountains, and some people work in space or at least do business that is related to space. You say you say why not? An argument could be, well, we've not made a good enough job on this planet as it is. We've done a pretty good job of destroying quite a large part of it.

Should we focus our resources, time, energy, money, training people like yourself on fixing those problems before we go and potentially trash another part of our ecosystem in the broadest sense of the word? Yeah, I think I have a positive approach in that sense. I think as human beings, we have enough talent and resources. And if we put our effort to it, enough intelligence and wisdom to be able to do all of those things altogether, first of all. But the second thing I will say is that a key to both space exploration and tackling climate change is technology. It's not the only solution, but it's going to be a big part of the equation. And so a lot of the technologies that will enable stopping and hopefully even reversing at some point climate change have a big overlap with the technologies that will enable us

also to expand into outer space. So there's a lot of connection between the two of them. Indeed, there is. And we could keep going on that particular debate for a while. But I've got to ask, like when you go on an amazing trip or a holiday, and I can't begin to compare it to what you've done by going to space, it can be hard to get back to normal. Was it hard to come back down to Earth?

It was. I would say it was probably the hardest part of this experience. It was probably not the training and certainly not being up there, but coming back was tough. It was tough from a physical point of view. Again, you have to put all that weight back on that you were able to shed for a while, but also, indeed, indeed reconnecting getting used again to have all those human interactions you're never alone up there it's not about loneliness you know you've got your

crewmates you have a lot of interaction with the ground you can call your family all the time but you can really control yourself how much human interaction you want or you kind of get used to a pretty limited amount let's say and then you come back you kind of get used to a pretty limited amount let's say um and then you come back and all of a sudden you're this astronaut who came back from space and everybody wants a piece of you and all you want of course is some time with your family you know to to rebuild those connections that are really important to you and it's not so easy because you know you're subjected to a lot of demands in that time. And so it certainly takes, I would say, at least a few months until you feel that you came back to normal.

Well, they must be incredibly proud of you. How do they feel, your family, about you going again? They're not taking it personally, are they? Hopefully not. hopefully not no no no actually I'm blessed to be an incredibly supportive family so and hopefully we will be able to make it part of the adventure also for our children you know I think it will be fun for them as well well I think you've got to go again just purely so you can have the the out of office message that you put on your email. What was it again for people who emailed you? Off the planet for a while, back in May.

And just to leave our listeners, any of them who may be thinking to apply, can you describe a site that you could, that will always stay with you from your time there, like a view that you saw from space that very few people have still seen um i would say there's something very special to sunrises in in space um because you you transition you know very quickly from this complete darkness and you know there's all these stars that are absolutely present. It's like, you know, on earth, if you go on a high mountain or someplace where there is no light pollution, when in space, you have that all the time. So you've got all that, you know, night sky that is always present with you. And then, you know, it starts to become fainter and fainter. And then

you can start seeing on the horizon, you know, this just small sliver of blue that becomes bigger and bigger. And then this burst of light of the sunrise. And you've got this very privileged view of seeing this on the entire, you know, curvature of the earth. And then you see basically light rolling over the planet and kind of chasing away the darkness on the surface of the planet beneath you. And it's just you're just in awe every single time. Wow. Samantha Cristoforetti painting such a vivid picture there. Jenny in Midwell says, since my teens, long before the first woman in space, I've wanted to be an astronaut in my next life. But the field was closed to women. Then I became a dancer.

Jenny, good morning. If you're inspired by that if you think you have the skills to be an astronaut it's not closed off to you anymore then applications for the European Space Agency astronaut training program are open until May 28th. What have you got to lose and if you get to see the sunrise lights some other time then I reckon it might just be worth it. That is now how you get on. Now to second chances. A mother's addiction and domestic violence are often factors in a child's removal. The reporter and DJ Millie Charles became a mum last year and she's in long-term recovery from addiction and had lots of chances to change. Having a baby after getting into recovery made her realise

that other mothers are not getting the help they need or they just aren't able to take it when it's offered. This is the fourth in a series of highly personal authored pieces about second chances and contains a disturbing scene of domestic violence. When the first part of this series went out, we got a tweet from a listener who said, I have a one-year-old grandson born to addicted parents and removed. When born, his urine tested positive for crack cocaine. And we also got an email from a social worker of 37 years who writes, to contact with increasing numbers of parents who have never had a chance. Very few parents set out to harm their children. Both people with direct experience and both views I can completely

understand and have sympathy with. I have a one-year-old son, I wouldn't want drugs anywhere near him. But equally, I and many other women I know in recovery are proof that with the right help and support, people can change. Today, the story of a woman we're calling Bea, who's had seven children. The Family Drug and Alcohol Court, or FDAC, offered her a way out of the cycle, but it took a long time to get there. My first five children were placed in the care of my family because I was in a domestic violence relationship. So they they obviously worried

about the safety and how my kids would be affected so I had multiple parenting assessments. What were they asking of you to do in order to keep your children safe? To go into either a foster placement, a foster care mother and baby placement or a residential not having a communication with children's father to do domestic violence courses. And was that helpful? It sounds like you got quite a few chances in a way. Unfortunately, at the time, I wasn't ready to take on them chances. Especially when I had my first child, I was 18 years old. I was a young adult who had been through a lot of abuse. You know, I had this kind of picture of normality

of what I thought life would be like having a child and then going into the care system and being told you can't do this you can't do that you can't take your child here you can't be on supervised with your child having to constantly ask people permission to do stuff with my own child and what it led me to do with Rebelle and obviously underlying all of that was my addictive nature of you know using drugs. And what drugs were you using? I started off with alcohol and weed, moved on to tablets, eventually led down the path of taking cocaine and crack cocaine. I'd pretty much used for just over 25 years. I'd classed myself as functioning because it wasn't something that was ever really picked up. I was ableed myself as functioning because it wasn't something that was ever really picked up. I was able to hold down a job, a house, everything else.

I guess a lot of people listening would be wondering why you went on and had more kids as each one was removed and you were in the same relationship in the same circumstances. The backdrop to the need to have more children was it tapped into the core belief of I'm not good enough. And then you come into the services and you try to do your best with the tools that ultimately I was given as a child growing up. Feeling like, OK, you told me I'm not good enough, but there's something deep inside me that needs that love, that thinks, oh, I can get this love from having a child. I'm just trying to understand because just having a child removed must be such a huge trauma, huge loss. And I wouldn't want to go through that process again. How was your thinking around that in terms of when you found out you were pregnant again after having a child removed?

Every time I kind of felt pregnant was like oh what am I going to do what is everybody ultimately going to think and then when the rush of hormones came through the feeling the baby moved was like okay you know what actually this is my chance I can do this you know I'm going to show them I'm going to prove to them that I can raise this child I can do everything that you've asked me to do. Kind of like my drug usage, I'd use, I'd end up having a bad time in my using and I'd put it down for a little while and then I'd pick it back up and be like, oh, it'll be different this time. I relate so much to what she said there about her addiction. As someone who's got clean and

relapsed a number of times, to an outsider watching my life, they'd think, wow, hasn't she learned her lesson yet? But in those moments moments of madness I just couldn't see the truth about my own experience and the almost certain disaster that lay ahead if I picked up again that protective instinct that keeps you from putting your hand on a hot stove just wasn't there for me around drugs or for B it sounds like I'm taken aback by B's honesty and how matter-of-fact she is in delivering her story. She's clearly had a lot of chances and she doesn't deny that, but she says she wasn't ready at the time, something I also relate to, but I think it's something you can only really see in hindsight. And those failed attempts, for me, were a big part of getting ready. Ultimately, what I

hadn't done was looked inside myself and obviously I hadn't been completely honest with the professionals or myself that my drug usage was a problem. And what about the relationship? How long were you in that relationship for? Nearly 10 years. So my first five children are all for the same guy

and actually feeling like he was the only person that cared about me and loved me I keep going back. Domestic violence is so often a factor it's come up again and again in this series. Being in active addiction you're so vulnerable to abuse it becomes a vicious circle that erodes your ability to see the truth or see a way out of either but B did eventually end her relationship. When our fifth child was born she was taken straight from the hospital. The general gist was obviously my basic care was good enough for the children so keeping them clean and everything else but keeping them safe and the emotional regularity was what my issue was. So she was taken into care

into my mum's care from a week old straight from the hospital and about three weeks after she was born we'd had our last altercation where he hung me off of a balcony and I had to go to hospital because I'd had internal bleeding it was only then after 10 years of you know doing this song and dance realizing actually that there is a potential that this man will possibly kill me. I have to do this, not just for my kids, but I have to do it for myself.

I'm actually worth more. So tell me where you were in your life when you started to work with FDAC and how that opportunity came about. I had been placed into a refuge because I'd got into another relationship that became very violent. Because it had been my second time in a domestic violence relationship, they were looking to remove my daughter from my care. The social worker had came to me and said to me, we have this opportunity called, you know,

the Family Drugs and Alcohol Court. Dr Sheena Webb is one of the clinical leads at the Pan-London Family Drug and Alcohol Court. FDAC, as it's usually shortened to, is a problem-solving court and it differs from standard care proceedings in that the court takes a non-adversarial approach and by that it's not so much about each side being able to prove or disprove whether a parent has capacity rather using the court to mobilize and facilitate all of the professionals to support the parents to try and make changes within a time scale that's reasonable for their children. So how do you work with people in this problem-solving way? What does the programme and the process involve? You have the judiciary working very closely with a clinical team

and also working alongside the local authority and all of the other professionals who might be around the parents or the children, really trying to make things happen for the benefit of the children. And how are those families selected? Who decides who gets that chance? The local authorities put families forward for the programme. They fund it, they pay for FDAC, they try and select families who they think are really going to benefit, who have that potential to make those changes. In the back of my mind, I knew that the drugs was now becoming a problem. I'd been going to drug services and saying look this is getting really bad I'm binging

so my daughter was actually removed two weeks before I actually started the FDAC process. I went to my first initial consultation. I was met with a lot of compassion because by this time around it's my sixth time around in child care proceedings and you wouldn't want to give me a chance to have another child or to even work towards getting the child back and I felt listened to I felt heard I was told what would happen so that I was told that I'd be going to court every two weeks and it'd be a non-lawyer's review so it would be me the judge my key worker from FDAC and the social worker and I'd be given a chance to say what was going well what wasn't going well if I had any concerns if my key worker or social services had any concerns, I'd be drug tested weekly.

It was such a different and refreshing experience because in all my other childcare proceedings, I had a lawyer speak on my behalf. There wasn't any emotion in it. There wasn't what I wanted to say. It was about what sounded right and what was legally factual. You see the same judge every time you go to court. It's consistency. So that person, you know, gets to see you from the beginning up until the end of your process. It took me about two weeks of being in FDAC

to actually finally put down the drugs completely and build a relationship with the people in FDAC. So my key worker, my therapist, my judge. I learned to trust professionals. I learned to be able to speak my mind without being rude, without being rebellious. I started to become mature. I needed to learn to sit in feelings and emotions and to not let them overwhelm me and dictate how I would respond. Someone once said to me, the good thing about

recovery is you get your feelings back. And the bad thing about recovery is you get your feelings back. I was actually just talking to a recovery friend this morning about how overwhelming the simplest of tasks were back in those early days of being clean. I remember having absolute meltdowns over things like a phone call or getting to an appointment, things I breeze through these days. It's not surprising if you've used substances your whole life, emotions become a foreign thing that you've never learned to manage. It sounds like Bea has grown in emotional maturity hugely throughout this process and she's developed genuine supportive but boundaried relationships with people who are there to help her for what sounds like the first time in her life. I remember having to say goodbye to my key worker and I'm sorry it's got a little bit tearful there. She'd been one of the very first professionals in over a span of 17 years that saw me for me. So I actually phoned her after the final hearing and saying, you know what, thank you, my daughter is coming home.

I think just being heard is a pretty powerful thing if you don't feel you've had that throughout your life. Parents are much more likely to cease their use of substances when working with FDAC than in ordinary care proceedings. And they're more likely to have their children returned to their care. I think it's really important to highlight, though, that that's not the only benefit of FDAC. Absolutely, our number one goal is to try and keep birth families together where possible. But I think what's really interesting is that even in situations where that's not possible, what we find is that the parents are at least in a place where they understand why and they themselves recognize that they're not ready yet and they're not able to have full care of their children, which means that they're much more able to collaborate and maybe support family placements

or other placements by not being in an adversarial court process, by having a voice in a process and by also feeling like people have done everything they can to support them. I think parents, at least at the end of of the process feel less done to and feel more like they have been given a fair opportunity. So how long ago was that and where are you now? The final hearing was October 2020. My daughter didn't come home until November 8th. I am 20 months off of substances. I've got a little boy as well. What I've been able to tap into is what I've learned in FDAC, that I could be the mother to my two children that I didn't get. How about the children that were removed before the two that you're now raising? Do you think it was a fair decision that the children were removed

in the circumstances that you were in? Yeah. It's taken me a lot of years to come to that conclusion. I can see that my kids were given a lot more than they would have been if they'd been with me. Do you have contact with them? So I don't have much contact with them because they all live in family. But my plan and process is that once I know that me and my two little ones here are completely stable and they're off their supervision order, is to go and repair the damage that I ultimately caused to my older children

to be a part of their lives once more. Let us know your views and what you've heard by emailing us through the Woman's Hour website. All episodes of the series are available on BBC Sounds. Just look for Second Chances and Woman's Hour.

Let's go back to where we began today's programme. Last night, the Brits was a huge night for women and rewarding women's talent. From Arlo Parks, who we welcomed to Women's Out at the start of the year, winning Breakthrough

Artist. Congratulations to her. To Taylor Swift, winning Global Icon Award. Again, congratulations. Women dominated the microphones, singing and speeches. And at the heart of what they had to say, and we played you a bit earlier from Taylor Swift and quoted Little Mix, is you've got to be free to be able to do

what you want to do. And yet only last week, we saw an uproar from fans and parents of fans of Billie Eilish, who also won big last night, bagging Best International Female Solo Artist. And the uproar came after a Vogue cover shoot showing her in a corset and a range of pin-up girl style bodysuits, a major change from the teenage sensation's usual baggy, oversized clothing style, which she said she prefers to specifically avoid drawing attention or comment to her body. Emily Clarkson is a writer and journalist. Dr. Jackie Wilson is a teacher at the School of Performance and Cultural at Leeds University.

Jackie specialises in women's performance art and sexual politics. Emily, I'll start with you. A lot being made of being free last night. We've talked all throughout the programme of defying expectations. If I read you some of the reactions to, for instance, what was said about Billie Eilish last week, in a corset, yeah, read the history on corsets and come back and talk about empowerment.

Is showing your body empowering or did Billie Eilish not have enough fans or attention when she wore baggy clothes? Emily. Eilish not have enough fans or attention when she wore baggy clothes. Emily? I mean, I find the conversation around her wearing baggy clothes and then changing as if it's some massive statement odd because she was a teenager, she was a child and she's now becoming a woman. She's in a weird position because she's doing that publicly um and I think a lot of people are saying oh well she's done this um for money she's done this because she

wants to be more famous I don't think she needs to be more famous like look at what she won last night look at the I mean she's like the most liked person on Instagram she's adored I don't think she did it for fame I think she did it because she wanted to and people really are like sort of bypassing that they're they're missing the fact that she was a child she's an adult she's doing what she wants now and that is empowering um let's bring in you know the thought here Jackie that even if it's empowering has the male gaze or the desire for the male gaze seeped into that because there are also remarks again about uh can women say a lot more empowering things wearing a lot more clothing i'm paraphrasing some of the remarks from social media off the back

of last night's brits well it's funny isn't it whenever you were where these kind of feminine accoutrements of sexuality it's seen as somehow uh that you're selling out to the male gaze but but really i mean if you think about people in the past like like Britney Spears and they were and their kind of sex body on stage there was uh consequently a seemingly a lack of of creative and financial control over over that image what um Billie Eilish seems to be doing is she's coming of age she's taking control of her sexuality by saying look you know making contact with Vogue you know controlling her sexual image, deciding that it was this kind of femininity

that she wants to access in order to express it. And the pin-up as a rich history in relation to women's erotic and self-contained and controlled sexuality. So I think the corset actually has quite a feminist history. I suppose the other side as well, just to bring, and that's fascinating to think about, although the implication from one of those remarks

about the corset is the opposite. But I suppose, Emily, to bring it back to actually what Jackie Weaver was saying at the beginning, who was too busy to go to the Brits and make her film segment to open it, which a lot of reacting to is that you you know we look to these people but it's actually the normal people looking to these people so they have this extra weight of responsibility to try and be certain things to certain people yeah that's one of the things that's been the most like distressing around Billie like she's she ask, I don't think, for all this expectation to be put on her.

And when parents are like, oh, I'm disappointed in her, when her fans say they're disappointed, we don't really have the right to be disappointed in her. She is now a grown woman. She can do what she wants. And I think it's been incredibly empowering for her. It really does feel like she's making her own movement, kind of regardless of what other people think.

I don't know, that's, I mean, a now huge Billie Eilish fan. That's how I feel about what she's doing. So it's turned you towards her, perhaps? A hundred percent. Jackie, though, for those who it's turned against, do they have a right to feel like that? Well, yes, of course. But what I found really striking about Billie Eilish's interview

was the idea of body image. And she was saying that probably most women have body image issues, including myself. Right. So she was using this kind of costuming, if you like, in order to create a second skin and to be able to image herself how she wants to image herself you know um and i work a lot with with burlesque burlesque kind of performance and they use femininity to access different kind of personas whether that be you know mary poppins or whether that be jessica rabbit whoever they want to in that moment and actually um what i think is interesting about these particular performers and if you think back to mighty cyrus for example is that young women as they grow up are not allowed to change right and it's this idea of being able to be an identity in flux and being able to access different femininities however

you want to express yourself it's interesting as well though uh to to bring you back into it Emily around how if it's you on your own as an artist doing it it's different if you're we've had a message about the some of the backing dancers last night grinding up against men and what they were wearing at the Brits that there seems to be different rules depending on if you seem like you're in control. Yeah I think this again you can go back to like Britney Spears and look at how much I mean in a way loads has changed because Billie does feel to be in more control perhaps than Britney was but in the same way the conversation hasn't changed at all and that's quite depressing because if you look at how society viewed Britney

it was the same in a way when her around her virginity the conversation was so distressing and the way that people viewed her changed massively when that happened and I think that's the same as what's happening now Billie's sort of becoming a woman publicly and the way that people view her is shifting and I think it's very interesting the responsibility that we put on different people kind of on how we've boxed them Billie was a baggy clothed wearing teen singer. Britney Spears was famously quite virginal. And when they change, people get, that's when the reactions come. But it's the idea also that women

only have to perhaps be one thing. We put them in a box and then they cannot be multifaceted. You've got your idea of them. And this is how it is. Discuss, discuss. We could keep going. Emily Clarkson, thank you to you.

A lot of nodding. I can see you on Zoom there, Jackie. Also agreeing, Dr. Jackie Wilson. Thank you very much for your insights. Keep your messages coming in. A lot more to say, I'm sure. That's all for today BBC Radio 4's discussion podcast that's back for another series. I'm Miles, one of the producers. We put four people in a room, face to face. There's no social media to hide behind or presenter to get in the way. Tricky is all about honest opinions on subjects that our guests really care about. Like at what age should you be able to vote? I think if you were to strip the vote from anyone I'd strip it from older people. Like forget this like stewardship thing. Why do we need to strip it from anyone? We don't need to strip it from anyone. I never brought that into the conversation. What I'm saying is but if we were

going to strip it from anyone it wouldn't be people that are under 25. So expect strong feelings in adult subjects, everything from living with HIV to surviving sexual assault. Discover more conversations like this by searching for Tricky on BBC Sounds. I'm Sarah Trelevan, 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 was 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. Available now.