Woman's Hour - Roe v. Wade, Girlboss and women of colour, Conscious sex work, Greenham Common banners

Episode Date: September 3, 2021

In Texas, a law banning abortion from as early as six weeks into pregnancy has come into force this week. This means that a woman can't have an abortion once a foetal heartbeat is heard, something medical authorities say is misleading. On Wednesday, the US Supreme Court refused an appeal from reproductive health care organisation, Planned Parenthood to stop the law. What will this mean for women and abortion access in Texas?“Girlboss” has been used as a term of empowerment - referring to a new generation of confident, take-charge women who pursue their own entrepreneurial ambitions. But since Nasty Gal founder Sophia Amoruso coined the phrase in 2014, the concept has been derided by those who says it has been dominated by white middle class privileged women. But what impact has the movement had for women of colour? Asma Khan of Darjeeling Express, and Otegha Uwagba, author of ‘We Need to Talk About Money’ join Anita to discuss.Beverlee Lewis describes herself as a ‘conscious sex worker’. Working with people who have disabilities, she helps coach them to explore relationships and sexuality. This will include being intimate with her clients, many of whom may have never had sex or a relationship with anyone previously. She speaks to Anita about her work. On Wednesday this week we caught up with some of the women walking from Cardiff to the RAF base in Berkshire, to commemorate 40 years since Greenham Common Women's Peace Camp was set up. The women were protesting US nuclear missiles being allowed on British soil, and many of the original protest banners made are still discussed today. Charlotte Dew is the author of Women For Peace: Banners From Greenham Common.Presented by Anita Rani Produced by Frankie Tobi

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. Hey guys, what's up? It's Eve from the podcast Constantly Evolving here. Before you get into Women's Hour, I just want to let you know about my show. Every week I'm joined by a special guest from the receipts to Paloma Faith to chat to them about how they get the most out of life. So, just like Women's Hour, I'm in the business of having inspiring conversations that will make you think. So once you've listened to Women's Hour, why not move over to an episode of Constantly Evolving? You can find it on the BBC Sounds app.

Just search Constantly Evolving. Enjoy today's Women's Hour. Hello, I'm Anita Rani and welcome to Woman's Hour from BBC Radio 4. Good morning. When you think of Texas, you might think of gun-toting cowboys, oil and the Vespereri. Well, this week, women in the Lone Star State can no longer have an abortion after only just six weeks of pregnancy, even though a woman's right to an abortion through the first trimester is protected in constitutional law. So how has this happened and what does it mean for women in the state? I'll be finding out shortly. Also today on Woman's Hour, we'll be hearing from sex and intimacy coach Beverly Lewis, who will have sex with her clients should they want it. Her

clients, however, are all severely disabled. And what does it mean to be a girl boss? Do you think of yourself as one? Today, I'll be finding out whether it was a term that was inclusive or was just coined to describe already privileged white women. Do you feel you're seen for who you are in the workplace? Do you feel you have a seat at the table? Are you trying to make a career for yourself? What obstacles have you come up against? It's been said, in fact, I'm one of the women who said it, women of colour have to work at least twice as hard. But this morning, I want to hear about your experiences of getting ahead and the difficulties you've had to overcome in your career. Get in touch via text 84844. You can also contact us via social media. It's at BBC Woman's Hour.

And of course, you can email by going to our website. And then banners. Have you ever marched with a placard or a banner? What did it say? How creative did you get? Well, the women who marched to Greenham Common were very creative. I'll be finding out a little bit about that in the programme.

But first, in Texas, a law banning abortion from as early as six weeks into pregnancy has come into force this week. This means that a woman can't have an abortion once something called a fetal heartbeat is heard, which many medical authorities say is misleading. On Wednesday evening, the U.S. Supreme Court refused an appeal from reproductive health care organization Planned Parenthood to try and stop the law. Now, millions of women in the state will be subject to very restrictive abortion laws, many of who won't even know they're pregnant before the six weeks. According to the Texas Policy Evaluation Project at the University of Texas, more than eight out of 10 people, that's around 85%, will no longer be able to access abortion. Well, here to discuss this with me is President and CEO of Planned Parenthood Federation of America, Alexis McGill-Johnson, and National Correspondent for NPR, Sarah McCammon. Morning to you both. Welcome to Woman's Hour. Sarah, I'm going to begin with you. Let's talk this through. Exactly what does this law do? As you said, it functionally bans abortion for really most people in Texas. I think it's important to understand that 85% of abortions in Texas, according to, I believe, Planned Parenthood and some of the other organizations there,

85% occur after what is essentially the cutoff point in this bill, which, as you said, is it's something that advocates for these laws call heartbeat. I mean, understanding embryonic development, it's more like cardiac activity that at six weeks or so, it's still in the embryonic stage of pregnancy. So it's very, very early. And as you also said, at this stage of pregnancy, many people don't even know that they're pregnant unless they have very regular menstrual cycles and maybe have been paying close attention. So functionally, it means that for most people in Texas, abortion is now illegal. And we can talk in a moment about the enforcement mechanism, but this law has a really unique

enforcement mechanism and people who, physicians and other providers who are found to violate it can be facing huge fines, huge penalties. How will that happen? Yeah, so this is what's really unique about this law and it's part of why it's still in effect. I think it's important to note that there have been many, many attempts in other states, particularly in the Midwest and South part of the United States, to ban abortion around this stage, around six or seven weeks. Those have all been found unconstitutional under multiple Supreme Court precedents, which in general, there's a strong idea in Supreme Court precedent in the U.S. that states cannot prohibit abortion prior to fetal viability. They have some leeway to restrict it and regulate it, but they cannot prohibit it.

Well, obviously, six weeks is well before a fetus is viable. But this law, rather than relying on public officials to enforce it, actually puts that in the hands of individuals. Anyone, a Texan or otherwise, is empowered by the statute to sue anyone believed to be in violation of it. And that could be an abortion provider, but that could also be there's an aiding and abetting provision in the law. And so that could also be someone who drives a woman to a clinic or in any way assists in the provision of an abortion that's illegal under this law, which again is most abortions in Texas. And anyone convicted under this law finds start at $10,000 plus court costs.

That's per conviction. Yeah, it's been called the bounty hunting scheme. Right, that's what abortion rights groups are calling it. They point out that it incentivizes people to file lawsuits and it could force abortion providers. And again, not just abortion providers, but people who assist women in patients and getting help with abortion services, possibly even counseling or referral. All of those people could face these kinds of lawsuits, which are extremely expensive to defend oneself against. If you're convicted,

the numbers could rack up incredibly high. And really, the advocates for this law, the anti-abortion rights groups in Texas, have been very clear about that that is the goal. They want to stop abortion. In my interviews with them, they've said they hope that providers will comply and we'll just stop doing abortions. And so there will not be abortion in Texas. It's intended to be a really strong deterrent. And what we're hearing is that that is the case. Many clinics, well, all clinics have been at minimum forced to significantly reduce their services. Some have stopped providing abortions altogether because of this risk.

Why are we seeing such a restrictive law? Where did this kind of law come from? I think it's important to understand that there has been in the US since 1973 when the Roe versus Wade Supreme Court decision legalized abortion across the United States. There's been a longstanding and concerted effort to reverse that policy. And prior to Roe, you know, some states did allow abortion.

And go ahead. I'm so just going to get you to explain for some for some of our audience who might not know the entire history about abortion law in the US, if you could just run through Roe versus Wade and why it's so important. Right. So prior to 1973, some states did allow abortion. I think New York was one of the more sort of cutting edge states in allowing abortion. There were networks, and this was well before I was born or even a reporter, certainly. But I know that there were networks of people, clergy, for example, who would help women travel out of state if they lived somewhere where there was no access to abortion. And so it was very much dependent on where you lived, whether or not abortion was legal and available.

And in many ways, we're starting we on a challenge to a law out of Texas, a case brought out of Texas from a's been sort of an evolving understanding of the precedent as happens with these kinds of cases. But the bottom line is that as it stands right now, at least on paper, under Roe and subsequent precedent, states have some ability to restrict abortion earlier in pregnancy, but it's until recently was very clearly understood that post viability after a fetus is viable or prior to viability, I should say, before a fetus is viable. The states are very limited in what they're supposed to hear another law out of the state of Mississippi that would ban abortion after 15 weeks. And the fact that the court even said, yes, we will consider this law was a bit eyebrow raising. Not really surprising to court watchers who've been watching the court move to the right, certainly moved far to the right under the Trump administration. But if you look at recent precedent, you know, you would expect the court to say, no, that law is clearly unconstitutional. It's not in line with all of our other precedent. However, the court has signaled a clear willingness to reconsider some of that precedent. And so I think what surprised a lot of people this week is the

fact that this Texas law, which goes so much farther, even than the Mississippi law I mentioned, is in effect, at least for right now. I'm going to bring Alexis in on this. Can you talk us through this from your perspective? And what, I mean, the most important thing, what does this law mean for the women of Texas? I mean, Sarah's absolutely right. I mean, for the women of Texas, Roe has effectively been rendered meaningless. It means that they could be waking up this week. You know, as you said, most people don't know that they are actually pregnant or just finding out that they're pregnant around six weeks. And they are, you know, trying to make decisions and they are finding out they're already without the right to do so. And so in effect, Texas is turning back 50 years of precedent of our ability to make these decisions pre-viability. On the ground, providers aren't able to schedule appointments for patients who have passed six weeks. They're taking phone calls from patients who are scared and need to now put together resources to travel out of state to find childcare, to take time off for work. Remember, most people who are seeking access to abortion, at least in the States, are already parents.

And so, you know, it's really quite devastating. And the law is having its intended effect, right? It is designed to deny Texans the right to abortion. It is designed to sow chaos and confusion and now fear in not just the patients, but also in the providers. The other thing I would just say is that Texas has had a longstanding, you know, as Sarah laid out, hostility to abortion. And so this law is also coming on top of other really insulting barriers to access abortion, like 24-hour waiting periods, state-based counseling, mandated counseling, forcing patients to have ultrasounds now to identify the cardiac activity. And that looks like, you know, a patient coming in for their 24 hour waiting period, not having any cardiac activity. and then a day later coming in for the procedure, even pre-six weeks,

and suddenly having the cardiac activity and not being able to get the medication. So what can a woman realistically now do in Texas if she wants to get an abortion? So we have been working with a network of providers, independent providers, Planned Parenthood providers and abortion funds, which are resources to help people get access to travel resources and money to get out of state. But she has to travel. She has to travel hundreds of miles out of state. Texas is huge. It is. It's huge. And the states surrounding Texas aren't all, you know, friendly. And so they have they have their own sets of restrictions. So the patchwork of abortion restrictions, I think, has severely undercut Roe broadly. And I think that's really what we're seeing. There were 600 restrictions that were introduced in 2021 alone, 90 of which have been enacted. And, you know, and so bro is definitely very much in danger.

And this disproportionately affects women from certain communities? We're talking about black and brown women. We're talking about trans non-binary women who are trying to, you know, again, without access to resources may, in fact, be forced into pregnancy. I think it's important to remember even pre-Roe, wealthy women always had a choice, right? They could get on a plane, they could fly to New York, to Puerto Rico, to other states, even across to Europe to gain access to abortion. But it's always been poor women who have been most denied access. Sarah, who's been pushing for this law? Presumably they are very happy with the result.

Right. One of the most vocal groups in Texas is Texas Right to Life, which is an organization that has a national umbrella organization above it. And there are many similar chapters in other states around the country. But as I alluded to a little while ago, there's been a long-term strategy since Roe to overturn it, to reverse these laws. There's a lot of organization on the religious right from evangelical Christians and Catholics, although certainly not limited to those groups. But those groups would certainly be, would dominate, I think, the anti-abortion rights movement in this country. And so, you know, these organizations have been

working for, and many others have been working for years and years at all levels of government to pass restrictive state laws and try to see if they can get them to stand up to constitutional scrutiny. And as Alexis mentioned a moment ago, even without banning abortion, many states have put in place all kinds of obstacles to seekingning abortion, many states have put in place all kinds of obstacles to seeking an abortion, like waiting periods and ultrasounds, all of which take, you know, sort of add friction to the process, add time. In addition to that, we've seen an effort at the national level to elect conservative senators, which in this country have control over Supreme Court confirmation. And so that's been a major focus from some of these groups. And of course,

the presidency, I covered the Trump campaign in 2016. There was a lot of attention to the Supreme Court and to the abortion issue from conservative Republicans, particularly conservative Christians. I heard that again and again and again as a reason people were voting for Trump. And so these groups have had their eye on this goal for a very long time and have worked together to get to this point. And so in many ways, it's not a surprise. I think what's been most surprising this week, again, is that this particular law, which is so restrictive and is really not incremental, which has been in a lot of ways the strategy to sort of incrementally erode Roe. This law is at least for now in effect.

It may not be forever, but it is. And I think there was a lot of surprise that the Supreme Court, even a conservative Supreme Court would not step in and at least stop this law long enough to allow the status quo to continue while some of these other questions about it could be litigated. Instead, they allowed it to stand.

Alexis, I think something definitely that our listeners here in the UK will be finding it very difficult to get their heads around is this bounty hunting scheme, which allows members of the public to sue somebody who they think might have had an abortion or aided someone getting an abortion. Why has this law been included in women's reproductive health? I mean, it's quite honestly maniacally clever. It is having such an impact already on the ground. And I think this is why, you know, obviously providers are complying with a law and in large part concerned, right?

I mean, we're seeing surveillance in parking lots. We are seeing people taking pictures of license tags and, you know, cameras on their iPhones of people going in and out of clinics. We are seeing an increased number of suspicious calls into clinics. And, you know, and I think that is really, again, it is creating not just putting a bounty on people who are supporting access to abortion. It's really creating, I think, a sense of vigilante justice.

And that, to me, is the thing that was most striking about the court, that the majority opinion really spoke to, you know, the novelty and the curiosity of this provision, as opposed to completely naming the fact that it is, you know, as Justice Sotomayor did, you know, so cynical and really a destruction of democracy, of neighbors, of community. And it is, you know, I'm sure this kind of ban, because the court has let it stand for now, is going to be copied across states that are also hostile to abortion, states that have created the similar patchwork that Texas has, that friction that Sarah talks about. And looking at the 26 states that could pass this kind of legislation in the next couple of years.

How concerned are you about women seeking out unsafe abortions? Well, that's the thing, right? I mean, having access to abortion is incredibly important. Restricting access does not stop people seeking access to abortion. So people will certainly revert to other measures. That, you know, that's just par for the course, right? We're also going to see people, again, traveling multiple states. You know, we had actually one patient who Ubered from Texas to LA at the beginning of just hearing about the ban taking effect, not knowing because, you know, the intent is to really sow confusion. So people are going through extreme measures to get access. And it certainly will

continue, particularly after six weeks. I'm sure we will definitely be coming back to this topic. But for now, Sarah McGammon and Alexis McGill-Johnson, thank you very much for speaking to us. Now, Beverly Lewis describes herself as a conscious sex worker working with people who have disabilities. She helps coach them to explore relationships and sexuality. This can include being intimate with her clients, many of whom have never had sex or a relationship with anyone previously. Beverly joins me now. Now, this will be a frank conversation and will include details of sex involved in her work. Very good morning Beverly. Good morning. First of all how would you describe what you do?

Well I describe myself as a sex and intimacy coach. Sometimes I describe myself as a conscious sex worker. Sometimes I am working as a surrogate which is a set way of working with the therapist and the client in what we call the try model and sometimes I'm described as my personal favorite tart with a heart lady of the night is often them I'm often referred to as a lady of night which is interesting because most of my sessions happen during the daytime because my clients and often get put into bed very early at night by their carers well lady of the night is also a term used to well some people use it to describe prostitution which is how is what you do different from prostitution so um in some ways it's not um

there is a transact a transaction where there is the buying and selling of sexual service. Well, actually, I'm not providing a sexual service. I think that's the main difference. Traditionally, sex work is around entertainment and providing services. And surrogacy or more conscious sex work or intimacy sex coaching is more around the therapeutic outcomes and sexual health and well-being and allowing a client to explore and express their sexuality. And I like to compare it to food. It's the same as kind of going into a restaurant and ordering off the menu a list of services and then consuming that food and then leaving and then you're hungry later as opposed to going in the kitchen with the chef and tasting all the food learning how the kitchen equipment and the utensils work and then sitting down together and mutually enjoying a

meal that you co-created and the benefits of that last much longer because the learning and the memories and the connection of doing something with somebody else lasts longer. So who are your clients? So I work with people with congenital disability, so disabilities acquired at birth, and then acquired disability, so later on in life from either accident or illness. And a large part of my work is problem solving and overcoming barriers to exploring sexuality or sexual pleasure. So, for example, that might be navigating a stoma bag or a catheter or a peg feeding tube that's coming out of the stomach. It might be working with paralysis and loss of feeling or loss of sexual function.

It could be around navigating certain equipment, so working with someone in a powered wheelchair, hoisting somebody onto a bed or into a bath, manual handling, dealing with sight and hearing impairments, traumatic brain injury, autism. I mean, the list goes on and on. There are many different disabilities you know out there

and the disabled community is huge there's 14 million disabled people out there in the world today that's 22 percent of the population. How do you know what your what what your client's issues will be like what's the process? So I have quite a lengthy um assessment if you like where i'm capturing a client's um disability needs and their expectations of what they would like to explore in the session or how they want to feel or what they um yeah what they would like to do to explore and then we meet online and we have like a half an hour discussion um face to face and so already the session has already started throughout that process and the idea is you know really getting an understanding and finding the language and framework to be able to talk very openly and honestly about sex and where they're at and what their experiences have been so far

and then from there we have quite a lengthy process around the logistics of how we're going to meet because accessibility is a huge issue for a lot of my clients. And, you know, most of my clients say it's not the disability that disables them, it's the society, the ableist society that they live in that disables them more so for example some of my clients live at home with parents or have carers with them majority of the time or

they might be in a residential home and they actually want the same rights as us and that's to have privacy and dignity around exploring their sexuality. And so sometimes it's like, okay, well, you know, they don't want to have to have that enabled for them. And so they'll, we'll have to arrange to meet elsewhere, perhaps, and finding somewhere that's accessible, perhaps with a hoist. In fact, I think there is only one hotel in London that has, it's fully hoisted so it's it's a real accessibility is a big a big challenge and a big issue and is it a challenge for you then so every time you meet a new client with a new specific set of needs having to kind of get your your own head around what what you how you will deal with this client and what you have to do? Initially, when I first started, it was a total baptism of fire

and I was completely unprepared for that. And it was a real eye-opener. When you start hanging out with people with disability, you start to see the challenges that they face and the discrimination. But now, I think that's one of the things that I really love about my work is the problem solving and as a as an able-bodied person the question is how can I use my myself and my able body to be a therapeutic tool or to open access or to facilitate or to enable somebody with a disability to access something that they wouldn't ordinarily be able to access but for me that's the fulfillment and the job satisfaction and why are they getting in

touch with you what are they saying i'm sure each client is individual but what what are the needs that you're fulfilling what what so yeah every client is different it could be that a client wants to lose their virginity it could be that a client wants to lose their virginity. It could be that a client wants to explore what their sexual function is after injury. Traumatic brain injury is a big one. It could be that a client actually just wants to have a discussion about, do they actually have a right to sex?

They've been desexualized and medicalized and often infantilized. And actually, you know, am I allowed to partake of this? Everyone else is, but, you know, there is no avenue. So is it actually allowed? Can I have sex? Can I be a sexual human being? And what's the reaction? I mean, it's therapy, right?

So it's a process. How do you know that it's working? So we all know that sexuality has a big impact on our health and well-being and our mental state of mind. And I have one client who meticulously documented the outcomes of the session in terms of the medical benefits for him. And this was to get funding for the NHS for this for him. And he documented that he could sit up in bed for the first time in years for five minutes, that the spasticity in his limbs was dramatically reduced, that he had less pain, that he didn't need to use so much medication, that he needed less physiotherapy, for example.

I have clients tell me that they live for this, that it's a lifesaver and it's not just about sex Anita it's about connection and authentic relating and intimacy and what are the rules and the boundaries you put in place to protect yourself from them becoming attached or you know or and vice versa so attachment is often unavoidable um if um if they've never been able to date a woman and they've never been physically intimate with a woman then for a time i become you know the woman of you know the most important woman in their life of course and you know and in a way you know that's part of the process because you know everybody has a right to go through not just the physicality of sex and sexuality and intimacy, but the emotions that are attached to that as well. And there's a thing around, you know, should we safeguard people with disability because, you know, oh, they're vulnerable and they're fragile. And, you know, yes, on one level they are physically, but on another level, they have just as much right to risk, to have their heart broken, to experience unrequited love,

to experience the full range of emotion that comes with relating to another human being, because that's where emotional growth comes from. But do you discuss that at the beginning? Do you discuss that as a possibility before you start the therapy that this could happen? Yeah, absolutely. We discuss it at the beginning and we also discuss it throughout the sessions. And sometimes if I think it is going to be problematic and it's going to have more of a detrimental effect than a positive one, then I will limit the sessions to say, I'll work more as a surrogate and I'll say, we're only going to do six sessions. And then after that, that's going to be the end. We would have completed

whatever it is you wanted to explore. And so hopefully with some clients with the hope that they will then go on and have the confidence to then be able to date and find girlfriends. I mean, ultimately for me, that would be the best outcome. For other clients, they know that that's unrealistic. You know, they might have got to 50 or 60 and they have never had a girlfriend and actually they don't want one but they might um work with me as part of their health and well-being they once a month yeah treat to themselves and i'm really fine with that it's absolutely um fascinating talking to you what's the what's the response that you get when you tell people what you're doing what's the public reaction um really positive i've not actually had anyone say anything negative to me about what i do and that was a big concern for me about

choosing to step into this work which wasn't an easy decision it's not like one day i kind of woke up and said i know i'm gonna be a sex worker for people with disability it was very much a um a process um a process that you know throughout the whole of my life everything that I kind of seem to have done has led me up to this point it almost feels like a vocation and a calling and people just see that I'm really happy and in my power. And for me, it feels great. And the people close to me are really supportive and encouraging of what I do. What feels great about it? What do you enjoy most about your work? I like that I'm making a difference, that I'm doing something um that contributes that changes stigma uh that enables people to um to to have quality of life and I enjoy the the challenge the problem solving

the overcoming um boundaries to sexual pleasure I think I've had my own journey with that. And so I realize and recognize how important it is to have to not have shame or guilt around sexuality, that it's really normal and natural and healthy to be able to express your sexuality. And if I can be a conduit or set an example or be a permission slip for somebody else, then I feel that in some way I've overcome some of my own traumas and challenges with my sexuality and my personal story. Beverly, thank you very much for joining us on Woman's Hour and speaking so openly and honestly about what you do. We've just had a text in from someone saying,

what a fantastic talker, the sex therapist for people with disabilities, such a breath of fresh air. Thank you very much. Now, girl boss has been used as a term of empowerment, referring to a new generation of confident, take charge women who pursue their own entrepreneurial ambitions. But since Nasty Girl founder Sophia Amoruso coined the phrase in 2014, the concept has been derided by those who say it's been dominated by white middle class privileged women. And with accusations of selling hollow empowerment after female entrepreneurs left or forced out the companies they founded. So what impact has the movement had on you at all, if any? Do you feel excluded from it entirely?

We've had some messages in. Molly says, I hate this term. all if any do you feel excluded from it entirely um we've had some messages in molly says i hate this term this is there's absolutely no need to put a gender to the phrase boss especially not girl extremely patronizing and belittling belittling i'm a grown woman after all not a child and another message saying um as a female running my company i personally can't bear the term girl boss i think it's patronizing and sexist boss will do me just fine. Well, earlier I spoke to Attega Uwagba, who's author of We Need to Talk About Money and Asma Khan, founder of Darjeeling Express. And I started by asking Attega what we mean by the term girl boss. Girl boss is basically a term that

refers to, I guess, an ambitious and successful and, you know, working women, usually one who is maybe self-employed in some capacity. So, you know, runs her own business or maybe is a creative. And it's a term that was popularised by the entrepreneur, Sophia Amoruso, who wrote this kind of memoir slash career guide called Girlboss back in 2014. And it really just took off amongst millennial women. And do you feel like a girlboss? You worked in advertising, decided to leave, set up on your own.

You're a very successful woman. Thank you. I wouldn't describe myself as a girl boss because I do think there are certain sorts of attitudes that accompany it that I don't necessarily share. But it's definitely a word that I've heard used to describe me in the past and I can definitely understand why. Who was the girl boss movement for?

Was it inclusive? I would say it probably wasn't inclusive. I mean, I think it was aimed at millennial women and certainly kind of relatively affluent ones and usually white ones, because I think a lot of the, I guess a lot of the attitudes and the way it kind of encouraged you to live your life required you to have a certain amount of privilege. Certainly most of the icons who were held up as girlbosses in the media and in culture,

like Sophia Amoruso or Audrey Gellman, who co-founded The Wing, or Emily Weiss, who co-founded Glossier, these were all white women. And often that's because, you know, the kind of secret sauce to being a girlboss is having access to funding and investment dollars, and women of colour very often aren't able to access that. So as Asaiga was saying there Asma you know venture capitalists are prepared to invest but is it because they are already privileged beautiful white women who come to them with an idea and that's why they get the they get the funding to

go off and become a girl boss? Absolutely and And I'm very uncomfortable with that word, because I think that the problem is that it is women taking on the persona of success in male terms. Traditionally, the whole idea of a boss and, you know, someone who's really bossing it around, you wouldn't normally associate with a female. It was always, you know, you would think that, you know, the boss is always a man, you know, culturally as well. And then this kind of taking on labels and putting on labels on yourself, it is makes me very uncomfortable, because I think that it definitely excludes me accented in my 50s. You know, I, I see myself as successful, I would never call myself a girl, or a boss. And, you know, this is the problem that it is an age thing as well. And it

is very, very white. This whole idea that, you know, I'm going to be in this privileged position, I'm going to be the top of the pecking order. It is what has happened with men all along, where success was seen as about you being at the very top. And I, you know, I've, you know, I've always tried to tell people who talk about, you know, just the Netflix episode that, you know, you broke the glass ceiling, you're a female, all female kitchen, you know, I don't want to be in a place surrounded by glass, I want to bring the edifice down. Because when there are buildings, and you're having to break the ceiling, it is a very lonely place to be. I want to see women in my lifetime surpass what I did.

I want to remove the hurdles. I want that generation coming after me, not even to see the hurdles I hit. They might say that it was a great idea and it's about empowerment and it's about giving a younger generation that sense of go out there and you can achieve anything. The problem with being a girl boss and coming across as this kind of powerful, you know, female figure who's made it, it doesn't talk about the hurdles that they may have been through. It seems so easy. I got it. And, you know, yes, I've struggled a bit. But the thing is that women of colour jump through hoops and go through so much

more pain. We carry the burden expectations of our culture, of, you know, a lot of other difficulties that no one sees. It is not an equal race between white women and women of color when it comes to business. I can, I'm a living example of that. I was never shown a place after Netflix for a year and a half, not a single landlord, almost all of them white, told me there was no suitable property for me. The first question they asked me is, do you have, you know, business funding? Do you have a business partner? I can't believe that. A business partner? Yes. And I can't believe it's been three decades since I left India where everybody asks you, who's your suitable boy? I was asked the same question here.

I had to wait for men to fail, for the pandemic to come, for me to be shown a site that was big enough for where I wanted to move. I was shown nothing for a year and a half. Atayga, I'm going to bring you in. What do you think about what Asma's saying well I think Asma kind of touches on one of the core criticisms of girl boss culture which is that it it's a way of living that is probably only possible if you come from a certain sort of background if you look a certain way so if you're white you know under middle class and what it doesn't really factor in when it kind of encourages you to you know to pursue these really high-powered careers that a lot of these careers, especially in the corporate world, are only really possible if some women, which is white middle-class women, you know, make use of the labour of other less

privileged women. So these are women, you know, who might be working, you know, in care, so, you know, nannies, housekeepers, cleaners, that sort of thing. And these are often, you know nannies housekeepers cleaners that sort of thing and these are often you know low paid precarious and often very racialized roles so you know how does you know a cleaner who is on a zero hours contract lean in and advocate for more it's more likely that she'd probably be fired you know than they're supposed to be getting a pay rise so I think you know that is one of the core criticisms of girl boss culture is that it doesn't really factor in the experiences of women of colour. What was your own experience? Because you set out on your own. Yeah, and I set out on my own because I felt really marginalised working advertising as a young black woman.

And, you know, this is why I kind of do have some, I guess, understanding of girl boss culture, because this was kind of 2015, 2016, when I became self employed. And in my early 20s, becoming self employed isn't something that I really saw as a potential career path. And it's not something that I would have entertained. But with the rise of girl boss culture, where there is a real emphasis on self employment, and how you can make it work, that I think did kind of open my eyes to a new possibility and so I'm sort of like keen not to throw the baby out in the bath water I mean it's a bit corny to say be your own boss but I am now my own boss and part of the reason that I felt able to make that leap was observing these examples and observing these stories and these narratives and these practical resources

but you know I obviously still have to deal with, I guess, marginalisation, discrimination, but it doesn't feel as pointed as it did when I was working in advertising. What was that experience like? Terrible. I had to deal with, you know, overt and covert racism. I was patronised. I was sidelined. Ad agencies in general are pretty hierarchical and quite toxic places. I wrote an article for The Guardian a couple of months ago where I kind of did a call out on social media and asked people to share their stories of toxic creative working environments. And I was absolutely inundated. I had hundreds and hundreds of responses, so much so that I had to take the call out down because I just couldn't deal with the volume of it. And pretty much every story that I heard, especially from people who are like me, who are either a person of colour or who are younger or who are female, had had really terrible experiences.

It's really interesting that we're talking about this. Two days after it was announced that Cheryl Cole's doing the podcast, the R&B podcast on BBC Sounds and the backlash that that's had because, once again, not a black woman. Apparently, nobody, maybe no one was asked, maybe no one was available, I wonder. We will always wonder. I mean, that was a really curious choice because she's not an R&B singer. And, you know, in the UK, we have such a wealth of amazing black British R&B singers. You know, you have Jamelia, you have Sade, we have, you know, Beverly Knight.

There are all these incredible women who have a real connection to that music, into that culture, who the BBC could have picked, but they chose Cheryl Cole. So this girl boss phrase then is utterly meaningless if you're a woman of colour, because it's just about white privilege. I don't think it's entirely about white privilege.

I mean, I think this is kind of what I'm saying. I do try and take a quite balanced look at it. And I think the elements of it, which are encouraging, you know, ambition and also encouraging women to think about carving careers outside of the traditional workplace structures, I found that really useful. And I think a lot of women do still find that useful. And I think a lot of, you know, women of colour and black women

that I speak to still find those sorts of examples useful I think where it becomes problematic is the fact that a lot of the examples and the um you know the kind of templates you know offered about how to achieve that are only really applicable to a certain subset of women and then that kind of makes you feel like you're failing if oh my gosh I can't get investment for my business and it's like well as a black woman you know the odds are very much set against you so you there needs to be more of a conversation within that um culture of of you know the challenges for different sorts of women but you know I do think kind of girl boss culture is kind of in that particular iteration kind of reaching its end anyway yeah it's reaching its end. you are not born in this country. You're older, you haven't got the networks of actually having gone through schooling here and college. It's even harder. So for me, this was a thing that I've

worked very hard on. I'm trying to work and trying to support immigrant women who've come in, who've been in this country for a while. But there's a huge disconnect, because they don't have an anchor. So they don't know where to begin. And the thing is, I've always described hospitality, which is my industry, as an all boys club, a Mayfair members only all boys club. You can come in, but you do not belong. And, you know, despite everything that has happened in my life, I am pretty much on the fringe of hospitality. Even after your amazing Netflix documentary, you know, A-listers come and eat in your restaurant. We all love you. We know who you are. Even then you still feel on the fringes. Yes, I do. Because you walk into a room and, you know, you sense that feeling that you stand out.

It's not just the color of my skin. So this is a double whammy, you know. So being female, being older, being Asian in an industry where there are so few of us around. The fact that we are spread so thin makes it very hard for us to actually be visible. You know, you need to be seen. And you know, when I wanted to open a restaurant, you didn't see anyone like me. You know, there was Mother Joffrey, and then after that, there was nobody. You didn't see women on media, on food media. You know, you didn't hear voices. You didn't hear accented voices talking about food. People who are talking about food were mainly white. People, you know, who traveling to India and talking about their stories. They made us look like, you know, you know, exotic, colorful people, you know, all singing, all dancing. This is not what my culture is. And this is not what my food is. And if we're not seen, if you're not seen, and then you do want to get investment for your business, or a new property to set your restaurant up in and nobody believes that it's viable. And this is one of the reasons why I feel victorious now. That, you know, this is the

legacy that I will at least have that, you know, if you are not invited to the table, pull a chair up and sit down. You have a right to be everywhere where you want to be. I feel like you are a girl boss. I never put labels on myself. I never do. I never do. I think I will decide who I want to be at any given time. It's also a huge responsibility, you know, which, you know,

anyone who's been successful, you need to look at your own community, the girls coming after you, you need to clear their pathways for them to encourage so that you don't also occupy all the space. Because there's also this thing of, you know, of ticking the box that, you know, let's get her in and, you know, she qualifies for everything. Let's put her on the panel. I never go on a panel where I'm the only female. Is this conversation now moving on? Have we moved away from the Girlboss movement? Is it time that we start talking about and taking on board other people's experiences of life and their identity, their race, their gender, their sexuality? And is it all happening now because we've lived through the pandemic and we're now, you know, Black Lives Matter happened, Me Too happened, so we're in a completely different world now

and the conversation has moved on? I don't know that I'd say that we're in a completely different world. I think there is still, you know, a huge amount of work to be done. I think the good thing, I guess, about the Black Lives Matter movement and Me Too in recent years, and even, I guess, with the pandemic, even though that's obviously been disastrous, is that it has, I guess, opened a lot of people's eyes to the level of inequality, you know, whether it's racial or gender,

and opened people's eyes to, you know, the experience of being, let's say, a woman or a black person in the workplace. Progress has been made, and I think understanding is higher, but I also think we can't get caught up in that and I also sometimes question the will of certain people to make some changes and I think that is as important as

them having an understanding of the need to make changes. As to successful women of colour who have a platform who are now on Women's Hour, there may be some young women listening who want to go out there and start a career or achieve something who might be feeling a little bit disheartened having heard some of this.

What can you say to them? I think it's just to kind of bear in mind the satisfaction that when you do, you know, kind of have certain wins and certain triumphs, it really does kind of make it all worth it. That's what I found. I think, you know, it was my first couple of years of being self-employed were pretty tough

and I wasn't necessarily sure whether I was going to be able to make a viable career. But just kind of having come out the other side of that and kind of having persevered through those years, you know, I wouldn't go back to what I was doing before and it all definitely feels worth it. So hopefully that can provide a bit of encouragement. And what's it going to take to change the situation so that people feel that they don't have to fight as hard as they do?

I think it's very important that, you know, we build alliances. That, you know, actually it has to be a movement, you know, like, you know, with empathetic men. This is not about us and them, you know. And I'm very uncomfortable always with, you know, white feminists, because I think that they don't get me and they don't get a lot of, you know, especially, you know, being Muslim, that complicates things as well. And I think that, you know, we need to build bridges with people who are, you know, like minded, read our stories, you know, listen to things like this. And we should not see this just as you know, I need to be successful

and see it in very personal terms. I think we need to see it in much bigger terms that actually we're changing a culture, we're shaking the earth gently, and that is what we should be doing. What a great phrase, shaking the earth gently. Well, we did mention the BBC Sounds, Cheryl Cole R&B series there,

and the BBC have given us a statement saying we feature a wide range of voices spanning different genres across our extensive music output many of our shows are fronted by DJs who are experts in their fields others are hosted by people with a passion for their topic Cheryl's You, Me and R&B shares personal stories from her youth soundtracked by her favourite genre if you'd like to comment on anything you're listening to today or in any of our programmes you can text us 84844. Now, on Wednesday this week, we caught up with some of the women walking from Cardiff to the RAF base in Berkshire

to commemorate 40 years since Greenham Commons Women's Peace Camp was set up to protest the sighting of US nuclear missiles on British soil. They actually arrived at the base on this day in 1981 and the women we spoke to on Wednesday should be arriving there today too, hopefully without too many blisters. No doubt there have been signs and banners made for the latest walk, but we thought it would be great to talk about some of those made for that original protest. Charlotte Dew is the author of Women for Peace, Banners from Greenham Common, and she joins me now in the studio, Charlotte.

It's so lovely to have you here. Why did women make these banners? So they made these banners for a wide number of reasons, but principally they wanted to stop initially the sighting of the cruise missiles at Greenham and Molesworth, which were both RAF bases. So that decision was made by the government in 79. And then there was a period of three years before they were actually located there in 82.

They were campaigning because they felt that their children wouldn't have a future if it was a nuclear future. And also, they wanted to be part of the debate on what the government were doing with military spending. So they marched? They marched. And when was that? Did they set out with banners? Were they prepared? When they set out, they just had one banner. It was made from a pink sheet in the garden of one of the people who founded the walk. And as they gathered momentum along the route, they made more banners. One in particular was made by a key man, a banner maker, Talia Campbell. And again, it was from a white sheet,

so very impromptu with felt tip pens and a number of teenage girls and they used garden canes to cold it up, which still had the earth on. So it was very immediate. What did it say? So it showed the route of the march and it said, Women's Action for Disarmament. We actually have a little clip from our Women's Hour archive back in 2000 and it's actually Talia Campbell

who's talking about her memories of making that banner. It was late summer and it was rather lovely weather really hot weather and it was a long way we walked 125 miles in 10 days. We had a gaggle of women with pushchairs and half a dozen men, and because we were holding up the traffic and the police were supervising us, that map out there in the hall with the root and felt-tip pens and on a sheet with beansticks for somebody's garden, a very ad hoc affair. The information at the back made those who were sympathetic to us more patient,

and it possibly also made those who were unsympathetic possibly more hostile towards us. Talia Campbell talking there about why she actually made the banners, and she made several of them, didn't she? But the press became very interested in this march very early on, didn't they? They did, although not necessarily in the way that the women wanted them to. So they were really keen to engage in an intellectual debate around the nuclear future that citing the weapons in this country had. They couldn't do that. The international press would talk to them, but the gutter press were much more interested in taking photos of the girl's skirts as they came across the bridge

in Bristol. They were upskirting them it was a very hot summer wasn't it I said so oh my goodness me. So that was really for Talia I think one of the key motivations for wanting to make banners. Many many women made banners though there would have been thousands of them over the 19 years that the camp, the Peace Camp was at Greenham. But you get a mix of different types of banner makers. So you get the artist banner maker, Tyler is one and Katrina Hauser is another. And then you get women who were not skilled craftspeople but but were motivated to support the cause. And they would make banners too. And there's something quite emotional about the amount of work that's gone into some of these banners. If you Google them like I did last night and have a look at just how intricate the work is.

Did they work on them collectively? So a lot of banners were made collectively, particularly by peace groups. So they would come together. A peace group banner commonly represented the name of the town or city they came from um had visualizations of what was particular about that commonly had the cnd symbol on it um the green and women often added um a cross at the bottom to make it into a women's symbol so it was a cnd symbol with a twist and also Talia taught workshops with groups of women she'd travel around to villages and towns particularly in Wales where she was from

and they'd make collective banners often they were made up of squares each made by a woman and then they came together to form a larger banner. And did they reference banners made by women in the past? They certainly did. They looked to suffrage banners in particular, and you can see that in a number of ways. They looked to the colours of the suffrage movement, so the Women's Social and Political Union, the colours were purple, green and white, So you have dignity, hope and purity.

And you see those colours often incorporated. There's a particular banner called Remembrance is Not Enough, which is about wanting, you know, it's not good enough to have red poppies to remember war. We want to stop war. And there you had poppies of the WSPU colours. You've got another fantastic banner, which is coercion is not government. And that's a quote from Sylvia Pankhurst.

And it ends by saying then or now. So that banner is edged with the colours of the National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies. So they were absolutely inspired by the suffragettes, but also the women's liberation movement that preceded them in the 70s. And all sorts of slogans written on them. One that stood out for me was a huge banner here. It says, Dear Margaret, here's your Christmas check. Don't spend it all on bombs for the children. Love, Mother. Absolutely. So they weren't scared of being amusing as well as being pointed in their comments. And I think that's how you often capture people's

attention. Talia's always said that a banner should have a whisper and a shout so you've got the big message and then you've got smaller messages underneath that. Absolutely fascinating thank you so much for joining me to talk to me about that Charlotte Jew who's the author of Women for Peace Banners from Greenham Common. Lots of you getting in touch with various things we've talked about in the show today helen says i have to say that as a businesswoman with a long hr career find the term girl boss really horrible it feels patronizing as if running your own business being an entrepreneur and working is somehow a surprise there are thousands of us just getting on with it and doing a good job i certainly feel like a person and a woman but not a girl and And James says, I work with people

with acquired brain injuries and complex disabilities. Sex is a basic human need and for many, they need support to understand positioning, experiment with aids and adaptations,

managing equipment, etc. But this is not available. We badly need the services of this lady. Thank you for addressing this. That's it from me. Join us for more Women's Hour, weekend Women's Hour tomorrow.

Have a lovely weekend. 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.