Woman's Hour - US singer/songwriter Beth Nielsen Chapman, Laura Bates, Menstrual leave/abortion reform in Spain, Feminine power & goddesses

Episode Date: May 20, 2022

It’s been ten years since the writer and activist Laura Bates founded the Everyday Sexism project, giving a platform to thousands of women to document their everyday experiences of sexism, harassment and assault. In her new book, ‘Fix the System Not the Women’ she argues we have wasted decades telling women and girls how to fix things, how to fix themselves, how to stay safe, it hasn’t worked because women were never the problem in the first place. She is calling for systematic reform of our key institutions and societal systems that she says are failing to protect women.Spanish women with severe Menstrual symptoms could be entitled to three days of leave a month - extended to five in some circumstances - if a draft bill going through the Spanish parliament is approved. It would make it the first legal entitlement of its kind in Europe. The bill is part of a package of reforms that could also overturn laws passed by the previous government, including 16 and 17 year old girls no longer needing parental consent to have an abortion. Maria Ramirez is a journalist and Deputy Managing Editor from ElDiario an online investigative and political news service based in Madrid.A new exhibition exploring female spiritual beings in world belief and mythological traditions around the globe opens at the British Museum this week. Feminine power: the divine to the demonic is the first exhibition of its kind to bring together ancient sculpture, sacred artifacts and contemporary art from six continents. It will look at how femininity has been perceived across the world, and how feminine power has been used in deities, goddesses, demons, saints and other spiritual beings. Belinda Crerar is Exhibition Curator at the British Museum and Dr Janina Ramirez is a British Art Historian and author of Goddess a book for children written to accompany this exhibition Two-time Grammy nominee Beth Nielsen Chapman has had a career spanning 40 years. Inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2016, Nashville-based Beth, has released more than a dozen albums and written number one hits and songs recorded by the likes of Bonnie Raitt, Willie Nelson, Bette Midler, Elton John and Neil Diamond. Beth joins Krupa to discuss her music and to perform her bluesy new single ‘Hey Girl’ (We Can Deal With It) an anthemic reaction to the ‘Me Too’ movement, a song Beth calls her “celebratory shout out to our sisters making their way in the world.”Presenter: Krupa Padhy Producer: Kirsty StarkeyInterviewed Guest: Laura Bates Interviewed Guest: Maria Ramirez Interviewed Guest: Belinda Crerar Interviewed Guest: Dr Janina Ramirez Interviewed Guest: Beth Nielsen Chapman

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, this is Krupa Bharti and you're listening to the Woman's Hour podcast. Hello, welcome to the programme on a Friday. Earlier this week, we learned that Spain could become the first country in Europe to offer paid leave to women who suffer from severe menstrual symptoms. We're going to hear more about how this might work with a journalist joining us from Madrid. South Korea and Indonesia are among only a handful of countries

around the world that allow paid menstrual leave. Is this something that you'd like to see happen here in the UK? If you found yourself in a situation, unable to work because of painful periods, how have you managed it also it's been a sensational week at the high court with footballers wives rebecca vardy suing colleen rooney for libel for alleging online that she had leaked private stories about her to the sun you may or may not have been following the trial but open any paper or scroll down your

social media feeds and there's a high chance you'll come across someone sharing their two pence worth on what's been coined as wags at war or the wagger for christy case poppy wood from the eye newspaper will join me to reflect on all that drama that's been unfolding in the courtroom and we have the two-time grammy nominee beth chapman with us and giving us a taste of her new single Hey Girl. We can deal with it live in the studio. That to look forward to towards the end of the programme. We are always keen to hear from you on any of the stories that we are discussing here on the programme. And you can do so via text on 84844 or get in touch on social media. The handle there

is at BBC Women's Hour on Twitter and on Instagram. And of course, you can email us via our website. This week has been punctuated by a handful of grim revelations related to women's safety and the government. A BBC investigation found that a MI5 spy used his status to terrorise his partner before moving abroad to continue his intelligence work whilst under investigation. And he cannot be named, this despite evidence

that he is a threat to women after the government took the BBC to court to block publication. We learnt of an unnamed Conservative MP being arrested on suspicion of rape and sexual assault, and he's been released on bail to a date in mid-June pending further inquiries. And Nimco Ali, the government's independent advisor on tackling violence against women and girls, has suggested that her calls for street harassment to be made a crime are being blocked. Writer and activist Laura Bates has a new book out called

Fix the System, Not the Women, in which she argues we have wasted decades telling women and girls how to fix things, how to fix themselves, how to stay safe. But this hasn't worked because women were never the problem in the first place. Ten years since she founded the Everyday Sexism Project, inviting women to document their experiences of harassment, sexism and assault. She is now calling for systematic reform of our key institutions and societal systems that she says are failing to protect women. And happy to say Laura joins me now. Laura, as someone who is committed to this fight in tackling those challenges that women face on a day-to-day level when it comes to sexism and harassment, all of what I introduced there just a moment ago, I imagine none of it has come as a surprise to you.

No, it hasn't. And I mean, the fact that those stories are just from the last few days alone is sort of all the evidence we need of the fact that this is an institutional problem. We are so repeatedly fobbed off. We're told that these are isolated incidents. In fact, as recently as a few weeks ago, the business secretary did the rounds of the media using that term bad apples. But the reality is that 56 of our MPs are under investigation for sexual misconduct, which amounts to almost a tenth of our elected representatives. We've got MPs watching porn in the parliamentary chamber. We've got other MPs joking on Twitter about this rape allegation. You know, this is an issue in the system. It's in the culture. And it's something

that has to be addressed as such. We can't keep fobbing women off by saying these are just a few isolated incidents. And I know you take great issue with that term and you have the statistics to be addressed as such. We can't keep fobbing women off by saying these are just a few isolated incidents. And I know you take great issue with that term and you have the statistics in your book to prove that these really are not isolated incidents. One of those that you mentioned, a woman is murdered by a man in the UK every three days. That is startling. It is. And yet, when it happens, our response is to blame the women. And if that sounds like an exaggeration, consider the response to some of the cases in the last 18 months or so. When Sarah Everard died,

police told women in Clapham not to go out alone at night. A police and crime commissioner said she never should have submitted to the false arrest that was used to imprison her and that women should be more streetwise. When Sabina Nessa was murdered, they handed out attack alarms to women in the local area. They didn't stop local men to talk to them about not assaulting women. When Bobbie Ann McLeod was murdered, the leader of her city council said that women shouldn't be putting themselves in compromising positions. And the response, even from the top level, we've seen politicians talking about women downloading apps to track their journeys. We've seen politicians talking about women downloading apps to track their journeys. We've seen the Met Police telling us that women should laughably think about flagging

down buses and be taking drinks biking kits with them on nights out. So even now, even as women are dying at such a rate, the response always seems to be, what could other women do to work that little bit harder, as if it's our fault as if they were asking for it when the reality is that the problem is a system that is utterly failing us. We did ask for a response from the Met Police to the concerns raised in your book in which they wrote we have been incredibly focused on transforming our culture standards and how we keep women and girls safe however we recognise we have much further still to go. We have already taken a number of significant steps to start real change across the organisation, but we cannot and are not waiting for the findings of ongoing

inquiries to begin rebuilding the public's trust and confidence that police officers will protect and respect them. We expect exemplary standards from our people at all times, whether on or off duty. We will improve our behaviour. We will deal with those who fall below the high standards we expect. Going on to your book, at the very beginning of the book, you offer an open and honest explanation of a list you keep, a list of all the incidences that relate to the concerns

that you talk about in your book. Talk us through that and what it revealed for you. I think as women and girls, almost from birth, we are receiving these messages. Sometimes they're subtle. Sometimes they are so-called minor incidents. And of course, for every woman, that list will look different. For some, it will be mingled with racism, homophobia, ageism, ableism. But I think every one of us has this trailing list of incidents that very often we haven't acknowledged because we have been told from childhood, oh, you're overreacting. That wasn't a big deal. It's just boys being boys. You're imagining it. It was just a compliment. Lighten up. That didn't happen because you were

a woman. Well, what were you wearing? Did you lead him on? Why didn't you do this or that? Why didn't you stand up for yourself? We have been systematically trained to blame ourselves and not to recognise incidents of abuse and inequality. And I think that there is a catharsis and a power in allowing ourselves to acknowledge that these are not isolated incidents and that our lives have been shaped, in fact, by institutional, by systemic inequality. Would you encourage girls, young girls to start keeping lists? I think there's something very personal. And I'm very keen to say that this book is not about telling women and girls what to do and how to fix things. It's about asking for

systemic change to support us in Parliament, in policing, in the criminal justice system. But I certainly hope that girls today recognise and feel that this isn't right. It isn't something that they should be having to go through, and that we are there to stand alongside them and support them when they do experience it. You talk of five key societal systems that need addressing education, policing, criminal justice, politics and the media. Why those areas? Because they all have a knock-on effect on each other. So if you look at policing, if you look at the fact that 2,000 Met police officers have been accused of sexual misconduct in a four-year period to 2020 alone, if you look at the fact that what was missing from that police statement was an

acknowledgement of institutional misogyny, that it isn't being tackled at a system level, you think what do we need to help us tackle this? We need political pressure. So you turn to politics, you think politicians can fix this. And of course, there, you learn that only six of our 23 cabinet ministers are women, only a third of our MPs, that there is this enormous cloud of sexual misconduct hanging over politics. So you think perhaps the media can help us put pressure on politicians to get them to take action. You turn to the media and you realise that only five editors of national newspapers are women compared to 14 men, that only a quarter of front page stories are written by women. And of course, that it's some of the newspapers themselves that are contributing to the problem by accusing women

of crossing and uncrossing their legs to distract our poor defenceless Prime Minister in Parliament. So you look at the education system to see if perhaps we can prevent this from happening in the first place. Perhaps education is the answer. And there you learn that on average, one rape per school day is being reported as happening inside a UK school, that 80% of girls told the recent Ofsted inquiry that sexual assault is normal, common amongst their friendship groups, and that 72% of teachers experience misogyny. And so I think for some people, there is a sense the criminal justice system will be the safety net here. You know, there is justice in our society eventually, surely. And yet you turn to that idea of whether there's justice to tackle these issues. And you realise that just 1.4% of rapes reported in this country result in

a charge or summons for the perpetrator, that it really isn't hysterical to say we live in a country where rape has been decriminalised. And you start to recognise that this system, these interconnected systems at every level are utterly failing women and girls and that requires real reform not a few cctv cameras real reform you talk about the media sue nelson's been in touch to say the unequal treatment and censorship of women on twitter how studies find men talk and interrupt more than women yet our voices are heard less putting women's thoughts first and foremost in any subject that affects only women because it's not just about newspaper coverage. It is also how about women are treated and interact there on social media.

And another one here who says the defence barrister tried to make the fact that my daughter's rapist knew her birthday was in September. Info given to him pre-trial. This was reasonable grounds for him to believe she was consenting unbelievable it is so tragic to hear feedback and comments like that from people who are affected by the issues that you raise but of course lots of people working for these organizations these organizations so often dominated by men would say that they can't relate to what you're saying, that this idea that they are inherently misogynistic, it's not something that they would agree with. I think it's really important to stress that when we talk about institutional misogyny, that doesn't mean

accusing every individual working in an institution of being a misogynist. I know that there are brilliant individuals, there are journalists within the media working so hard to raise these issues, there are individual teachers in the education system fighting to tackle it. This is not about accusing every individual in those systems of being a misogynist. It's about recognising that it goes far beyond a few bad apples or baddens, that it is a cultural problem at the deepest level and that that needs to be addressed. Let's talk about solutions because you say it isn't up to women to find solutions that is a thread that is consistent throughout your book but you say there is a solution in the Istanbul Convention which is a human rights treaty of the Council of Europe against violence against women and domestic violence and it was opened for signatures in 2011. The UK signed in 2012. Why is the Istanbul Convention key in your opinion? Well it is a kind of gold standard

piece of international legislation that really joins the dots between these different sectors and the ways in which they intersect in impacting women and girls. So it looks at criminal justice, it looks at media, it looks at support for frontline women's organisations. What we're seeing at the moment is that government does seem to be making moves towards ratifying the convention, but with reservations around the protections for migrant women. And this is something we see again and again, it seems like we're making progress, but certain sections of women are left behind. And that's just not good enough. It isn't good enough to say that we'll support some women in our society when they experience domestic abuse

but migrant women with no recourse to public funds will be left behind particularly when we know that the abusers of migrant women so often use their immigration status as a tool of the abuse. So we have to put pressure on these systems. It's not just about reform, it's about reform that is meaningful for the most vulnerable. Because if we get a system that works for the most vulnerable in our society, those who are at most risk, it will work for everybody. Just returning to the 10 years of the Everyday Sexism Project, you expected, I think, about 50 responses. You had over 200,000 women. I mean, how did their honesty impact you? But also, how did it impact them? I've been utterly, utterly blown away by the courage and the strength and the humour of the

women and girls who have shared their stories with us so bravely. And I think what we've seen is that there is an incredible sense of relief in having your story heard and believed when you have so often been dismissed and disbelieved. We have heard from so many people who have said, this has changed my life because for the first time ever, I don't feel alone. A woman in her 80s wrote to me and said, I've carried the burden of sexual violence my whole life. I was raped when I was a young woman and I was made to feel it was my own fault. And reading the stories of these

other women has for the first time ever given me the lightness and the relief of knowing that it wasn't my fault. It was never my fault. And that's incredibly powerful. But what I'm really proud of is that we've also seen the stories offline create real change. We've seen the stories from women who are brave enough to talk about what happened to them on buses and trains, used to directly retrain thousands of British Transport Police officers and raising the reporting by around a third. We've seen the stories from girls who are being harassed and assaulted at school in Parliament used to convince MPs and ministers alongside other women's organisations to put consent on the curriculum. So real change has come from those stories and I just hope that those women and girls who've

spoken out feel proud of that. Laura Bates, thank you for joining us. And Laura's new book, Fix the System, Not the Women, is out now. Thank you for your time here on Women's Hour. Right, you probably need to have been living under a rock or to have not noticed the high court drama of the last week. Perhaps you've purposely been avoiding it. It concerns two women who are both married to footballers, Rebecca Vardy and Colleen Rooney. And it all began in October 2019 when Colleen Rooney, wife of the former England striker Wayne Rooney, accused Rebecca Vardy, the wife of fellow England player Jamie Vardy, of leaking her personal information to British tabloids. Years later, and it's turned into a libel court case with Rebecca Vardy suing Colleen Rooney, reportedly costing each side over a million pounds.

Well, the case finished in the High Court yesterday and we await the judge's verdict. Someone who's been following this every step of the way is Poppy Woods, senior reporter at the Eye newspaper. Thank you for joining us here on Woman's Hour. First of all, for those not following all the ins and outs of what has happened, bring us up to speed. How did we get to this point? So, as you mentioned, Rebecca Vardy is suing Colleen Rooney for libel over a viral social media post from October 2019 in which Colleen Rooney claimed to have unearthed the source

of several leaked stories about her in the Sun newspaper as coming from Rebecca Vardy's account and I think the public were really surprised by the sort of internet sleuthing that had clearly gone on behind the scenes and it ignited this social media phenomenon which became known as the Wagatha Christie trial. Rebecca Vardy has now taken that to the court because she claims that this is libelous and it's caused her a huge amount of harm to her reputation but also she's become the subject of an enormous amount of online trolling so she's looking to clear her name. And the trial it took place this week it was animated we had tears we had fashion statements talk us through those key moments. Yeah so it really was a week of high drama at the High Court. We obviously saw, as you said,

a lot of sobs, a lot of sighing and a lot of sass as well. I think a lot of that derived from the theatrics of the lawyers. They really lent into the fact that this was a trial about social media, very much playing out on social media and so offered a lot of quips that were there for the public to sort of gobble up. We saw lots of funny instances of you know Rebecca Vardy starting sentences by saying to be honest and the lawyer replying saying well I hope you're being honest in the witness box in the high court and other instances where you know the lawyer told the people in the courtroom to look away if they were scared of snakes as he presented a picture of Rebecca Vardy wrapped in a boa constrictor.

It was very much an acknowledgement that this was going to be a very public affair, and that led to a lot of drama trickling out of the courtroom. And the Harspens, they too had a role to play, didn't they? They did. I mean, Wayne Rooney was something of a silent phenomenon for much of the week, sort of staring off into space. But when he took to the witness stand, he had a character of his own. He said that he was unaware of the Wagatha Christie case, and this was all news to him. We also saw a slightly dramatic turn of events when Jamie Vardy accompanied his wife to the courtroom on one day and accused Wayne Rooney of talking nonsense

on the stand and offered his own side of events on the High Court steps. So, you know, what we saw at the beginning of the week was very much a spat between wives. By the end of the week had become a family feud involving husbands as well. I mentioned, Poppy, in my introduction that this could cost each side up to a million pounds julia's been in touch to say in my opinion the libel trial demonstrates what happens to people who have too much money for their own good in the case of the footballers wives they seem extremely jealous of the publicity showered on their husbands any publicity is considered desirable even making a fool of yourself will get you on the front pages, which is all that

matters. I mean, let's break some of what Julia says down there. First of all, the money, it is costing so much money. Is there a sense that this shouldn't have gotten so out of hand? Yeah, I think there is definitely that sense. I mean, as you mentioned, the legal fees for each side will cost upwards of £1 million and potential payout will be far lower than that. It could even be a sort of payout in name only and damages worth as little as £1. So there's no doubting that the legal fees will dwarf those. But, you know, Rebecca Vardy is claiming that she took this to the High Court because if this is, if Colleen Rooney has got this wrong, then it's a huge amount of people that have been privy to false information.

And that's why she's doing it. She wants to clear her name. Colleen Rooney is saying she's felt betrayed by somebody that she let into her private circle. So it is about reputational harm rather than financial harm. But there is also this overwhelming sense of disbelief that this has ended up in the high courts and I think that's where the public has derived a lot of its entertainment from this court case is kind of a being gobsmacked that lawyers and curly wigs and an oak paneled room are talking about these amounts of programs and using words you know babe and omg and FFS yes but poppy you say it's entertainment for people, it's become quite an obsession.

It has become an obsession. And, you know, as I said, I think the public feels justified in finding entertainment in this because the stakes are so low. It's hard to ignore the equivalent court case going on across the pond between Johnny Depp and Amber Heard, in which the stakes are much higher talking about abuse allegations. And I think the British public consciously or subconsciously are aware that this is a spat about social media. I think also it's offering light relief and, you know, hard times. We've had something of a gossip drought for two years during the pandemic, and now we find ourselves in the cost of living crisis, and there's a war in Europe. And I think the public are aware that this is, you know, a bit of fun that is trickling out of the courtroom crisis and there's a war in Europe. And I think the public are aware that this is, you know,

a bit of fun that is trickling out of the courtroom and it's lawyers themselves, you know, playing up to that. And that's where the justification comes in. You mentioned the Johnny Depp and Amber Heard case over in the United States, which is also one at the moment. And given that case is being televised, it's being clipped and talked about just about everywhere. I mean, how has this case been different? Because in the UK, we don't have

cameras in the courtroom. Exactly. I think it's a really good point. I think both cases are kind of an indication that we are heading more towards trial by social media as things are allowed to play out in real time. They will be analysed in real time. In the UK, of course, as you mentioned, it's not being televised. So there is a huge reliance on journalists to filter through what's being said, and for the public to then consume that. And the quickest way to do so is social media. And that's why it's ignited so much. On the other hand, in the US with the Johnny Depp and Amber Heard case, it is being televised. And as I was speaking to a legal representative earlier this week, he was being televised. And I was speaking to a legal

representative earlier this week who was saying, you know, she was all for opening the courts and allowing transparency and having people, you know, access everything by it being televised. But then there's a dark side of that when you see people basically clipping allegations of sexual abuse, domestic abuse into something that can go viral and also can be manipulated and distorted a little bit. So it's a slightly concerning future that we're heading towards in terms of public courts. Poppy, we've had this message from a listener who writes, footballers' wives are spitting their dummies out in public. What a total waste of court time and any media coverage just encourages their puerile behaviours.

Journalists, as a journalist covering this story, what's it been like? As I said, I think there has been a sense of disbelief that this has ended up in the high courts. But then on the other hand, there is a huge amount of interest in WAGs or Wives and Girlfriends of Footballers, as Colleen Rooney kept correcting the lawyer that was cross-examining her when he used the term WAGs. I think there's so much attention on footballers, male footballers, and the WAGs are sort of inserted into the back ends of newspapers every four years when there's a massive football tournament and they are you know not giving so much of a voice but if we're allowing the public to sort of peer behind the veil into the lives of footballers why are the wives not allowed to have that airtime as well you know they're just as much as part of that sort of architecture of fame surrounding footballers uh that we should

be privy to that too poppy wood from the eye newspaper thank you for your time. Your work, of course, is far from over. We await a verdict from that trial. Spanish women with severe menstrual symptoms could be entitled to three days of leave a month, extended to five in some circumstances, if a draft bill going through the Spanish Parliament is approved. It would make it the first legal entitlement of its kind in Europe. The bill is part of a package of reforms that could also overturn laws passed by the previous government that would include 16 and 17 year old girls no longer needing parental consent to have an abortion. Here to talk through these developments is Maria Ramirez, a journalist and deputy managing editor from El Diario, an online investigative

and political news service based in Madrid. Welcome to BBC Women's Hour. Good to have you on, Maria. Thank you for having me. So happy to be here. Well, let's talk through the fine details of what is being proposed here. If this becomes law, help us understand what will women with severe period pains and menstrual symptoms, what would they be entitled to? And then how would this work practically in terms of payment? Yeah, obviously, it's still a draft going through a process. So the details could change. But for what we know now, any woman could take a medical leave for a few hours or for a few days. If she has strong menstrual pains,

you still need to go to a GP to have a medical diagnosis every month, even if it's a recurring issue. This could be done maybe on telephone or even afterwards if you don't manage to get an appointment, but you would still need to have the medical papers. It's not enough just saying that you are in pain. And then, at least for the draft now, there is no minimum or maximum time that you can be doing this.

And, of course, the state would pay 100% for this leave. So not the company, but the actual state would pay. The actual state. But Maria, just hearing what you said there, that you would have to go every month to your GP to get a piece of paper either before or after you have had a period just to say, I was in extreme pain, I am in extreme pain. I mean,

it sounds great on paper what Spain is proposing here, but it also sounds like there's a long way to go for this to work practically for a woman and to be fair. Yeah, actually, it's not going to be if this is a proof automatic at all. And actually, now you can also take a leave if you have a really painful menstrual period, if you have a very painful period, as with any medical condition. So this is in a way, a way to standardize these technical consequences as the 100% pay and also a symbolic weight to this but in terms of what would change actually for a woman uh it's true that you would still have to do this paperwork so it's something also in a way to say that well it's not just for any painful period but it's really when you have a very particular strong condition yeah sue a listener

has been in touch to say so glad to hear that period leave is being talked about now as well as menopausal leave i am a menopausal mom of a 20 year old daughter and we both struggle occasionally with our bodies hurt more than me with monthly pain and symptoms whilst working hard at uni and working part-time it's much harder for young women and girls who must find it so uncomfortable to tell male colleagues why they are struggling in pain or need extra toilet breaks. But that also ties in to what Spain is looking at as well because I mean it's already far too common to hear men say things like is it is it that time of the month? I mean wouldn't your employer and colleagues know then when a woman is menstruating? And it may not be information that a woman would want exposed.

And also, might this add to the language around and the attitude around menstruating becoming worse? Has that been tackled at all at government level or discussed? Yeah, that's definitely part of the debate. There's one part that actually discussed? Yeah, that's definitely part of the debate. There's one part that actually says, well, it's good to talk about these issues. And so women could also talk about this in the office as it's a normal thing to do. And now they may be not even daring to just explain that they have this pain, right? But there is also the concern that this could be, in a way, discriminatory against women. And if it's a recurring issue, also there is definitely a privacy thing

about having this very sensitive information, as every health information is. So there is even a debate among the unions. They are not really sure. Some of them, they are supporting the government, some not, because there is this debate. So there is both sides of the coin, in a way. It's good to have maybe this debate in the open, but in some companies that may create a problem

or even some uncomfortable situation for some women. So there's definitely both sides. Yes, that's become very clear from our conversation. And this draft bill, Maria, it also overturned some of the legislation on abortion, which was introduced by the previous government back in 2015. What are those changes being proposed on matters of abortion? Yes, our reform of 2015 law that we have already in place. So that one of the main changes is that now girls who are 16 would not need the approval of their parents or legal tutors if they want to have an abortion, because that was the case before the law in 2015,

but that changed, so now the minimum age is 18, so that would change back to 16. And also there is like also minor changes, like now if you want to have an abortion you have to wait three days the reflection period that's this call and it's these three days you are given information on what would happen if you decide to go ahead with their pregnancies or information on adoption or other options and that would go to reflection leave that's quite the term, isn't it? Look, we know that we've seen abortion laws liberalised in Spain

in recent years, but it still does have a conservative population in part. How have people reacted? What's been the opposition to this? Actually, not much opposition because actually public opinion has changed a lot in the last years. Even part of the voters of the Conservative Party support abortion now, the right to abortion now. And so actually it's his leader, the leader of the Conservative Party, is not very clear if he's going to vote against or in favour of this law. He's saying things like, well, we should talk about other issues. This is an

instruction by the government because there are more pressing issues. But he's not saying clearly that he's going to vote against it because he knows that even in hisate is not a clear-cut issue. There's going to be a protest at the end of June in Spain against it that is organised by several Christian, Catholic groups, and we'll see how many people they manage to move. But from the political part, still we are not getting much opposition to this, even on the right. Very good to get your insights and expertise there. Maria Ramirez,

a journalist based in Madrid, thank you for your time and thank you to all of you who have been in touch to share your experience on this matter. Anushka says I have severe endometriosis. 20 years ago I worked for the Fabian Society. They let me take as much time off as I needed. No years ago, I worked for the Fabian Society. They let me take as much time

off as I needed. No questions asked, no medical notes needed. Normally, I had to have 10 days off a month. And another text here who writes, having severe pain every month from period cramps is hard to deal with the pain and carry on on a daily basis or a full-time job. So thanks to painkillers, I can just about manage my work. In the past, I took time off sick as the pain was excruciating. So being given paid time off is a welcomed idea. But as, of course, we have learnt from Maria, it's also very complex.

Lots of fine details need to be ironed out. If you want to get in touch on this story or on any of the stories that we have been discussing on the programme, please do. We are at BBC Women's Hour over on Twitter and Instagram. And of course, you can text us as so many of you have so far. It's 84844. Let's move on to something quite different.

Well, yesterday saw a new exhibition open exploring female spiritual beings in religious and mythological traditions around the globe at the British Museum. It's called Feminine Power, the Divine to the Demonic and it's the first exhibition of its kind to bring together ancient sculptures, sacred artifacts and contemporary art from six continents and it will look at how femininity has been perceived across the world and how feminine power has been used in deities, goddesses, demons, saints and other spiritual beings. Happy to say that Belinda Crera is exhibition curator at the British Museum and Dr Janina Ramirez is a British art historian and author of Goddess, a book for children written to accompany this exhibition. Dr Ramirez, let me start with you. I mean, you wrote a book called Goddess, but what did you mean or what do you mean

when you say goddess? Well, it's the first thing that came to me with this project was, of course, the title to accompany the exhibition, Feminine Power. And I think we all have an idea of what the word goddess means. It tends to get used nowadays, I suppose, to compliment a woman, to suggest that she's beautiful, strong. I start the book saying, oh, Beyonce is such a goddess. That's how we sort of throw it around. And I think if we think about goddesses of the past, from a Western perspective, we might think of a nude Venus, maybe one of the Greek or Roman goddesses. But that is so far from the truth. And what I realized immediately when I started to branch out, because it was very much for both the exhibition and the book, the intent was global, that we wanted to reach out across the world.

And my goodness, it became such a revelation researching this, because not only did I feel like I was traveling the world in my mind, I wrote it in lockdown. A lot of it was done in hotel rooms where I couldn't leave and I was just traveling around in my mind. But by looking through the lens of a single goddess, it tells you about religion, spiritual belief, but it also tells you about a country's history, its relationship with its landscape, its understanding of morality, and it becomes a lens through which to see so much more. And so the title evolved into spirits, saints and other female individuals who've influenced belief, because that word goddess doesn't even transplant across other parts of the world. Absolutely. You know, when I was a kid, my mother had two goddesses in our Hindu shrine at home. And one was Lakshmi with her very pink pout, sat on a lotus flower, looking very gentle.

And then the other was a goddess called Durgama, who sits on a tiger, looking really stern and holding multiple weapons in her multiple arms. And I had really mixed feelings. And I was almost scared when I looked at her image. So when we talk about femininity in the West, it almost seems to align with gentleness or kindness or even just being passive. But these goddesses and deities, they are often very fierce, aren't they?

You could not be more right. And actually, it was learning about some of the Hindu deities, they are often very fierce, aren't they? You could not be more right. And actually, it was learning about some of the Hindu deities and the contrasts that exist was an absolute revelation. I mean, Kali, if I had to pick one, is my absolute favourite. And it's exactly as you described. It's so interesting to hear you say that you found her scary at times, because she is scary. Let's be honest, she has this necklace of skulls, a skirt made out of arms as you say weapons and she's about and the tongue out and this is a fact I learned when I was researching the tongue of Kali is the tongue from the Rolling Stones uh imagery they borrowed it from the tongue

of Kali how interesting but there's that rage that passion you know her relationship with with her male counterpart she would be the stomping on his chest, that pure unrestrained violence of Kali can seem really unsettling. But it makes complete sense within the concept of Shakti, the relationship between, you know, active and passive roles. And in context, she's not scary. She is time. She is the destroyer of things and the creator of things. And so the complexity of each of these goddesses individually is one thing. But when you put them together, like the exhibition does and like the book does, what it becomes is a real insight into

what it is to be alive, to be human. It's not even for me about male or female or gender difference. We are complex individuals and the goddesses of the past were too. And they represent that. Belinda, let me bring you in here because this is not just about goddesses. You also look at other figures like the Virgin Mary and Eve, for example. Yes, that's right. So we called the title of the exhibition Feminine Power, The Divine Demonic, to introduce that spectrum because, as Janina said,

not all spiritual traditions conceive of spiritual power in divine terms and the way that femininity is represented in spiritual thought goes much beyond that so we have these figures that have this human element to them like you said like the Virgin Mary like Eve like Lilith which I think says something very profound about how women themselves have been viewed in spiritual traditions. And one of the most interesting parts for me, I found working on the exhibition was actually the narrative we have around the Virgin Mary, which, you know, speaks to my upbringing, I was raised C of E, Mary didn't feature very prominently in my early religious education. And so researching this project and

learning about all the ways that Mary has been approached in different traditions around the world, Abrahamic traditions in Christianity and in Islam, but actually beyond that as well. She's a figure who really transcends spiritual boundaries. And she has sort of acquired all of these powers, you know, her apparitions, that she's the one who actually appears in front of you in times of need and so I think what we see here by looking at these figures and including them in this discussion is that you don't have to be divine to be powerful Mary is categorically not divine but she is such an important spiritual force around the world today. And the word today is really what I want to

focus on because looking back and analysing them is all well and good but what can we learn and what can we apply from what we understand about them in a modern context for the modern woman? Well that's the that's the big question really that's the question that we're really trying to ask in this exhibition what does this mean today what can it mean today for individuals and so as part of that we've been working with five commentators that we've invited to come to the British Museum and explore these objects and ideas with us. And they have shared their own personal responses to the theme.

So as you move through the different sections of the exhibition, you can hear the thoughts of these commentators. So you can hear what Bonnie Greer thinks about this. You can hear what Mary Beard thinks about it. Elizabeth Day, Rabia Sadiq and Deborah Francis-White, they've shared their personal views. And you may agree with them, you may not agree with them, because a lot of this, we are talking about belief and perception. And a lot of that is so personal. So we're really asking visitors to reflect on that themselves.

And then at the end, we have an interactive space where you can share your thoughts and leave them in the gallery as part of this conversation. It sounds fascinating and also very striking as well. And let me turn back to you, Yenina, because your book is also very striking. It's beautifully illustrated. And interestingly, I mean, it appeals to me as an adult, but also the target age group is 9 to 12, I was reading,

which is quite interesting because these are often complex and, like I said earlier, sometimes scary characters. I mean, how do you make children comfortable with viewing and learning about these? That's what, I mean, it is the most beautiful book and Sarah Walsh's illustrations are just breathtaking and and I mean yes 9 to 99 I think the readership for this because this is the first time with both the exhibition and with my book that some of these got these individuals have been written about at all

and had their stories taken from oral traditions from different backgrounds it has been an incredibly complex experience to research and put these things together. Because, you know, this is people's beliefs. I had to show the utmost respect. I am not entitled to take these people's stories and make them my own. I am purely curating and bringing to other people's attention, so they can find out more about them themselves. And so sensitivity was huge in writing this book. And research was huge. I read so many original texts that go back 1000s of years. So but for me, the whole idea here is that children can read this. But I think people say children can't take these complex themes. Of course they can. Children are curious. And if you give them the information, they they will be able

to understand it and comprehend it. I've written this book and I've also written another book that's coming out in July called Feminar. And they're both taking this sort of multiple, this idea of human beings, as Belinda said, we're complex and we have personal beliefs, personal ways of getting across what matters to us. But we can find collective themes, collective approaches, things that we can celebrate together. And I think with both of us, with the exhibition and with the books, we've tried to tread that careful line. We don't want to be the authority figures telling you what you should think

when you see these images or when you research these goddesses. But we want to sort of open up the discussion, really. I think you certainly are doing that. And exploring what femininity means today in this exhibition. It also means looking at masculinity and gender fluidity and you know growing up again I was accustomed to seeing this composite male female figure again in the home shrine and it was Shiva with his consort Parvati and I never questioned it and that's what's interesting. I questioned it as an adult but as a child I never questioned why this half man, half woman deity was in our shrine at home.

This really does raise questions about how we identify when it comes to gender, doesn't it? Yeah, absolutely and as part of the discussion in the exhibition we're looking at how femininity and ideas of feminine power in belief intersect with ideas of masculinity. And you're absolutely right. In the Hindu tradition, you have that intrinsic unity, which is expressed through these figures like Shiva and poverty. In the exhibition, we have a similar figure to the one you're describing, which is Lakshmi and Vishnu conjoined into a single being. And this is expressing the idea that you must have feminine and masculine power in combination for creation, destruction, the cosmos to exist, which is quite intrinsic to Hindu cosmology.

And in other places, we're looking at how a singular being may be seen as interchangeably male and female as they choose or genderless. So we're looking at some Bodhisattvas from Buddhist tradition who are enlightened beings who have transcended all limitations and binaries. And one which features quite prominently in the final section of the exhibition is the perceiver of sounds who, as well as this sort of genderlessness, is depicted as male in Tibetan art and as female in Chinese and Korean and Japanese art.

So these ideas about gender fluidity, gender identity, have a very long history in spiritual thought going back hundreds, even thousands of years. I could speak to you both for much longer than I have but thank you Dr Janina Ramirez and Belinda Crear thank you for coming on and if you'd like to see that exhibition it is on at the moment at the British Museum until the 25th of September thank you both for coming in. Thank you so much. Two-time Grammy nominee Beth Nielsen Chapman has had a career spanning 40 years. Inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2016, Nashville-based Beth has released more than a dozen albums and written number one hits and songs recorded by the likes of Willie Nelson, Elton John and Neil Diamond.

And she has a new single, Hey Girl Out, and a forthcoming album. And she joins me now in the studio. Great to have you here. So great to be here. Before we talk about your wonderful musical journey, you are in the UK gearing up for your UK tour. And you have this new single out called Hey Girl. Tell me what it's about. It's kind of a celebration of the strength of women, especially when they support each other. And so much of what you're talking about, it's all that. It's a goddess and a woman. Yeah, yeah. You know, it's about this thing. To put it in a nutshell, it's kind of like what Ginger Rogers said, where she was asked what it was like to dance with Fred Astaire. And she said, it's wonderful to dance with Fred Astaire.

I just do everything Fred does only backwards and in high heels. There you have it. It kind of sums that up. Another song that I really loved writing is called Put a Woman in Charge. And it's not just about that. But there's a lot of fun on this album. I ended up working with Ray Kennedy, who's a legendary producer in Nashville, and we had such a blast. We just kind of hit the ground running and we recorded like six days and recorded the whole record and then the next week the pandemic hit. So it's fascinating how many of the songs

would sound like post-pandemic songs. And how do they sound post-pandemic? Because I often write ahead of my life. I have done it several times and this was a definite, another one of those. I wrote a whole album about going through breast cancer and the last day of mixing it and turning it in, I found out I had breast cancer. So that's happened to me. I don't, I don't know why, but I just, I just try

not to look too close when I'm writing a new song, if it's sad or something, I'm like, oh dear, I wonder what's going to happen. But that comes through, that depth certainly comes through in your, in your music. But let's talk about your musical journey because you were born in Texas. Then you moved to Germany for a while. You got hold of a guitar. Yeah. What inspires you to start songwriting for such an early age? Well, I was 11 when the first guitar was made accessible to me.

My dad was in the Air Force. We moved around a lot. And the last thing that we did in the school year when I was 12 and when we were living in Germany was we went to see Dachau. And I was completely blown by that. It was just like my mind was blown. And I remember I started watching the news. I put away my dolls. And then my dad's orders came and we moved to – and this was 1969.

I was looking at the news and going, wow, there's this thing called the Civil Rights Movement. That looks bad. And then there's the Vietnam War. That's not good. And I was suddenly not a child anymore. And then we moved to Montgomery, Alabama in 1969. So that was a bit of a culture shock. So that guitar was my life raft. And it's been that way my whole life. I've written songs through all the stuff. You've held it close. And yeah, it's been a lifesaver.

And then you later moved to Nashville, which is one of the most musical cities in the United States. Yeah. It's hot beats on country music. I mean, how did that spark your creativity further? Well, it's amazing because now, I mean, Nashville's like every music. Absolutely. Country, of course, is the core original. It's the vortex of songwriting.

It's where the song is king. You can have a pretty face and dance good and make good records, but you've got to have a song in Nashville. Otherwise, it's like... I like that. So it's a beautiful community there, lots of support. And I love teaching up-and-coming songwriters. And people say, what do I do when I move to Nashville?

I say, you'd be nice to the person on your left and the person on your right because they're going to be like record executives in a couple of years yeah there's so many people coming there and they and they you know in waves they kind of rise through the ranks and it's a great town I love living there I want to talk about your many hits but specifically those lyrics because when I hear your lyrics I get goosebumps not only do you have a wonderful voice, but the writing. There's one song, Sand and Water, which has given solace to so many people who are grieving. And I know that you wrote it in memory of your late husband

who passed away in 1994. Help us understand what comes first, the lyrics or the melody? For me, if I'm left to my own devices and I'm writing by myself or wherever I can, I usually have a melody or some kind of a feeling for a melody. And then I do this weird thing and I record it because I don't know what I'm, I don't know what's going to come out of my mouth. And sometimes it's a line and it ends up becoming part of the song.

And sometimes it's just gibberish. But the gibberish is like part of the process for me. So I'm like... Which I'm sure sounds just as beautiful. It is actually very lovely because I'm usually very, you know, like in an altered state. And then what's fascinating to me

is that the vowels of the gibberish line will 99% of the time line up with the final line that I might write a month later or two months later. So when somebody says, what comes first? I say, well, the melody comes first and then the vowels and then the consonants and then the idea. Because I'll look at that and I'll go, sounds like I said sand and water. That's cool. And I'll make a song about that. So I follow this sort of blind faith that the song is trying to be written through me.

And I really believe that songs come of their time. And that song came and it was released just in the wake of Diana's death and Mother Teresa died and Versace died and all these things. And the world was just talking about it. And that song just happened to be there at that time. A lot of it to me is really magical. talking about. And that song just happened to be there at that time. You know, it was, you know, a lot of it to me is really magical. And I just kind of am along for the ride. I try to let go of having to know what I'm doing. That's what I teach, how to be comfortable not knowing what you're doing. And that takes a lot of courage. Well, it takes courage or chutzpah, one or the other. I haven't decided which one it is, but it takes sort of a leap of faith.

Yeah, yeah. Crazy Town, it is your 15th album and you were inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame back in 2016. What did that mean to you? That was the ultimate. I mean, I couldn't imagine anything more meaningful to me as an award. And there's a beautiful bronze hand with a quill that sits in my studio. And I really use it a lot because if anybody gives me a hard time about the lyric we're working on, I just hand it to them and I say, talk to the hand. I'm so proud of that. And it's my peers.

It's my songwriting family, really, that votes you in. And that meant so much to me. I'm actually surprised because I keep thinking they're going to find out, wait, we didn't put so-and-so in there first before you. So yeah, it's an amazing honor, incredible honor. You know, we could talk about favorite songs of yours, but what is your favorite song that you either enjoyed singing for yourself or writing for others? Oh, man, that is a tough question. It changes. And often it's the one I'm working on now. There's a kind of love affair I have with whatever I'm working on at the moment. One of the songs on the new record is one of my favorites that I've ever written. It's called With Time. And it's a ballad I wrote with Annie Roboff. She and I wrote a bunch of songs like This Kiss and Happy Girl.

We've written a bunch of hits together. And this song took seven years to finish from start to finish. So it's one of those songs, just the title, With Time, I was waiting for these two syllables for like five years. I had the rest of the song. I was like, there's two syllables. And one day I was just eating my cornflakes and I went, wait, it's just with time. Why did that take so long? You know, we can't, we can't make these things happen before their time. Absolutely. Well, look, thank you so much and all the best

with your new album. It's been an absolute pleasure having you on. Thanks for having me. And I love this whole conversation. It's been fantastic. Thanks for listening. There's plenty more from Woman's Hour over at BBC Sounds. Hi there. I'm just popping up to let you know about another Radio 4 podcast that you may be interested in. Especially if, like me, your social media feeds are constantly bombarding you with adverts that are hyping up the latest wonder products,

promising you the world. You know the ones. Personalised vitamin plans to make you healthier. A pair of sustainable jeans to make you greener. NFTs to earn you millions. I am on a mission to find out the facts behind the fads. I'm Greg Foot and my BBC Radio 4 podcast Sliced Bread is back to ask if another batch of these wonder products really are the best things since sliced bread.

If you'd like to know about manuka honey or mosquito repellent or mindfulness apps, or if you've got something you'd like me to investigate for you, just go search for sliced bread on BBC Sounds. I'm Sarah Treleaven, and for over a year, I've been working on one of the most complex stories I've ever covered. There was somebody out there who's faking pregnancies. I started, like, warning everybody. Every doula that I know.

It was 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.