Woman's Hour - Weekend Woman's Hour: Women and confidence in the police; Syria; the future of the handbag

Episode Date: March 20, 2021

Susannah Fish, former Chief Constable of Nottinghamshire Police and Olivia Pinkney Chief Constable for Hampshire talk about how confident women can be in reporting crime to the police. We hear from Conroy Harris, CEO of A Band of Brothers, David Challen, domestic violence campaigner and Mike Berry, Consultant Clinical Forensic Psychologist on why men attack women and what can be done to stop it.Why is inclusion in beauty important? Make-up artist and model Sasha Pallari and founder of MDMflow, Florence Adepoju tell us how beauty brands can be more diverse and the damage face-filters can have on mental health.This month marks the 10th anniversary of conflict in Syria. Dr. Rola Hallam, CEO and Founder of CanDo explains why women and children have been disproportionately affected.How has lockdown changed what we want from our handbags? Lucia Savi curator of the V&A's Bags: Inside Out exhibition tells us about the history of handbags and how they will be used after lockdown.Singer-songwriter and cellist Ayanna Witter-Johnson tells us about her career and sound which she describes as an eclectic, soulful sound with roots in soul, classical, with reggae and jazz influences. Presenter: Anita Rani Producer: Paula McFarlane Editor: Louise Corley

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.

Hello and welcome to the weekend edition of Woman's Hour. We've had a packed week on the show and today you get a chance to hear some of the key moments. Later we hear from Florence Adepojo, the founder of a diverse beauty range, and Sasha Polari, a makeup artist and model, about why inclusion and beauty is so important. And Dr. Rola Hallam explains why women and children have been disproportionately affected by the conflict in Syria. And we have a fascinating discussion by a group of men talking about why it is they think men attack women. It's very much environment. We teach kids from a very early age to behave in certain ways. Boys don't cry, man up, all these expressions that we're using. So we're not allowing boys to express emotions, to express weaknesses.

And how has lockdown changed what we want from our handbags? We discuss the history of handbags and how they'll be used, if at all, after lockdown. And you can catch up with any of the week's programmes on our podcast on BBC Sounds. But first, the death of Sarah Everard has led to concerns for women's safety in public. Women have been encouraged to put their trust in the police if they're facing harassment or any kind of jeopardy. But following last Saturday's vigil on Clapham Common, the Met Police were criticised for their response. The Met Police has referred itself seven times to the police watchdog over incidents relating to the Sarah Everard case alone. Emma Barnett spoke to Olivia Pinkney,

Chief Constable for Hampshire representing the National Police Chiefs Council, and Susanna Fish, a former Chief Constable of the Nottinghamshire Police Force. After Saturday's vigil, Susanna Fish has said there was institutional misogyny in the way the police handled the event. She explained what she meant by that. Well, what I mean is that I think there is a mindset in policing and no doubt, you know, there are so many good people in policing. It doesn't mean to say that they're bad. It's just about where their mindset is, where the culture, where the structures, where the processes, how decisions are made and how they think.

And it's unwitting in that sense, because no one wants to be, well, very few people want to be like that. And no doubt current police officers and senior police officers will point to data and all sorts of things that says that's not the case. Well, actually, this is the lived experience of women every day. It has been for years. So whether it's looking at how the police continually treat rape victims, how the criminal justice overall treats rape victims, how they treat domestic violence victims, those subject of harassment, you know, historic matters about undercover officers, having male officers seeing having sex on duty with women they've met through the course of their work as a perk of the job. And indeed, my own personal response when I brought in misogyny as a hate crime in Nottinghamshire as the first force in the country to do so and the closing of ranks by some of my very senior

colleagues much more so than junior colleagues across the country to say no we don't need this you know you're only doing this because you're a woman you're only doing this and you're campaigning or you're changing legislation. That's not the role of police officers. The role of police officers is to implement the law. I agree with the latter. I think there is still significant parts of policing where there is a very toxic culture of sexism, of misogyny that objectifies women. I'd like to say that policing has moved on and it has moved on compared to when I joined the police service back in the 80s. However, it hasn't moved as far and as fast as society,

I think, requires it to. And quite possibly, it also reflects some of those societal changes, for example, the availability of pornography, the issue of online violence, threats of violence, intimidation, and how that then plays out in public. So, you know, society has changed for the better in terms of its approaches to women. But there are also some other dynamics, particularly the online arena and pornography. I think that whilst not new, but much more widely available and accessible. And that sort of like seems to have failed to have matured and moved on into something that actually is much more respectful in policing. What would you do if a male police officer working alongside you made a comment like that? One of the bits about my sort of latter part of my service as a senior officer you are quite insulated as a senior female officer so it was much more subtle I would say which is which then if you do challenge it's oh

you're really sensitive but certainly earlier in my service yes and you've got a couple of options really either you put up with it and hope it goes away and keep your head down or you challenge it and that's exhausting and then you get marginalized and isolated and that's really tough too and I've taken both those courses of action. I mean you've been called all sorts haven't you for trying to do some of the things that you did for whether it's as you say making misogyny a crime a hate crime, or trying to actually deal with coppers who were not behaving how they should have done? In my old force, we started to address officers who thought that having sex on duty was a perk of the job

before it was deemed corruption nationally. What do you mean by that? Sorry, working with people when they were undercover or generally? No, generally. Generally uniform officers, often response officers, who would attend emergency calls, perhaps about domestic violence, but where women, they might have been seen as sexually attractive, but they were certainly seen as available and usually vulnerable women,

so maybe with drugs, mental health, alcohol issues, perhaps all of those. And of course, who's going to believe a woman like that, as opposed to an upstanding member of the police service with an impeccable record? And actually, we sent an officer to prison and dealt with others because of the evidence threshold. We were only able to deal with people through misconduct proceedings in the force. Sorry, just so I understand that, and I'm sorry if I sound naive even asking this question, but are you saying that police officers would try and meet women through the job, effectively, women in vulnerable positions sometimes? Yes, yes, that is now formally described as a form of corruption and is taken very seriously by policing.

Some was was knowingly predatory. Others thought this was wonderful. You know, it was like manna from heaven, wasn't it? You know, so and so you went through a process of essentially within your own force policing the police. Yeah, and we did. And we we which was incredibly hard hitting including the partner of with her obviously with her consent um of the officer who went to prison um explaining what had happened and the impact on her and the impact on policing and how she saw that and we made everyone police officer and member of police staff, so our civilian employees, read and sign what, if you like, terms of engagement, making it crystal clear what was and what wasn't acceptable.

You know, so what I would say is there are so many elements of policing, both in a very tactical in it, but also in a really strategic structural sense, many of whom have been tackled by the police service, but yet they come up time and time and time again. Having been where you've been in terms of your career and now being on the other side of the police, how do you feel as a woman reporting crime to the police? I would think very carefully about it. Crime against property, not an issue. Crime against myself. I would probably struggle for how I would be judged.

I think people would find it, you know, that story that you shared extraordinary, but I think they would find it extraordinary what you've just said as a former police officer, a former very senior police officer, that you wouldn't feel comfortable reporting a crime against yourself? I think there's two issues going on. One is, I think for me, it's not that I think some officers wouldn't be sensitive. Some would be. Some would be less so. And it's that feeling of sort of being judged I also know in terms of conviction rates and the challenges of going through the criminal justice system as a woman it's thankless you know endless repeated humiliation telling your story over and over again worrying whether you're ever going to be believed, putting yourself through that repeatedly, as well as the shame of what's happened to you that, you know, victim blaming has

become so endemic. You know, it's all that bit about, it shouldn't really have happened. What did I do? And all that questioning, I think, and trying to then explain yourself and justify yourself just feels to me to be incredibly difficult. The former chief constable of Nottinghamshire Police Force, Susanna Fish, joining me now, Olivia Pinkney, chief constable for Hampshire, representing the National Police Chiefs Council. We've just heard a former chief constable wouldn't feel comfortable, would probably struggle to report a crime against herself to the police. Listening to Sue's interview there, I don't recognise, I don't recognise today the organisation, the service to the public, our culture within our organisation. I just don't recognise it at all in the way that she's describing.

Now, that isn't to say, of course I recognise there are incidents. We're not proud. And one of the brilliance of this country is that we have a free and independent media. One of the other brilliant things about this country is when things go wrong, our police service calls it out,

deals with it, and is transparent. And the fact that, you know, I agree with the examples that Sue's just described. If that's happened, it's disgusting and there is no place for it in policing, absolutely no place. You know, Susanna has been left with that view, having served in the police force.

So what can you say to our listeners to give them faith and trust in reporting anything that may happen to them? Let's hope people aren't suffering the most violent. But I know, we know Sarah's death, but we also know Jess Phillips every year reads out all the names of other women who have died and have been killed, frankly, at the hands of men. I realise that. That is not okay. It's not okay for women to be suffering domestic abuse. It's not only women, but it is by far the majority of women who suffer that. And when women have the courage to come forward

to anyone, including the police, then they will be listened, they will be heard, they will be supported. I know that happens because I know that we follow up every case. You know, yes, there are examples and I'm sure that we get stuff wrong,

but if we get it wrong and I want to hear about it, we'll fix it. The other thing I'd say to answer your question, is come and work with us. You know, one of the brilliant opportunities right now is you've got 20,000 new police officers joining the UK, we've been shrinking for over a decade, we are now growing, come and be part of it. Olivia Pinkney and Susanna Fish talking to Emma there. If you'd like to get in touch with anything you hear on the programme, please do so. You can text us on 84844, or you can email the programme by going to our website,

or you can get in touch with us via our social media. It's at BBC Woman's Hour. Now, statistically, we know the more likely victim of male violence is another man, but we also know that most women live with a feeling of fear on the street and regularly curtail their movements. Because of Sarah Everard's murder, we're in the middle of a national conversation about women's safety and key to that is male behaviour.

So we invited three men to talk about why men attack women and what can be done to stop it. Conroy Harris is the CEO of A Band of Brothers, an organisation that works with previously violent young men, and it aims to challenge their attitudes and behaviours and offer them alternative views of positive masculinity. David Challen is a domestic violence campaigner. In 2010, when David was 21, his mother Sally went to prison for the murder of his father. She was released after an appeal in 2019

which recognised the lifetime of coercive control she'd suffered. And Mike Berry is a consultant clinical forensic psychologist who's worked with offenders. He started by explaining what causes men to attack women. Simple reasons are power and control. Men want to get back the power that they've lost or perceive they've lost and control of women. And are there particular influences at the moment that are more pervasive to that? We already heard somebody getting in touch about television and the way things are shown. They're also getting some messages about porn. What's your view on that? Oh, I agree with your callers that porn is a dangerous element to this because what happens is we fantasize about the perfect woman. We make this woman do things

that she normally women wouldn't do in life. And boys get a wrong perception of what sex is about. And what we've got to do is get away from this idea that people are perfect. We've got to show people in their normal day-to-day life. And just on your thought around the idea of nature versus nurture on this, other messages around education, men learning violence or having some kind of innate, as some put it, this concept of the beast within, what's your view of that? I don't accept the beast within. What's your view of that? I don't accept the beast within.

I accept that there are genetic factors and sense of the size of men for women and things like this. But it's very much environment. We teach kids from a very early age to behave in certain ways. Boys don't cry, man up, all these expressions that we're using. So we're not allowing boys to express emotions, to express weaknesses. What I love at the moment are all these six foot three butch rugby players who are now starting to come out and expressing emotionality. And they're making it acceptable

that boys can cry, boys can be emotional. And I think once we start doing that from an early age, and I'd like to see it from preschool, teaching boys to express emotions, not to hide them, then I think they're going to be much more willing to express to male and female partners their feelings. There won't be this essential need to be in control and respect and things like that. They learn to cope with ambiguous situations, which life is full of ambiguous situations. Conroy, to bring you into this, how have you felt, first of all, this week with the framing of this discussion? For me, I've been feeling that this has been...

I understand a lot of the anger that has been poured out and that anger is also welcome from a lot of women. Their experiences over the years and what I've been listening to has been awful. Women have been going through a lot of really difficult stuff on the streets and that sense of safety. I am going to be slightly controversial and will be talking about my experiences.

I'm a black male. I've lived in this country from a very early age and my experiences growing up on these streets, they weren't safe for me. They weren't safe for many of my for many of my my friends and and contemporaries um from the age of nine ten my mother was telling me i had to protect myself on the streets learning how to kind of um um dodge attacks i've been attacked on the streets many times had things thrown at me so i i have a level of empathy it's not the same experience as many women would have had,

but there's an experience there of feeling unsafe on the street. David, what do you want to say about how you feel this conversation has been framed this week? I think, you know, there's a lot of discussion around demonising men. And I think it's important to reframe how we are looking at the centralisation of which is women's voices. And I am very thankful to be on Women's Hour taking up airtime that is devoted to women. I think that's a privileged spot and I recognise that's not welcomed by all women. But I think to recognise women's experiences through men's victimhood first is at this moment in time, in a very emotional amount of time, really difficult

and quite outrageous sometimes. But I do recognise the intersectionality between male violence and that happens to men as well because the majority of men are creating this. But the main point of it is that when young men are being killed in inner cities, when you get knife crime on the front of newspapers, there is outrage. There's not enough outrage, of course. But you don't get women coming out saying, what about us?

I think that's a really interesting part of that argument. And when you have police coming out and saying when Sarah Everard was missing at the time, it's like women stay indoors. Where's that messaging for young men? I mean, that's a discussion there, but it's really highlighting the restrictive elements to men's violence on women's lives, of which they're playing no part in than just living their lives and that way they have to think about that consciously.

Conroy, in your work, what do you see as the reason why men are violent and specifically towards women? There's a whole raft of things that play into the idea of violence. I can talk about my own personal case, and I know for me, and again, it may not be very popular, there is something that we talk of, unresolved intergenerational trauma. So for me, what that looks like is my early childhood, I was brutalised by a very violent mother.

And a lot of the work I do, a lot of the men I work with, they have also had experiences of being brutalised by violent mothers and things like that. And in return, I'm not going to hold this to my mother because I'm close to her, I love my mother. Her childhood, she was brutalised by a very violent father, who brutalised her from a very early age

until she had to leave the West Indies to come into this country, and she brought that with her, and that also plays part of my story, so I'm not saying that's everybody's story, but I'm saying the levels of violence we're exposed to, it's like a jungle. If you're picked on, you're looking for someone lesser than you. Mike, you know,

looking at who attacks who, we do not see the same statistics of when men are attacked on the street of that being done by women. Yeah, that's true. I think what you've got to realise is violence can be very helpful for men. It's an instrument that they can use to control people. And kids learn from an early age that violence gets some results. And that's one thing we've got to tackle. The other thing you have to accept is some men enjoy sadistic violence. They actually enjoy it. And we've got to challenge that view. And I've worked with these kind of men for years, and they're very, very difficult to change their attitude. And what you've got to do is you've got to get people willing to change. And a lot of men, unfortunately, as Conroy would say, in prisons and securities, don't want to

change. David, what would you say is your view of men who, in inverted commas, respectable men, who haven't been brutalized in the home who may not have had any of the problems that comroys talked about who still go on to abuse and not necessarily on the street in their own home yeah we've got to talk about engagement here you know we're not don't just need to talk about men's violence against women obviously it's sexual harassment i think you won't get the same levels the statistics aren't being reported at the moment but you won't get the same levels of sexual harassment that uh men carry out um against women that happen to men that won't happen you know 97 percent of women aged 18 to 24 have all experienced it and you've got to open up a holistic viewpoint to women's experiences and

just the lack of engagement on that and a lack of engagement and discussion in society from men caring about that you know a lot of men coming around coming out like I never knew that that that's how much fear was dictated in your life by just me as a man walking down the street with you you know you've got to engage men who have misogynistic views because one sexist joke in your circle, someone might be taken at home behind closed doors and coercively controlling non-physical violence, but as severe to a woman. And it's all our duty, even as men, women have been having this conversation too long alone. Why aren't men getting involved? Why are we being offended by being asked to get involved? Conroy, do you feel that there is almost a fence taken?

We've had a few messages from men saying, I'm so sick of being made to feel like it's all men. You know, and but actually, I suppose what David's saying there is, can we just get over the offence and actually engage with the reality? It's really difficult for a lot of men to actually get away from that idea of getting over the offence because there's a lot of men to actually get away from that idea of getting over the fence because there's a sense of shaming and they may have had difficult backgrounds in the past and I have to say something that I've learned last year when we had the awful murder of George Floyd

and the massive outcry and public kind of anger around that. And that led to the Black Lives protests. And for me, I have to say there's a similarity. And what that similarity is, what the Black Lives Matter and the George Floyd killing that showed us was that black people, white people, all people of all ethnicities need to get together and start discussing their ideas about discrimination and what they hold inside of them. We've had a message here, which I think is really important to share. It's a great discussion,

but I would like to hear from a man honest enough to admit his own urges to abuse women and why, even if it's suppressed. That's from Catherine who's listening. And I'll just use this platform then to say, if you do want to talk to me and you do want to talk about those urges, and perhaps you have acted on them in the past, please do get in touch to me and you do want to talk about those urges and perhaps you have acted on them in the past please do get in touch with me here at Women's Out we can do this on another day we can come back to it we don't have to give you a real name because I think it is important to not just hear from the men who are either specialists or trying to change this it is important to hear from some of the men that you will have worked with Conroy some of the men that

you will have spoken to Mike and David you can email us via our website or on social media we're at bbc woman's hour do you think this could be a moment for change i really hope so i really hope so and just to say but i am one of those men who felt brutalized and who felt angry with women for a large part of my teenage for a large part of my teenage years and had resentment against women. And it's only kind of by looking at myself and wanting to change that I took the treatment and did the work necessary to challenge my own attitudes. And that's what's led me to be doing this work with other men, because I know it's possible and I know it can happen. We can make change and this is a really important time for us as a society, be it around race, be it around trans rights, all these issues and our

opinion and violence, male violence, violence as a whole. Let's come together and let's start tackling this. A fascinating discussion. That was Conroy Harris, David Challen and Mike Berry and you got in touch to tell us that you too found it incredibly interesting to listen to Karen says such a brilliant idea to engage men on the program a very engaging item and I really hope will prompt a wider understanding and discussion and also more support of organizations such as Band of Brothers which is obviously doing a great job with damaged and disaffected youth and Ginny to say, I've worked for the past 35 years at HMP Grendon, a therapeutic community with men who've murdered and raped.

These men are provided with a space to understand the process by which they've come to offend and also provides them with space to look at their own trauma and abuse. Many of these men, rather than accept their own sense of fear and helplessness at the hand of their own perpetrator, have chosen to identify with their abuser rather than accept their own sense of fear and helplessness at the hand of their own perpetrator, have chosen to identify with their abuser and go on to offend against those who they perceive as weaker than themselves, women and children. The work entails through small group psychodrama and art therapy to acknowledge these early feelings, to place their angry feelings where

they belong, as well as acknowledging the impact of their crime on their victims and their families. And again, if you would like to email us, please go to our website. Now, last week, consumer goods company Unilever announced that it will remove the word normal from 200 of its beauty products in an attempt to create a more inclusive definition of beauty. They will also ban excessive editing of the photographs used in advertising. How do you feel about the word normal on a beauty product? What is normal in beauty anyway? Well, recent studies have found that 7 in 10 people felt using the word. And a report based on young women and non-binary people revealed that 90% use a filter or edit their photos before posting to even, and Sasha Polari, who's a makeup artist, model and founder of the Filter Drop hashtag campaign. Florence Adepojo started by explaining why inclusion in beauty products is important. I think inclusion

is important because you need to be representative of your community and the clients that you're trying to serve. And I feel like in beauty is one of the industries where historically making people feel insecure has been somewhat of a marketing and a sales tactic. So is it enough that Unilever have taken the step to remove the word normal from 200 of their products? I think it's a good step. Obviously, they're a really big company and they have like what they do impacts the industry

at large. But I do think it's just the beginning. I think diversity is more than just the language that you use. It's about your technology. It's about your formulations. It's about suitability for diverse skin tones. So there's just so many different elements that will make this step progressive and not just the removal of a single word. Sasha, you've created FilterDrop, the hashtag, and asked your followers to post their unfiltered pictures.

Tell me, why did you start this campaign? I think it's just a progression of everything I believe in when it comes to beauty. I really do want to remove so much language around the way we talk about beauty products. And at my personal stage in my confidence journey, I'd stopped using filters. And because I'd stopped using them, I was noticing just how much everybody else was using them. And I just took to my Instagram one day and I just said, look, do we even see real skin anymore? Because these kind of digitally enhanced filters go over our face

and they remove everything. So I really wanted to change that. And Flo, they can actually lighten your skin tone as well, can't they? Which is another issue altogether, isn't it? Colorism and this sort of whitewashing of beauty standards. Definitely. And I think the fact that there is a beauty standard is quite damaging because essentially beauty needs to be like more diverse and people need to be able to feel like they can self-represent as they are. And Sasha, in conversations you've had with influencers, did they understand why using filters promote products specifically was problematic? I think I've had a

bit of a mixed review a lot of people have kind of said oh what's the difference between this and makeup and what's the difference between this and surgery and the difference is everything that we do to our face in real life is there's a reality to that so we can have all the makeup on in the world and you can still see pores because pores exist on every skin with these filters they take away and they remove so much reality that we end up looking at ourselves and only comparing ourselves to this unachievable standard. And to go back to what Flo just said, one of the biggest problems I have with these filters is they've taken ideals from different cultures, put them together, not celebrating individual cultures, and then created this complete unrealistic achievable like unachievable thing but you know

it's so wrong so there was a mixed review but in general over the last year I have seen so much more real skin and that's been amazing and you've got you've really got the bit between your teeth because you've contacted beauty brands you've even contacted the advertising standards authority haven't you good on you yeah and what kind of reaction have you had what was the outcome of the outcome from the asa investigation i put in last august so august 2020 and it was a six month long investigation to my original complaint was that i just wanted it to be declared if you're going to use a filter to promote a beauty product please make sure that you state that so that the people who are profiting off your sales are going to you know be you're being transparent with your audience.

And the investigation took it one step further, the ASA, which is the governing body for advertising online. And they basically said, don't use filters, full stop. So it was an incredible outcome. And yeah, it's been very overwhelming, but I am over the moon. It is, again, like what Flo said, it's another step in the right direction. It's still a long way to go. Flo, how much of this is about us using filters to change the way we look or is it about these big brands

these big influential brands and the images that they're pumping out of what so-called normal beauty is? I think it's a I think it's a mix of both I think the big brands are being led by the movement that is happening through individuals online and through independent beauty brands and they're realizing that if they don't get with the times that they're just going to be irrelevant and I think they have a bigger impact like globally um you know in like developing um like we mentioned before about lightening like skin lightening is very big in Africa and Asia and a lot of these products are put out by huge conglomerates. So I think by us, you know, removing filters and having more diverse products available.

I mean, OK, so there might be people listening who are like, what do you mean I have to remove my filters, Sasha? How do I do that, Flo? Like, just how do you encourage young women particularly, not even young women, all women, just to stop using that filter? What would you say? How do you empower them to do that, Sasha? I think, you know, I hand on my heart say that I used to edit my photos and I used to use filters. I think people think I woke up one day this confident and that definitely isn't the case.

I was, you know, part of the problem as well. This is such a societal issue that we need to address from such a young age because they're so damaging in the way that we see ourselves. So I always just say to people, care about more, care about more than your image. So try and use less filters and then eventually you'll start seeing yourself without the filters. And then that helps you to then eventually use no filters. And then by the time you've got the other end of it you put a filter on and I can't even use them on my skin anymore because I just think I look utterly ridiculous and that's been a long process and it has been a lot of hard work but I know that

anybody can get there because you know I used to do it so yes and you are leading the charge with your own Instagram account and Flo I guess this is about you know you know growing up in a country where you never saw a reflection of yourself in any of the magazines. Just encouraging more women with any level of melanin to be in photos, in magazines, on Instagram, advertising, the lot of it. Right, Florence? Yeah, absolutely. Be as visible as you can. And I absolutely love Sasha's campaign. I think it's important to build up communities of women who are able to show up as themselves

and feel confident and beautiful as themselves. And we here on Woman's Hour don't just like to hide behind a microphone. We are visible too on Instagram. It's at BBC Woman's Hour. Filters may or may not apply. Karen got in touch and said, perhaps a good step would be to stop calling these products beauty products instead of skincare and cosmetic products,

both gender neutral and less divisive than beauty. And Lynn said, in middle age, I'm comfortable with my looks. I do look back at photos of my younger self and think, why did I ever feel I wasn't beautiful enough? If I could say one thing to my younger self or to younger women I would say celebrate your individual beauty because you are beautiful don't waste any of your precious time thinking you're not beautiful enough Lynn hear hear and Suzanne emailed in she says about filters in photos and the beauty industry it reminds me of a story about Audrey Hepburn we We all sit back to pay attention.

Whatever Audrey has to say, we need to know. When a photographer asked her if she wanted her wrinkles airbrushed out, apparently she said, don't you dare. I earned every single one of them. Now, this month marks the 10th anniversary of a conflict in Syria that has devastated the country and the Syrian people. In a country whose population in 2011 was estimated at about 21 million, more than half the population has been displaced. 6.6 million Syrians have been forced to flee their country over the decade. Another 6 million have been uprooted from their homes but remain displaced inside the country. Of this group, women have been affected disproportionately, two-thirds being women and children. It's

impossible to estimate the number of people who've been killed. In 2014, the UN stopped counting, saying it was too difficult to verify the number. Its last estimate in 2016 was 400,000. Some say now the death count is as high as a million. More conservative estimates put it at about half a million. It is by any standards a humanitarian crisis of unspeakable proportions. Well, last weekend, the Times reported that Asma al-Assad, the first lady of Syria, who's also a former British investment banker, faces possible prosecution and the loss of her British citizenship after the Metropolitan Police opened a preliminary

investigation into allegations that she incited and encouraged terrorist acts during the country's 10-year civil war. Dr Rolla Hallam, CEO and founder of CANDU, a charity set up to deliver health humanitarian aid in war zones, explained what the charity does. CANDU, a charity set up to deliver health humanitarian aid in war zones, explained what the charity does. KANDU is a charity, a not-for-profit organisation, and we work closely with frontline healthcare workers to help them build hospitals, clinics and protect civilians, especially children. Talk to us about women and children in Syria and what you can say about this decade.

So I think the important thing to start by saying is that today marks 10 years of when Syrians, men, women, children, every type of sect took to the street to peacefully protest, to call for freedom and dignity. They were fed up with a 50-year rule of an authoritarian dictatorship and were shouting harriya karameh, wanting their freedom and for their dignity. And the regime met those chants with a bloody crackdown, with unleashing a war machine against its own civilians. And what we have now is not a civil war, as many people say, but a war on civilians. The regime has used as a core strategy, the bombing targeting of civilians, of women, of children, of hospitals and of schools as its main target so that you can

either surrender or you will be killed. I think it's one of those conflicts, if I could describe it like that, that people find very hard to get their head around because it has been going on for so long. And it's got some unique characteristics to it that I know that you've been up close and personal to. And one of the defining characteristics of this conflict and cited by the UN as a blatant violation of international laws is the attacks that have taken place over the years on medical centres and schools. And I know that you were involved in a particular attack in 2013. I wondered if you could share something about that. And I should warn listeners that perhaps part of your answer

could be quite graphic. Sure. Yeah, absolutely. That's been one of the most devastating features. So as a doctor based in the UK, I was doing medical missions between the UK and Syria to help rebuild hospitals, which, as you said, have been bombed. Physicians for Human Rights, a US-based human rights organisation, say that nearly 600 attacks have happened against hospitals. Imagine, over 900 of my colleagues have been killed, 40% of them under torture. And it has decimated our healthcare system.

And so in 2013, I was on a medical mission, and I was in the north of the country. This is August 2013. And if you may remember, just a few days earlier, there had been a huge chemical weapons attack, the biggest of the 21st century that the Assad regime had unleashed against a suburb in Damascus, murdering over 1,400 people, 420 of them were children. So during that time, I was in the north of Syria, and I was in one of seven hospitals I'd helped to set up, and I'd witnessed a war crime. A schoolyard full of children was aerially bombarded with an incendiary weapon, which is a napalm-like weapon that causes severe burns. And we had dozens of severely burnt children, teenagers who came wounded into my hospital. I'm shaking as I tell you this story. It really was a scene out of Armageddon. A gut-wrenching smell of burnt flesh and a chemical hung in the air and I'd never seen

anything like this the screams of one of the girls who was there that day injured in this attack still still ring in my head 12 kids died that day and dozens were severely injured we treated them in the rudimentary hospital that we had set up, giving them fluids and painkillers and then transferred them to Turkey for intensive care therapy, which was beyond the means of the hospital I was working at. And I recently spoke to the father of this girl, Siham, who unfortunately passed away. She couldn't survive the devastating burns she had over 60 percent burns to her body and he told me that for six weeks in intensive care he died 100 times each day watching her suffer like this as her skin literally melted off her

do you want to take a moment I'm sorry to ask this this fee to recall this but i suppose it's very important for people to hear what has been going on it's so important i mean where where this this this instance was was captured in a documentary called safe serious saving serious children and and we're doing a follow-up documentary to that so people can actually hear these stories and listen to people's stories and hear them courageously tell them. I think it's so important because, you know, just as we so often need to face our own fears and our own darkness, our own shadows as individuals, we need to face it as a species or as humanity collectively outside, right? It's only when we look at these things and we face pain and we see the things that we do to each other that we can actually hope to bring any kind of healing and any kind of peace and justice to it. So it's absolutely critical that we do that. But what I really want to say is that this school attack wasn't the only one. This has been a systematic deliberate targeting of war to create

fear and terrorize the population. This is one of over a thousand attacks on schools that has happened in the last 10 years. Just 59 of them in the last year, one happened just a couple of months ago. So we need to move away from a position where we as a globe have normalized the attacks. You know, these schools are protected by international humanitarian law for our collective protection. When they break for one, they break for all. We need to say it is not acceptable to commit these war crimes with impunity and we need to bring the perpetrators to justice. And just on that, with what I just said about the First Lady of Syria, just because it's linked to this country,

Asma al-Assad, who faces possible prosecution, loss of British citizenship. Do you welcome something like that? Because you're talking about, obviously, peace, but also justice and accountability. I think we need to be not talking about stripping her of her citizenship, but putting her and any other potential war criminals to face justice for their war crimes. It's woefully inadequate for the father of Siham, for all of the victims and

all of the survivors to say, strip her of her citizenship. This needs to be going to the international criminal courts and all to face justice. But I think, you know, one thing I really want to stress is that 10 years, Syrians have been getting inaction, apathy and silence, and it's time to change that. You can watch the Panorama update, which is called Syria's Schools Under Attack, today on BBC World News and the BBC News Channel. It will also be available on BBC iPlayer. Now, handbags. Remember those? In lockdown, they have become almost obsolete, as many of us have not strayed far from home.

Sales of luxury handbags fell 19% globally last year, according to Euromonitor International. In the UK, it was even more severe. So how has lockdown changed what we want from our handbags? Lucia Savi is curator of the V&A's Bags Inside Out exhibition, showcasing more than 300 bags used by both men and women from the 16th century to today. Lucia started by talking about her use of handbags during lockdown. I started to go out using more pockets. The only few times you were allowed to go out,

you would carry very few things with you. And the handbag started to be left in our wardrobe. And I did read a lot of reports as well, especially during the first lockdown, about the handbag is dead. It's almost like an obituary of the accessory. But I think it's not really true. And I think we have started looking at bags during 2020 in a different way as well. And the handbags will give us a hope of that different life that is waiting for us outside, because, of course, they mean so much

and they are such a connection to the outside world. Your exhibition put together for the V&A on handbags had an opening of two days, I think is right? Yeah, the exhibition, Bags Inside Out at the V&A, was supposed to open in April 2020, but of course, because of the first lockdown, we had to postpone it. And then we managed to open it again in December 2020.

But we managed to have it open to the public only for two days before we had to, of course, close the museum again. In your exhibition, though, you have a bag from the war years. And I wonder what we could take from that, because we have also experienced the rise of the war analogy during this time. Definitely. We have a handbag by the maker and designer H. Walden Cole. This bag was made during the war. And during the war, everybody, children, men, women,

had to carry gas masks with them at all times. So initially, people carry gas masks in cardboard boxes, tin boxes, and even canvas bags. But then, of course, as the year passed, manufacturers became more clever about the design, and they designed this beautiful leather handbag, top handle handbag, with at the bottom a round compartment to house a very bulky gas mask. So it's really a stark reminder of difficult times, of course, of a time of uncertainty and a time where we adapt and fashion adapt to the danger of a poisoned gas attack. And really, although the exhibition was curated before the pandemic, this object that I selected before the pandemic came to a new light.

Thinking about the current times and us had to carry masks, but also hand sanitiser, protective equipment now during COVID time. I was going to say the idea of the handbag as a window on history is very interesting. And they are still one of the few items people pass from generation to generation. You have a personal example, don't you? Yes.

One of my favourite bags belonged to my grandmother. And it's quite simple, leather Italian handbag. And I don't think I'm alone in having in my wardrobe an object from family. People, especially when thinking about handbags that are made to last, that are well-made, are passed on from generation to generation. But also because handbags remind us very much of other people they have a power of contained memories physically and also symbolically and I do and I think with the pandemic as well people want to go back to object that maybe a bit nostalgic but also make them feel comfortable so

I hope I could use my grandmother's handbag again it's's not very practical in COVID times. I was going to say, what's it like? Describe it for us. It's a top handle, navy blue leather handbag with a zip, very practical, and many pockets inside. The problem is it's a top handle, so it's not really practical nowadays in COVID times. So I might just maybe add a strap to it or update it. I cannot fit a laptop in it, but I still feel like somehow it's nice

to take it out for a walk. It hasn't been out for a walk that bad for a while. We need to air them. I was also talking to a friend who was saying she'd reopened one of her handbags. And you know, the treasure that is inside a handbag that you have left there and may not have seen for a while, also the debris, it's safe to say, or maybe that's just me, whether it's crumpled up tissues, half eaten, packs of chewing gum, whatever is in there, maybe a fiver, you know? They have inside all sorts of memories of our everyday life. That's what's so fascinating about bags. They are everyday objects. They are functional, but also very symbolic. Some of them, they get very expensive as well. We are ready to

spend a bit more cash on bags. And they're a really fascinating object because as well, they're very sculptural. So although they don't go out, some people during the pandemic have used them almost as sculpture to decorate their home because they're so beautiful. Well, some people are thinking, really? I don't think I would be putting my battered handbag hanging on the wall. But others really do invest in this. In fact, sale of luxury handbags have fallen, but certain luxury brands have benefited during the pandemic, particularly in China with the auctions of vintage bags and all of that. But looking to the future, how do you think handbags and the design will change? Because we're already seeing reports in some of the papers around exactly what you were saying,

they're a symbol of hope and bright colours, for instance. I'm not surprised about the bright colours. Bags are really shortcut for how we're feeling. Spring hopefully is coming soon. People want to be feeling optimistic, the vaccine. And so bags are almost like an accent for an outfit, even if you're wearing maybe a very plain outfit with a colourful bag, you can really signal to the world and to yourself the psychology and what you hope for. But also I think bags will be maybe a bit bigger and quite functional because when we go out nowadays, we go out less, but somehow we carry more. The few days that you're allowed to go to work, you need to bring more, sometimes even a laptop, more equipment. And more people are cycling or walking to work, so they need bigger

bags to carry all of this. So I think that we'll see more cross-body bags, a bit more practical, full of pockets. So really a mirror of the times they're living in. Lucia Savi there talking to Emma. Well, Pat emailed in to say, I returned to nursing in the late 1970s after a long break. My ward placement as a nervous staff nurse was care of elderly, mainly women. Some patients got restless at times and even distressed. I hit on the idea of bringing in an old handbag for one lady who wandered for hours. I put in an old key, a hanky and a brooch

and it calmed her enormously. She took it with her everywhere. It made me think most women carry a bag and know where it is. We panic if it gets mislaid. Does this attachment carry through to the end? Before long, other handbags appeared on the ward and were loved by their new owners. My favourite, Annie, aged 99, wore bits of jewellery the nurses gave her

and on a late shift I had to put these crown jewels safely in the handbag and tuck it away under her pillow. Thank you for that email, Pat. Spring onions in a handbag. I've not considered that one. I do always have a bottle of chilli sauce in the bottom of mine, though. It's a must. Now, the singer, songwriter and cellist Ayanna Witter-Johnson is a rare exception to the rule that classical music and eclectic soul cannot successfully coexist.

Now be prepared to feel inadequate. The British musician graduated with a first-class degree in classical composition and won the Trinity Laban Silver Award in 2008. She then went on to complete a Masters of Music in Composition at the Manhattan School of Music. While she was there, she became the only non-American to win Amateur Night Live at the legendary Apollo Theatre in Harlem. She was nominated for her first MoBo Award in 2012. She co-wrote and featured on Anushka Shankar's song Those Words from the Grammy-nominated

Love Letters EP and features on Nitin Sawni's single Movement Variation 2. Ayana's recent release Rise Up featuring Akala has become a revolutionary anthem for young black people. She's part of the WOW UK Festival, which is online now and will be running until Sunday the 21st of March. And she did a brilliant cover of Roxanne, which I absolutely love. Bye. Roxanne, you don't have to put on the red light. Roxanne. Welcome to Woman's Hour.

I'm swaying in the studio. Tell me Sting has heard that brilliant version. Thank you so much, my love. I really hope he has. He has now. I'm sure he's a massive fan of Woman's Hour you have achieved so much uh let's get but let's go right back to the beginning to when you were three at the beginning of your musical journey how did it all start well you know there was a tape that my mum

used to play and it was an album by Sweet Honey and the Rock and I just absorbed this music and she took me to see them live and as she told me the story goes that I sang along to all the words and the couple in front of us turned around and was like I think she's got some musical ability there so I started piano lessons shortly after that classical piano so when did you pick up the cello well that happened in the early years of secondary school and when I started essentially I wasn't learning much in the music class and my teacher bless him just such a perceptive person he said you should do something new and challenge yourself and start a second instrument while we're all here doing basic piano skills so that's um I took a list of instruments home to my mum and she was like no woodwind please no brass uh no drums I was like

okay we've got strings left and I by process of elimination I thought the double bass was a bit big the violin was a bit small I didn't know what a viola was and there was the cello like and it was the cello from school that you ended up taking as your first cello so I had a beat-up cupboard cello to start with and my music teacher said oh you're progressing really quickly why don't I try and find you a better instrument? And he contacted the school governor, yeah, who loaned me his personal cello the whole time I was at school. That's amazing. Yeah.

And your cello has a name? My cello is called Ruben. Ruben. And thanks to my wonderful grandma, she purchased him for me at the end of school from the governor. And we're still together today. And it is so wonderful. I advise everyone to just Google Ayana, watch her perform,

because you're not just playing, you are one with Ruben. It's beautiful to watch. And you actually play the cello Ruben in quite an interesting way, don't you? You don't just use him in the traditional sense. No, he's not only is he my dance partner, and there's this like synergy between us, but I play him like a guitar sometimes, I drum him, I play him percussively with my bow, a lot of Collegno Battuto for the string players out there. And I play him like a bass and of

course, as a bowed instrument in a traditional sense. Now you've worked with quite frankly, all of these people are legends in my eyes. Anushka Shankar, Nitin Soni, whose new album drops. Yes, and it's incredible. Immigrants, honestly, I cried. I listened to it first thing this morning. And just to think about the Windrush stories he talks about and partition and just the story of his family. And it's really striking. And he knows how to pick amazing artists to work with because you are on there as well.

And you've worked with the incredible Akala in Rise Up. So you've just worked with amazing people. I'm sure no one turns you down. But tell me about Rise Up. Yeah. So Rise Up, the song itself, I wrote a few years ago just to remind myself of who I am as a young British Caribbean person, my gifts and my power and how I can use my voice to kind of create change

and just to rally my community and to give hope. And given the summer that we had last year with the murder of George Floyd and just the sense of isolation we're all feeling, I felt that Rise Up was the perfect song to kind of re-release into the world. And I accompanied it with a really powerful cover featuring Cleveland Watkiss of Declaration of Rights by the Abyssinians, the great roots reggae Jamaican group. And we cover this song and I pair it with a final remix of Rise Up just to give this powerful statement.

I think we should have a listen. Turn up the volume. Let's hear the sound. I think we should have a listen. Yeah. Getting louder. Can you hear that? Can you feel that? Getting louder. Fires are burning deep in the night. Why are you asleep? They've under the stars. They're starting to sing. And there's a rumor that nothing's going to stop this thing.

Ayana, it is so brilliant and so refreshing to hear a cello being played in a different style. So how much did the music that you grew up with influence your style of music? A lot. There was a lot being played in the house. Everything from Vivaldi's Four Seasons to Anita Baker, Stevie Wonder, Steely Dan. Just a lot of different influences that have enriched my life. And Ayana, I have to add that your music enriches our lives, so continue doing what you do. That's it from me. Join Emma on Monday from 10am. 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.