Podcasts about Mumsnet

Justine Roberts is the founder and CEO of Mumsnet, the UK's largest online network for parents—and a surprising powerhouse in British political life. Since its launch in 2000, Mumsnet has grown from a niche forum into a digital force capable of shaping public debate, influencing party manifestos, and unnerving prime ministers. Politicians from across the spectrum have courted its users, recognising the site's unique reach into the hearts—and voting intentions—of middle Britain. Often underestimated, always influential, Justine Roberts has carved out a space where motherhood meets activism—and where difficult questions are the norm.

Have you ever noticed a man explaining something to a woman in a supremely confident way which suggests he absolutely knows more than her about the subject? Well, there's a term for that, which is mansplaining. A recent thread on parenting forum Mumsnet invited women to share their worst examples of mansplaining. Among them were patronising explanations of the offside rule, a gas man telling a qualified engineer to wait for her partner to get home so he could tell him how to fix the boiler rather than her and a male doctor telling a pregnant woman not to worry as C-sections aren't painful! How long has mansplaining been around? Why do men do this then? Are they really all that bad? In under 3 minutes, we answer your questions! To listen to the last episodes, you can click here: How can you avoid bed bugs when you travel? What is microwork? How does pollution affect my mental health? A podcast written and realised by Joseph Chance. First broadcast: 19/7/2021 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today I draw upon the works of James O'Brien and David Cameron to explore how when David set out on his political journey he wanted to support families. Why then did he do the opposite and make huge welfare cuts and bring in the austerity measures. I look at the psychology of why this might be and draw upon Dr Gabor Mate and Nick Duffell to explore this. For the documentary Boarding on Insanity: https://www.boardingoninsanity.com/ For the Observer article: https://www.theguardian.com/education/2025/apr/20/breaking-our-spirits-was-the-plan-the-lifelong-impact-of-having-gone-to-boarding-school For the Mumsnet article: https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/_chat/5319413-lifelong-impact-of-going-to-boarding-school Take care, Piers #boardingoninsanity #davidcameron #drgabormate #austerity --- Piers is an author and a men's transformational coach and therapist who works mainly with trauma, boarding school issues, addictions and relationship problems. He also runs online men's groups for ex-boarders, retreats and a podcast called An Evolving Man. He is also the author of How to Survive and Thrive in Challenging Times. To purchase Piers first book: https://www.amazon.co.uk/How-Survive-Thrive-Challenging-Times/dp/B088T5L251/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=piers+cross&qid=1609869608&sr=8-1 For more videos please visit: http://youtube.com/pierscross For FB: https://www.facebook.com/pierscrosspublic For Piers' website and a free training How To Find Peace In Everyday Life: https://www.piers-cross.com/community Many blessings, Piers Cross http://piers-cross.com/

Broadcaster, Sky Sports News Presenter and Former Lawyer Bela Shah gets into changing career at 29, being a "mature" student, getting a big break at Channel 5 that led to her current dream role, the best way to deal with sexism and racism at work, why IVF wasn't as straightforward as she thought it would be, Mumsnet and more.Raj has a ridiculous story about the Heathrow power cut. Of course.almost40thepodacast@gmail.comFollow @almost40pod @_rajpander @missbelashah xoxo Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

COFFEE MOANING the PODCAST ON APPLE PODCASTS: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/coffee-moaning/id1689250679ON SPOTIFY: https://open.spotify.com/show/3p6z4A1RbhidO0pnOGGZl2?si=IqwD7REzTwWdwsbn2gzWCg&nd=1HOW TO STAY MARRIED (SO FAR) the PODCASTON SPOTIFY: https://open.spotify.com/show/57MT4cv2c3i06ryQlIpUXc?si=1b5ed24f40c54ebaON APPLE PODCASTS: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/how-to-stay-married-so-far/id1294257563 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

www.DogCastRadio.comIn this podcast, host Julie considers a variety of Reddit AITA questions, and Am I Being Unreasonable from Mumsnet. We have stories of a puppy biting a child at a family get together, the pet sitting friend who took the dog to doggy daycare, the rescue dog defender feeling the pressure to meet up for dog walks, the sister who caused trouble when she said her sister's baby name sounded like a dog's name, the devoted owner who ducked out of his brother's wedding to care for his injured dog, an off lead dog causing issues and two alleged service dogs joining at the children's playground. Do you agree with Julie's take on all these canine conundrums?

AI bots have scraped 6 billion words of content from Mumsnet. Justine Roberts (Founder of Mumsnet) isn't going away without a fight. In this episode she reveals why she's suing AI and warns of its potential to destroy the future of content creators. She also reacts to the unfair treatment of women entrepreneurs and shares the challenges she's faced throughout her own entrepreneurial journey. Plus, she breaks down why Mumsnet's 9 million users hold significant influence over UK elections. Don't miss this insightful conversation about AI, gender inequality, and the political power of one of the UK's most influential platforms ___________ Sign up to Wise Business banking: https://wise.com/gb/business/?utm_sou... Thanks to HP our sponsor for this episode. For 10% off the HP Omnibook UltraFlip with built-in AI, use code 'HPLOVEWORK'. Valid until 31st January 2025, UK only. T&Cs apply. https://bit.ly/HPOmnibook-SLQ424 Join Vanta and recieve $1000 off: http://vanta.com/secretleaders Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Justine Roberts is not happy. Earlier this year she discovered that tech giant OpenAI has been scraping Mumsnet—the successful website of which she is CEO—for content. AI machines, like ChatGPT, train their Large Language Models (LLMs) in this way. Justine and her team have recently launched the first British legal action against OpenAI.Meanwhile, Google is fighting to overhaul UK copyright law to allow it to freely mine content for commercial gain, without compensating other publishers.Justine explains to Alan and Lionel what she hopes to achieve in her court case—one that could be just one of the first of many of its kind—and why she is so angered by what she views as an existential threat to anybody publishing content online.To watch this interview and much more, head over to YouTube and search for ‘Prospect Magazine'. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Support Bugle podcasts here https://www.thebuglepodcast.com/donateJosh Gondelman and James Nokise join host Alice Fraser for episode 175 of The Gargle.All of the news, with none of the politics.

In this episode of the Business of Laravel Podcast, Matt Stauffer sits down with Matthew Davis, the CTO of Mumsnet, a leading social platform for parents in the UK. They discuss Mumsnet's full-scale transition to Laravel, unpacking the challenges and victories of their ground-up rewrite. They dive into the technical architecture behind their hosting and how they're leveraging machine learning to personalize content for their users. The discussion also covers the nuances of hiring Laravel developers and why finding the right culture fit is crucial for avoiding micromanagement and fostering independence in the workplace. Matthew Davis offers incredible insights on building trust between engineering and product teams and highlights how Laravel can be a game-changer for boosting productivity and driving real business value.Matt Stauffer TwitterTighten WebsiteMatthew Davis Twitter Mumsnet WebsiteMumsnet LinkedInRandical Candor Book Conflicted by Ian Leslie Growth Levers by Matt Lerner Matt Stauffer's Empathy Gives You Superpowers Talk - Laracon EU 2015 -----Editing and transcription sponsored by Tighten.

Enjoying the podcast? Tell us what you think below and give us a rating. As always we'd love to hear your suggestions and feedback. Send us an email: podcast@pensionbee.com.   In this bonus episode of The Pension Confident Podcast, we have tips for new parents: from the benefits you could be eligible for, to the impact parenthood could have on your pension. Tune in to hear the best bits from episodes three and 19, as our host, Philippa Lamb and our expert panels discuss nesting, building emergency funds as a new parent and more. We hear from: CEO of Mumsnet, Justine Roberts CBE; Founder of Vestpod, Emilie Bellet; Money Advice Editor at The Telegraph, Sam Brodbeck; Senior Digital Editor at Money Week, Kalpana Fitzpatrick; PensionBee's CTO, Jonathan Lister Parsons; and PensionBee's CEO, Romi Savova.   Episode Breakdown: 00:37 The reality of Shared Parental Leave 02:22 Statutory rights for adoption 03:13 How to budget for a new baby 04:44 Anticipating early costs and childcare expenses 06:23 Exploring Tax-Free Childcare Allowance and Child Benefit 08:05 Parenthood and the Gender Pension Gap 09:31 Starting a conversation, before starting a family   Further reading and listening: To learn more about personal finance tips for new parents, check out these articles and podcasts from PensionBee: Episode transcript E19: Can you afford to have kids? With Justine Roberts CBE, Kalpana Fitzpatrick and Jonathan Lister Parsons E3: How do we tackle the gender pension gap? With Sam Brodbeck, Emilie Bellet and Romi Savova Pensionbee's research on fair sharing of childcare PensionBee Parental Leave Policy What I learned about mothers and their pensions from answering Mumsnet questions Why parents need to make a Child Benefit claim to protect their State Pension   Other useful resources: Mumsnet Statutory Maternity Pay and Leave (Gov.uk) Statutory Paternity Pay and Leave (Gov.uk) Statutory Adoption Pay and Leave (Gov.uk) Disability Living Allowance for children (Gov.uk) Tax-Free Childcare (Gov.uk) Child Benefit (Gov.uk) Boosting paternity leave has economic benefits (Pregnant Then Screwed) Average childcare costs (MoneyHelper) Transparency on parental pay (ABI)   Catch up on the latest news, read our transcripts or watch on YouTube: The Pension Confident Podcast The Pension Confident Podcast on YouTube   Follow PensionBee (@PensionBee) on X, Threads, Instagram, TikTok, Facebook and LinkedIn. Follow Mumsnet (@Mumsnet) on X, Instagram, Facebook, TikTok and LinkedIn. Follow Vestpod (@VestPod) on X, Instagram, TikTok, Facebook and LinkedIn. Follow Kalpana (@KalpanaFitzpatrick) on X, LinkedIn, Instagram and TikTok. Follow Sam (@sambrodbeck) on X and LinkedIn.

Skip the Queue is brought to you by Rubber Cheese, a digital agency that builds remarkable systems and websites for attractions that helps them increase their visitor numbers. Your host is Paul Marden, CEO of Rubber Cheese.Fill in the Rubber Cheese 2024 Visitor Attraction Website Survey - the annual benchmark statistics for the attractions sector.If you like what you hear, you can subscribe on iTunes, Spotify, and all the usual channels by searching Skip the Queue or visit our website rubbercheese.com/podcast.If you've enjoyed this podcast, please leave us a five star review, it really helps others find us. And remember to follow us on Twitter for your chance to win the books that have been mentioned in this podcast.Competition ends on 3rd July 2024. The winner will be contacted via Twitter. Show references:Lego House in BillundSutton Hoo (National Trust)Sutton Hoo at the British MuseumThe Dig on NetflixSutton Hoo mask on Lego IdeasThe Dig: Lego version of Sutton Hoo treasure 'amazing' (BBC News)Events at The Hold IpswitchAndrew Webb is a LEGO enthusiast who uses bricks in outreach programmes for teams and organisations as diverse at Arm, Pinset Mason, The National Trust, English Heritage, and the Scouts. During the UK's second Lockdown in early 2021, He made the 1500 year old Sutton Hoo Helmet out of LEGO bricks and submitted it to LEGO Ideas. The build achieved international media coverage, and has since been donated to the National Trust. Andrew continues to help attractions and institutions with LEGO programmes. By day, he works as a global head of content marketing for a B2B tech company. Find out more at http://teambuildingwithbricks.com Transcription:  Paul Marden: Welcome to Skip the Queue, a podcast for people working in and working with Mister attractions. I'm your host, Paul Marden. Today I'm talking to Andrew Webb. By day, Andrew is a content marketer for a tech firm, but in his spare time helps attractions to use Lego as a tool to attract and engage diverse audiences and enable them to interpret history and culture. We're going to talk about what it means to be an building, a model of anglo saxon helmet, and the 24 skills that are used when building with Lego. Paul Marden: So welcome to the podcast. Andrew Webb: Thank you. Paul Marden: On Skip the Queue, we always start with some icebreaker questions that you know nothing about. So let's launch into a couple of those. Book and a pool or museums and galleries for your city break. Andrew Webb: Museum and galleries.Paul Marden: Yeah. I'd expect nothing less given what we're about to talk about. This is one from one of my colleagues, actually, who is really good at icebreakers whenever we do a team building eventually. So he said, “Would you rather have it and lose it or never have it at all?”Andrew Webb: Oh, gosh, I'll have it and lose it for sure. Paul Marden: Yeah, gotta be. That one's from miles. Say thank you, Myles. That was a cracker. Andrew Webb: Do you remember the word there was a great one. Would you rather eat ten donuts or raw onion? Paul Marden: Oh, ten donuts, hand down. I could easily do that. Andrew Webb: I'd get onion. I'd get onion. Every time I would take an onion over ten donuts. I'd be sick after ten donuts. Paul Marden: Oh, no, I reckon I could take that. No problem. Andrew Webb: Okay. Paul Marden: Okay. So we're going to talk a little bit about your adventures in Lego over the last few years. So why don't we kick off and talk a little bit about your original interest in Lego? Because I know it goes back not a long way, because that would be rude. But it goes back to a few years ago, doesn't it? Andrew Webb: It does. I mean, like most people growing up in what we might loosely term the west, I had like, I was a kid, you know, I think most of us grew up with it like that. And then like, you know, growing up in that first age of plastics with Heman, Transformers, Lego, Star wars, all of that sort of stuff. Paul Marden: You're just describing my childhood. Andrew Webb: It's funny because that was. It was all sort of ephemeral, right? I mean, the idea was that the reason why that boom happened, just to dwell on why they're going plastic things. Before that, toys were made out of either tin or wood. So, you know, they were very labour intensive produce there's certainly injection moulding comes along and we could just have anything coupled with the tv shows and the films and all this sort of stuff. So we all grew up in this sort of first age of disposable plastic, and then it all just gets passed down as kids grow up. It gets given away, gets put in the loft and forgotten about. There's a moment when a return of the Jedi bedspread doesn't look cool anymore, right? You hit about 13, 14 and you're like, “Mom, I really want some regular stuff there.”Andrew Webb: So like everybody, you know, I gave it all away, sold it and whatever, but I kept onto my lego and then fast forward, you know, I become a parent and Lego starts to come back into my life. So I'm sort of at a stage where I'm working for a travel startup and I get a press release to go to the Lego House, which if no one has heard about it, where have you been? But also it is a fantastic home of the brick, which Lego built in, opened in 2016. And it is a phenomenal temple to Lego. Not in terms of like a Legoland style approach with rides and things like that, but it's all about the brick and activities that you can do in a brick. Andrew Webb: There is great pools and huge pits of Lego to play with there, as well as displays and all this sort of stuff. They've actually got a Lego duplo waterfall.Paul Marden: Really? Andrew Webb:  Oh, I mean, it's a fantastic attraction. And the way they've done it is just incredible. So they blend a lot of digital things. So if you make a small fish and insert it into this thing, it appears in the tank and swims around and this sort of stuff and the way you can imprint your designs on things. I should just quickly tell you about the cafeteria there as well, just really quickly. So the cafeteria at the Lego House, everyone gets a little bag of Lego and then whatever you build and insert into this sort of iPad sort of slots type thing, and that's what you're. Andrew Webb: So a pink brick might be salmon, a yellow brick might be chicken, whatever, and you put it all in and it recognises it all and then it comes down a giant conveyor belt in a Lego. Giant Lego box and is handed to you by robots. I mean, mind blowing stuff. This is not like with a tray at the National Trust place or somewhere like that for us to come. It is a technological marvel. Absolutely fascinating. So, of course, on the day went, it was a press preview, so there was no canteen workers, so there was no food in the box when me and my daughter, so went without that data, was a bit disappointed. Andrew Webb: But that started that whole reappreciation of Lego, both as a toy to play with my daughter, but also as a way of using Lego in different ways. And that manifests itself in lots of different things. So currently, now, you know, fast forward a little bit. I use Lego for team building exercises, for workshops, for problem solving with organisations, and also just for having fun with adult groups as well as kids. And I think one of the biggest things we've seen since this kind of started around 2000s with the sort of adults reading Harry Potter, do you remember that was like, why are you reading this children's book type of thing? Paul Marden: Yeah. Andrew Webb: And then all the prequel Star wars films came out and Lego made sets about both those two things. And it kind of. I mean, Bionicle saved the company, as only AFOL will know, but it started that whole merchandising thing and adding Lego into that firmament of IP. Right. And we fast forward now, and it's Marvel and Star wars and everything. Paul Marden: You just said AFOL. I know what an AFOL is, but many of our listeners may not know what AFOL is.Andrew Webb: Just to go for acronyms here. So an AFOL is an Adult Fan of Lego. And we've seen actually Lego in the past five years, even earlier. I mean, Lego always had an adult element to it. And one of the original founders used to use it for designing his own house. And there was a whole architectural system called Molodux. So it's always had that element to it. But just recently we've seen, you know, almost retro sets. So we see the Lego Atari 2600 video game system from 1976, which, yeah. Paul Marden: An original NES wasn't there. Andrew Webb: Exactly. NES that's come out. I've got a Lego Optimus prime back here for transformers, you know, all that kind of stuff. So with what's been really interesting is this kidault or whatever, however, call it. And I think that's really fascinating, because if we think about Lego as a toy, we are rapidly approaching the age where we might have three generations of people that have grown up with Lego. Lego first came around in the very late ‘60s, early '70s. And so it's not inconceivable that you might have three generations that had Lego as a child, especially if you grew up in Denmark. A little bit different when it would come to the rest of Europe as they expanded out. So I get to this point, and I'm getting into Lego and doing all this sort of stuff. Andrew Webb: And then, of course, COVID happens and then lockdown happens and we all think the world's going to end and no one knows. Everyone's looking for hobbies, aren't they? They say you were either hunk, drunk or chunk after lockdown. You either got fit, got fat or got alcoholic. So try to avoid those three things. And, you know, everyone's looking for stuff to do, so you have so much banana bread you can bake. And so I stupidly, with my daughter's help, decided to make the Lego Sutton Hoo helmet, the 1500 year old Sutton Hoo helmet found at Sutton Hoo in Suffolk, now in the British Museum. Out of Lego, as you do. Paul Marden: I mean, just exactly. Just as you do. So just a slight segue. I was at the National Attractions Marketing Conference yesterday and there were two people presenting who both talked about their experiences of wacky things that they did during lockdown. There was one person that opened a theatre in her back garden and had various different stars just randomly turn up in her backyard up in North Yorkshire. And you choose to build a Lego Sutton Hoo helmet.Andrew Webb: Lockdown, there will be a time, I think, as we look back, tragic though it was, and, you know, a lot of people died, but it was that moment when society sort of shuffled around a bit and people sort of thought, “Well, if I don't do it now, why not?” People were launching bakeries in their kitchens and serving their community and like. And that element of it. And so people have that. The good side of that, I suppose, is that people did find new outlets of creativity. And Joe Wick's yoga class is in their front row walking groups, you know, all this sort of stuff and beating beaten horsemans and learning to play the violin and dust and stuff. Suddenly we all had to find hobbies because we're all just in. Andrew Webb: No one was going to restaurants, no one's going to bars, no one's going to gigs, nightclubs, theatres. We like to make entertainment at home. It was like the middle ages. So I decided to build the Lego Sutton Hoo helmet, as you do. And so I start this in lockdown, and then, like, I get wind that Netflix is making a film called The Dig. And The Dig is all about, I think it's Lily James and Ray Fiennes in it, and it's all those other people. And it's all about when they found theSutton Hoo helmet. And the guy who found it was called Basil Brown, and he was asked by Edith Pretty, who owned the land, to excavate these humps in the ground that were on her estate. Paul Marden: Okay, so she owns this big estate, in Suffolk, right? And, so she can clearly see there's burial mounds in the back garden, but doesn't know what's in them. Doesn't have any clue that there's treasure locked up inside this. Andrew Webb: I'm not even sure she knew there were anglo saxon burial maps since it was. Paul Marden: They were just lumps of ground in the garden. Andrew Webb: Yeah. I mean, she may have had inkling and other stuff I've turned up over the years and whatever. And some of them were robbed sort of georgian times around then. So some people knew what they were and they were somewhere excavated and gold was taken to fund the polynomial wars and whatnot. But she asked Basil Branson, he was like an amateur archaeologist, right? And so he was just like this local guy would cycle over and do. And the film goes into all that, and the film kind of portrays it as working class. Basil Brown should know his place against the sort of British Museum who are sort of the baddies in this film who think they know what. And of course, this is all set against the backdrop of war. So they escalated it all, then they had to rebury it. Andrew Webb: And then it was used as a tank training ground, so lots of tanks rolled over it. So it's a miracle anything was ever found. But when he did find the Sutton Hoo, who told me and a bunch of other things, clasp brooches, shields, weapons and whatever, when he did find it, so people think it kind of popped out the ground as a helmet, but it didn't. And if you look at the photos, it came out the ground in hundreds of pieces. Paul Marden: Oh, really? So you look at this reconstructed mask that's now in the British Museum, and you think, “Oh, so they just found that in one piece,” lifted out as if it was a Lego hat, you know, for a minifig. In one piece? No, not at all. Andrew Webb: It was actually more like a big parlour Lego in the fact that it was just in hundreds of thousands of pieces. And so there was the first guy to have a go at it was an elderly architect at the British Museum who was, I think, blind in one eye. And he had a go at putting it all together. And he used an armature and clay and pins and whatever, put it all together and said, “Yes, I think it was this.” And then actually it wasn't. He got it all wrong. Lots of different pieces after some more research, and then it falls to this. Nigel Williams is another sub architect, and he was famous for. Andrew Webb: There was a famous Portland vase that was broken in a museum by someone pushing it over as a sort of what you might call, like a just stop oil type of protest now, I can't remember what the call was, but someone smashed an exhibit. And he had painstakingly pieced all this together. He was a total dapper dude. Three piece suit, Chelsea boots, proper swinging sixties, and he had to go and put it all together. His version is the one that's in the British Museum, but he was a massive jigsaw fan. And if you think about Lego, what it is a 3d jigsaw. You get a bunch of pieces and you have to make. Make it into a 3d sculpture. So that was one reason, the dig was the other reason. Andrew Webb: The third reason was that the relationship between East Anglia and essentially Denmark and Billand and Anglo Saxon and Jutland and all that area, I'm talking like Vikings and Anglo Saxons and invasions and all this kind of stuff against the native British, there is essentially a relationship between East Anglia, a trade relationship and a conquest relationship between them. So I built this thing and I frantically put it together and I'm late nights and just losing my marbles trying to get this thing to work. Because Lego is not designed to make, like, spherical shapes, necessarily. It's quite blocky. Right. Everyone knows this. It's the square. Paul Marden: Really easy to make a car, really easy to make a house. A spaceship. Andrew Webb: Houses. Brilliant. Yeah. Square stuff is fantastic. But baking, not only a sort of a semicircle, but a hemisphere, which is what essentially a helmet is. Is even harder because you have to get the Lego to bend in two directions. And so a lot of work went into that just to get the actual face piece came together quite easy. And there was once I had the scale of the pieces under the eyes that formed that sort of thing, and then I could build the nose and face. Ideally, it was going to be so that I could put it on my head. I've actually got a massive head. So in the end, I had to realign that and sort of make it into this sort of child sized head. Paul Marden: But it's a wearable thing, right? Andrew Webb: It is. It is wearable. I mean, at one point, it was probably more fragile than the one in the British Museum because it just kept dropping to pieces. So there's a lot of sub plates that are holding together the outer plate. So it's actually sort of. So just quick Lego terminology here. So bricks, obviously are bricks. The flat things with bubbles on are called plates and then the smoother ones are called tiles. Okay. And used a combination of these to create. There's also a technique called SNOT, which stands for Studs Not On Top. We love acronyms in the Lego community. Right? Paul Marden: Completely.Andrew Webb:  So if you say, “Oh, man, I'm an AFOL covered in SNOT,” people know what you want to know what you mean. So after a night in the tiles, I got covered. Yeah. Andrew Webb: Anyway, so I make the helmet, I make the thing, and then, you know, I get a lot of support from the National Trust, specifically East of England National Trust and Sutton, who site itself because it's there. It's their crown jewels. The British Museum, not so much, because they was like, we've got a billion exhibits here. No, it's just one of them. When you've got the Tippecar moon and the Rosetta stone, it kind of pales into significant. But actually, they were helpful. And one of the curators there, who was on Twitter, who sent me a link to some 3d photos, because if you. If you google it's all pictures at the front. That's fantastic. But what does the back look like? Paul Marden: Oh, right, okay. Andrew Webb: So actually, buried deep in the British Museum's website, in their research department, under a filing cabinet, in the back of a server somewhere, are some quite technical photographic images of it, turning every sort of 30 degrees so that. That it's documented as to what it looks. Because you got to remember that everything on the helmet is symbolic of various different things. There is symbols that mean there's a guy on a horse who's sort of fighting and all this sort of stuff. And it all has quite a lot of meaning. I can occur from different parts of history as well. So there's some sort of roman influencing things there and symbols. And so this whole thing is designed to be not only a battle helmet, but it is also because, remember, crowns haven't been invented yet. Crowns are a later mediaeval sort of invention. Andrew Webb: So this is both a symbol of authority, headwear, like a crown, but also a weapon or a piece of defensive armour and equipment. So it has several functions in its life. So it's quite a complex piece of equipment, that this symbol of authority. So I make all this and then I also submit it to a thing called Lego Ideas. So Lego Ideas is a fantastic programme where anybody in the world, members of the public, can submit Lego Ideas, right? And they go onto a website. There's certain criteria, they have to meet a certain checklist, but then the rest of the public can vote for them. So, I mean, if Taylor Swift just stuck together a load of blocks and said, “Vote for this,” she probably hit the 10,000 threshold instantly. Andrew Webb: But I'm not sure Lego would necessarily take that forward as a build. So there is a judging panel that. But actually, some of the most recent really fantastic sets have come out of Lego Ideas. Members of the public, and they're designing things that the Lego designers wouldn't have thought of themselves. So I think that's been kind of interesting. Sadly, Paul, we didn't make the 10,000 threshold. We did a lot of media coverage. By then, lockdown was over and were sort of getting back to our lives and all this sort of stuff. And my daughter was entering her dark ages. And so it sat in my studio for another sort of year and a half and I thought, “What am I going to do with this?” And so in the end, I thought, “Well, you know what? It's gathering dust here. I'm fed up with it, dustin it.”Andrew Webb: And so I actually approached Josh Ward at the National Trust at Sutton Hoo, who has been a fantastic advocate for Lego and for this particular project, and I have to thank him immensely for that. And they got some money and some funding to build a cabinet and also to house it. So I donated it to National Trust and it is now on display there as part of their firmament of interpretational trail. Paul Marden: That must feel pretty good fow you. Andrew Webb: Yeah, it is quite good looking in there and watching kids go, “Wow.” Because Lego is one of those things instantly recognisable for kids. But certain hill as a site is quite complex for children to contextualise because essentially it's several mounds in the ground. And the helmet itself is at the British Museum. Right. They've got a replica built by the royal armouries. There were several of those. They've got those. They have loads of dress up, they have great explainers and videos and they do a lot of work to show the size and shape and things as a cast iron sculpture, to represent the boat, to show just how big it was when it was pulled up from the sea, because he's buried in a boat. So do a lot of that work, sort of that sort of work as well. Andrew Webb: But having this extra funding in the. They opened up Edith's pretty's house now, and having this room where we've got some other things as well, like crayons and paper and other tools and drawings and colouring in and Lego and big chest of Lego just helps, particularly smaller children who, by the time they've walked from the car park around the site, and it has probably flagged it a little bit. And so just providing that little support for them, it's been a fantastic way to contextualise and another way to interpret that. And I think more and more venues could look into that. When you think, well, how else can we add stuff, particularly for children to help tell the story of this place? Paul Marden: Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. We went to. It was half term last week and went to the City Museum in Winchester. So they've got some mediaeval, they've got some Roman finds there, and there was lots of fun, but they had. It was full of lots of ways for kids to engage, so there was trails to go around, there was colouring in, make your own mediaeval shield. And all of these things are ways that, you know, my ten year old could engage with it because there's only so many glass cabinets of stuff dug up from the ground that she actually wants to look at. Andrew Webb: I mean, I love. I love pit rivers, right, in Oxford, my favourite museum. Paul Marden: It's crazy, isn't it? I love it. Andrew Webb: But basically, he just went around the world nicking stuff. Right, but as a collection of objects, It's fantastic. Paul Marden: It's deeply unnerving. Andrew Webb: Sorry, sorry if any pit rivers curators are listening there, nick, and stuff about it, but, it is my favourite museum because it's just for kids. It's probably really kind of like, how do you tell that story? I also think there was an article in the garden recently that, you know, the cost of living crisis as well. Parents are looking for value solutions now and so I think it wasn't Peppa Pig World, it was Paddington World. And a family ticket is 170 pounds. That is a huge dent in the family finances for a 70 minutes experience. If you are watching the pennies, if you can afford that and save up for it, whatever. And I know these things are, you know, memory making and all that sort of stuff, and I've been to Harry Potter with my daughter. Andrew Webb: That is not cheap, but it's a fantastic day out because once you're in, you spend the whole day there. If you take a packed lunch, you can save a lot of money on that, on the thing. But I suppose what I'm saying is that, you know, our museums and galleries, particularly traditionally, the what you might call free spaces, public spaces, are facing unprecedented demand in terms of parents looking for cost effective value days out, as well as funding being cut from central government and that sort of. So they have to do a huge amount with less and less for a bigger audience. And that is a strain on any institution and things like that. Other examples of places that get this. Andrew Webb: So obviously with the Sutton Hoo helmet, the hold in Ipswich, which is Suffolk Council's kind of flagship museum in the county town of Ipswich, but instead of calling it, you know, the Museum of Suffolk, they've called it The Hold, which is a reference to the fact it's on, I think it's either because it's on the shore or it's doing sheep, I'm not sure anyway. But a fantastic space, contemporary modern space  had a Lego exhibition a few years ago, borrowed my helmet, had some Lego exhibition stuff to do. And the good thing about that is when these teams have to do quite a lot of comms marketing and, you know, that has a cost as well, but often you see different demographics than perhaps would normally go to a stones and bones museum, if you know what I mean. Right. Andrew Webb: You'll see that it makes it more accessible to the community and to different people who don't like going and looking at the Magna Carta or whatever. For some kids, a day at the British Library is fantastic. Look at all these old books for more, maybe more boisterous children. That's probably not a really great idea. So I think galleries can take a leaf out of this and think, or museums or any institution really can take a leap out of this and think, “How can we do more for less? And what tools can we have that perhaps we haven't considered before, like Lego, as a way to open up our interpretation and our offering?” So this could work in Museum of Docklands, for example. This could work in the royal armouries. Andrew Webb: There's lots of places where if you looking to improve your children's offering that some form of lego, I mean, it ends up all over the floor, it ends up being taken away. Sometimes you've got to watch out for things like that. But that's why I always recommend, like, just the basic blocks and plates, not minifigures and stuff like that, because, you know, they just end up in kids' pockets and trousers. But I do think it is a fantastic tool for developing that interpretation piece. Paul Marden: So I run a coding club using Lego. Okay. So I work with years four, five and six, typically. And we normally start off by the end of two terms, we will be building robotics, programming things, doing amazing things. But we start at the very beginning with just open up a box, and it is amazing what a bunch of seven, eight and nine year olds can do with a two by four red brick just given bricks. Yeah. And they will build amazing things. Yeah. And they will tell you amazing stories. And you also see real diversity in the behaviours of children, because some children, in that free play context, they do not have the skills to do that. And I had one girl recently who hasn't played with Lego, and free play just blew her mind, and she was in tears because she couldn't embrace the creativity of it.Paul Marden: But then the following week, when we were following instructions, she was great at building from a set of instructions, You can do that from a limited palette and give them a mission. Sutton Hoo, build a, I don't know, a sword, build a shield, build something to interpret what you have seen. You're in the transport museum. Build, build. How did you get to the museum this morning? Give them something to do and then let them go. And half an hour later, you will be amazed by what they will have built. Andrew Webb: I actually did something this at the National Archives down in Kew, where they had a kids exhibition. Well, an exhibition in the summer about wacky inventions, because obviously the National Archives holds the patents for all these things, and they've got things like Victorian top hats with umbrellas in, and, you know, all this kind of crazy Heath Robinson style stuff that, you know, forks with four sets of tines, so you can eat four times as much. It just bonkers. Really interesting things. The curators had gone through and found this wacky world, sort of. What's his name? The guy that illustrates Roald Dahl. They got illustrations and all that. Paul Marden: Quentin Blake. Andrew Webb: Yeah, Quentin Blake, yeah. So they had this Quentin Blake sort of stuff, and, like, there was activities. And I came down for some special stuff because they had the first Lego brick patent in the UK. When it was first launched in the UK, 1963, I think it was. That's when they filed the patent. Paul Marden: And I bet. So that patent would be exactly the same as a two by four brick, now, won't it? Andrew Webb: The patent was for a one by four brick. Isometrically dawn. Just three diets. Just three views with what? It was a construction toy. And then the page. Sorry. And the address was just Railway Station Billund.  There wasn't like, just all the mail just went to the railway station in Billund just addressed for attention of Lego. And it's only like. I mean, it's not even a sheet of A4, It's a piece like this. And after it is something like a lamp that won't blow out on a thing, and before it's like some special kind of horse comb, but it's kind of this bonkers catalogue of just these things. But again, it was about, “Right. We did some work. The curators and interpreters looked, you know, had kids analyse the painting to think, what could it be? And look at the dates and structure. Look at that.” Andrew Webb: And then I came out and, like, did some Lego. So we did things like, who can build the longest bridge? Who can build the tallest tower out of a single colour? Those sorts of exercises. But then also the free play was build your own wacky invention. And kids are building automatically dog washers, where the dog ran on a thing and it scrubbed its back. And one kid built something that was like a thing for removing getting pips out of apples. It was just like this sort of like this crazy little tool. They like some sort of problem that he had. Andrew Webb: And I think what this also speaks to is developing those stem skills in children and adults and building that engineering, because I've also ran Lego workshops with explorers who I used to, I thought were between Cubs and scouts, but are actually after scouts. So I did this in my local town, here in Saffron Walden, and was like, “Oh, my God, these kids are like, 15, 16. They're not going to want to play Lego. Some of them are in my daughter's year at school, so. Hello, Amy.” And it was really interesting because we did a series of challenges with them. So the egg drop challenge, can you protect an egg and drop it from the floor? And can you build this and work together? Another good one is looker, runner, builder. Andrew Webb: So you give everybody two sets of the same bricks, and one person is the looker, one person is the runner, one person is the builder. So the looker can't touch, but he can tell the runner. The runner can't look at the model, he can only tell the builder, and the builder can't speak back. And so this is a really useful exercise. And I've done this with teams where, because this is exactly what businesses see, engineering will build a product. Sales or their marketing are like, what the hell is, you know, or whatever it might be. Paul Marden: It's that. It's that classic cartoon of a Swing, yeah. Andrew Webb: Yeah. So it's that, you know, this is what the brief said. Engineering interpreter does this. Marketing saw it. So it's a great tool for things like that. Especially when you put people like the C Suite or CEO's or leaders at the end, because all they're getting is the information and it. It's there and it's how to build communications. Because in life, the fluctuations reverse. A CEO says, “Let's do this.” And by the time it's cascaded down to engineering, who don't get a say, it's not at all what he imagined so, or they imagined so, it's. It's an interesting case of using tools like that. So I did that with these kids and it was fascinating because they're 14, 15, 16.Andrew Webb: A group of three girls won two out of the three challenges and probably could have won a third one if I felt that I couldn't award it to them again because it would just look weird. And they were smashing the looker runner builder thing. They were working together as a team, they were concentrating, they were solving problems, they were being creative, they took some time to prototype, they refined and iterated their design. They were doing all this sort of work. And it's brilliant because 15 year old girls don't often take engineering related STEM subjects at GCSE. Certainly, probably don't take them at a level and more than enough. And I think that I once interviewed Eben Upton, who invented Raspberry Pi, and he said, “We think about the eighties as this sort of like golden age of computing, but actually it was terrible. It was terrible for diversity, it was terrible for inclusion.“Andrew Webb: And he said, “Like growing up, there was one other kid in his town that had a computer, you know, so there was no sort of way to sort of getting other people involved and make this accessible.” And part of the reason now computers have got smaller. Some of the work I did at Pytop was like trying to make technology more accessible and seeing it not just video games and things like that, but actually I can use this in a fashion show, or I can make music, or I can use this to power some lights to do a theatre production, and trying to bring the, I guess, the creative arts into technology. And that's when we start to see the interest application of technology. Andrew Webb: And Lego plays a part in that, in the fact that it is a tool, a rapid prototyping tool that everybody is familiar with. And it is also, you know, clean, safe. There's no, you don't need blow torches and saws and those sorts of things to kind of prototype anything. You don't even need a pair of scissors, you know, it's completely tool free, unless you're using that little mini separator to get your bricks apart. And so I think that just circle back on, like, how the Science Museum or what's the one down there? Isabel Kingdom Brunel Museum and things like that. I can see those guys could be and should be thinking about, “How could we have a Lego programme?“Andrew Webb: You don't have to have a permanent deployment like they've got at Sutton Hoo although that is great because they've got the mast there as the head piece of it. But certainly a programme of events or summer camps or summer events, because I did this with English Heritage at Kenilworth Castle as well. They were having, like, a big Lego build and the public were invited in 15-minute shifts into a big marquee and everyone got given a tile. And the idea was to build the gardens because the gardens at Kenilworth Castle were laid out to impress Elizabeth the first. And so everybody got there was like bunches of stuff and regular bricks, also flowers and this sort of stuff. And it was like, “Come on, we've got to build something to impress a queen.” Andrew Webb: He said to kids, like, “Yeah, you've got to impress. Bling it up, like, dial it to ten.” And were just getting these enormous, like, avatar sized trees with just incredible bits hanging off it. And like, “There she has a teapot because she might want a cup of tea.” And you're like, “Brilliant, excellent. Of course she does.”  And so I think that. And then they moved through. Some of the Legos were selected to be displayed and things like that. So there's different ways you can do it. You can either do it as like. And I'm a big fan of the drop in sessions because kids and parents can just naturally build it into their day rather than the pre built. My child was. We were rubbish at, like, organising things. Andrew Webb: People like, “Oh, great. Half term, it's a chocolate thing, sold out ". And you're like, yeah, because there's 30 spaces for three and a half thousand kids who want to do it. Whereas if it's like a walkthrough or a. In groups phase through and then the activity, small kids kind of conk out after about 20 minutes, half an hour anyway. You get much more people through and much more people get to enjoy the experience rather than the 30 organised people who got up early and booked. So that's my other top tip to any institution, because it's heavily weather dependent as well. Sun comes out, everyone piles pass into the nearest sort of stately home, national attraction. All of those places can definitely benefit English Heritage. Did a really big push this half term, just gone on Lego at several events. Andrew Webb: We had one here at Audley End, there was one at Kenilworth that I was at. There's been pairs of the ones all around the country, because again, you just need a marquee, which most venues have access to because they use them for other things or some sort of space in case it rains. And you just see someone like me and a whole massive tub of Lego and you're off to the races. Paul Marden: Exactly. So we were talking about this at the conference yesterday about ways in which. So for many attractions, people turning up is a literal flip of a coin. Is the weather good or is the weather bad? What can you do to adapt your attraction to be able to deal with when it's bad? And then what can you do to bring people when you have made that adaptation? So, you know, you've now got a marquee and you have a Lego exhibit that you can put into there. So it's just dumping a pile of Lego and a bunch of well trained volunteers or visitor experienced people who can facilitate that, police it, little Johnny sticking minifigs in his pocket. Paul Marden: And then you turn on your Google Adwords and show that you've got this, you know, bad weather reason to go to a stately home that my daughter would turn her nose up to all of a sudden, “Okay, we're going to go and do that. We're going to go and have afternoon tea and you're going to go and play with some Lego and see some animals, maybe.” Yeah, what can you do to attract that extra audience and adapt to the bad weather and service different sorts of people? Andrew Webb: I think that comes down to a bear in mind. I convert some of my Lego lens rather than a venue lens. But I think speaking as a parent and someone who does this is you need a reason to go back to somewhere that you already know. Okay, so you go to Stonehenge, you go and look at the stones, you go, “Wow.” You look at the visitor centre and then it's ticked off. I mean, you see busloads of tourists. Stonehenge is at Cambridge, maybe, or Oxford people, when people do England, Lambeth, Heathrow, London Crown Jewels, Tower Bridge, West End, day trip out on a coach to Stonehenge, maybe to Cambridge, and that's it, off to Paris. Right? So parents like British people like that too. Like why go to Stonehenge four times a year? Or why go to any venue when you're familiar with it? Andrew Webb: It's always about offering something new and something different. Audley End up near where I live, I think, is English Heritage. All through July, every Sunday, they're just doing music. So there's a string quartet or someone with a harp or maybe someone with a guitar or whatever. And you've got a book, but it's. It's not like there's 30 places and it's a bonfight. It's just like, “Oh, wow, they've done something different.” They do a really great thing. Like, they do victorian falconry, for example. So they get someone in who talks about how Victorians use falconry for hunting as a sport, but also for the kitchen table, and they're flying falcons around and doing the whole bit of meat on a string and all this sort of stuff. And everyone, like, “They do a world war two one.”Andrew Webb: I mean, the editorial calendar for any venue's got to look like, “Go and make Christmas food. January, we're closed to kind of dust and clean everything. Valentine's Day, chocolate make you put. It's daffodils”, it's whatever it might be. And then you just build that. Build that programme in and you need. This is why I think that venues now, again, I'll just come back to that. You talk about AdWords, but that, again, is more spend. It's like, how'd you build that mail list? How do you drop into the local Facebook groups and Mumsnet and all that kind of stuff? You know, that's where you can do it organically rather than. Because people don't sit in front of Google necessarily, or think, like, what should we do? Paul Marden: You sit on the sofa on a Thursday night trying to figure out what on earth are we going to do this weekend? Yeah, so you're completely right. The mum's net, the content marketing, is hugely important, isn't it? Andrew Webb: Which is my job. But also it's kind of like how can institutions become part of that? When I say community, if you think about most people travel a thin hour to go somewhere. I mean, people go further afield, you know, but. But basically it's like, what? My mom turns, like, a tea and a pee. So you've got to go somewhere. You've got to have a cup of tea, visit the loos. It's all about tea. It's all about canteens and loos, basically. You could have a World Heritage Site, UNESCO World Heritage site. And it's like, how good's the caf? And are the toilets clean? Yeah, that's what people remember. Gar went hens at dawn. I was awed by the majestic. But that Looney D cleaning, you know, it's not good. It's all that people come home with. Andrew Webb: So, you know, institutions go into place that they are trying to offer different things. Like late nights. We've talked about that. How can we use this space after hours? Because if you think about it, if your institution's open 10 till 6, most people are at work five days a week, you're gonna have students and pensioners who are gonna be not great spenders, either of those two groups. So, late nights, I went to a great one in the National Gallery when the James Bond film. I was kind of sitting royale or whatever. He's still on the top of the National Gallery overlooking Trafalgar Square, and they've got the national dining rooms there and they had Vesper Martini, everyone got a cocktail. Andrew Webb: And then went to look at the fighting Temeraire, which is the bit where he's standing with Q, the new Q, who voices Paddington, whose name escapes me and gives him, like, a gun and a radio, but they're like the fighting Temeraire by Turner is this little thing. And so, you know, you've got to make hay out of that, right? You've got to sort of, like, do a late night, various ones. And so all it was a few cocktails in the cafe next door and are taught by the curator and stuff like that. But 30 people just looking for an experience. And so if venues are clever, of course, the dark side of this is when you get Willy Wonka world up in Scotland. Andrew Webb: Or interestingly, some of the Lego events that have been happening at NEC have caused a massive online backslash in the community for just being exceptionally bad value for money. And so you read about these things that people have said, “Come and visit Santa's grotto, and it's just a muddy field with a tree in it,” so you've got to be careful. But I think those events, those sort of fly by night kind of institutions, don't really work. But how galleries can leverage the creativity of what they're doing? Whether they are come and paint in our, you know, our local gallery, come and have an art class, come and do that. People are looking for stuff to do that is value for money. That isn't always drink lead, you know, it's not always cocktail making or things like that. Andrew Webb: And that comes with a whole heap of other things and dietary requirements for cookery courses and just clean up and the mess and all that kind of stuff. So I think that, yeah, canning organisations, the ones that can really think about that, and I'm happy to help organisations who want to think about this, especially through the life of Lego. They will be the ones that will start to add and build out and develop their. What you might term this whole sector needs a name. The kind of extracurricular offering, we might say, above and beyond their collection and then their traditional interpretation and if they're. Paul Marden: Thinking of doing this. So there's a good why. Yeah, the why is you can reach diverse audiences, helps people with interpretation. Andrew Webb: Quite cheap. Paul Marden: Yeah, absolutely. It's a cheap way of extending your offering and diversifying what you do. You can bring in event elements to this, but how do they do it? Apart from engaging with somebody like you? And I'm going to guess there's not many people like you. So that's going to be a tricky thing for some people to do. But if they were starting from scratch, how would they go about doing this? You said earlier, “Don't go mad with buying the bricks and spending a fortune on.”Andrew Webb: There are people like me that can do all this as well as myself. I think that the first thing is plan it. Plan what you need to do. You can't throw this stuff together. You might be looking at. Already the hold have been contacting me for a late night they're doing in September. They contacted me April. Paul Marden: Okay. Andrew Webb: Because if you're a creator, you're planning exhibitions, you are thinking on that long term cycle. Paul Marden: Yeah, completely. Andrew Webb: And so what you need to do is bake this in as part of that curational process or part of the interpretation of things at the start, rather than like, “Right, we're doing exhibit on Peter Rabbit, let's chuck in a load of fluffy bunnies or whatever.” You know, it's got to be. You've got to think about it and have it contextualised. I think the best things are. What success looks like is, first of all, you need a space. Now you can hire a marquee that comes with a cost. If you're a venue and you've got your own or you've got a hall or a stables or interpretational room or something like that, often spaces, specifically bigger ones, will have classroom spaces for school groups anyway. So that's often that can be where you can host these sorts of events. Kids are very familiar. Andrew Webb: The chairs are all small wall colour, you know, etc. Industrial strength carpet in case stuff gets built. So locations like where you're going to stage this? Paul Marden: Yeah. Andrew Webb: Secondly, I think you need to think about, what do we want people to do? What is the experience? What is the narrative piece? Because you can't just say, here's a big part of Lego. Kids will just build cars and houses, right? You know, they need context. You know, if you give a kid a sheet of paper, you could draw anything. They're like, well, what? And so you need to give them a mission almost. They need a task, I think. Also think about, as I said before, keeping the tasks around 20 minutes, because actually adding the time running out jeopardy element is quite fun for kids because they'll go, “Well, I've only got five minutes left.” And often that's when it all falls apart and then they have to iterate the design. Andrew Webb: So think about that kind of moving people through in 15 to 20 minutes cycles. We had kids at Kenilworth, that would go out the exit and just walk back around and come in the front like that. Like four or five times. One boy came in, he was loving it. So think about that. Think about how you're going to move people through the space. Think about what you need to envisage it. So the Kenilworth, for example, there was me hosting it from dawn toward dusk. We had another builder there who was helping take break it all down and put them against the model that we built. There were two members of staff who were letting people through, so just monitoring it from an entry exit point of view, walkie talkies, in case people had issues and things like that. Andrew Webb: And think about when you're going to do it. Okay, so half term is a good one. It's a good thing to do. We saw a lot of this at Kenilworth, but I've seen other places as well, particularly half terms and things like that. You often see grandparents caring for grandchildren, right? Because parents are at work and grandparents can only walk around the site so much before they want to sit down. So sometimes have it, like, think about where they can. And when I was at Kenilworth, grandparents came in with their two grandkids, and the kids started playing and I was like, you could join in, too. Oh, no, I don't want it. You know, they were almost like, “I can't do this. It's like, come on, get in, get in. Come on, grandma. Come on. I'll show you how it works. “Andrew Webb: By the end of that session, they were memory making. I then took their photo with their phones, they'd have this sort of grandparent. But, you know, you always say it like, my grandfather taught me to fish. Like Sean Connery says in the hunt for red October. This sort of moment where sort of, it's a Hollywood trope that grandfather knowledge is sort of passed on type of thing. Right. And so you can see that where you could have this, almost either the reverse of that, of kids showing grandparents, but also they're all having this event outside of the parental unit. So it's a new type of experience. It adds value, it gets people to play with their grandkids. Paul Marden: Priceless. Andrew Webb: So I think that's kind of an interesting way. So think about when, think about where and think about what will be my three sort of tips for any institution looking to put this together. Paul Marden: You gave one the other day which I thought was priceless, which was, don't give them wheels. Andrew Webb: Oh, yes. Paul Marden: Don't include the wheels. Andrew Webb: Take the wheels out of any sets, unless you are the Transport Museum or the, you know, a car based museum, because kids will do wings as well. I'd probably suggest taking those out because kids have just built cars. Some kids have just built cars, you know, even if you give them a mission. Unless that is the mission. The other thing that I would think that venues could do as well as sort of all day events, because it's quite a time drain, you know, on staff and this sort of stuff, but it is a value. The other thing you can think about is one off evening events for adults. Yes, I've done this. I did this at my local add them shops. Bricks, beers and bubbles challenges supercompass teams. Think of it like a pub quiz with brick is the answer. Andrew Webb: So build me a thing that does that kind of thing. Teams all get together, you can race them, you can see who goes the furthest. You can do all this stuff. And the hold is what I'm doing at the hold in September. I did it at the hold a couple of years ago. And what was interesting was that we had quite diverse groups of adults. We had just couples who were clearly AFOLs and were like, “Yeah, I'm going to go to that.” We had a group of friends. One of them had just come back from years travelling and they didn't want to go sort of straight to the pub and just interrogate him about his travelling, whatever. Andrew Webb: They kind of like, “Well, we wanted something to do where we could have a beer and have a chat, but were doing something else whilst we're doing that.” And that's the joy of Lego. Your hands are doing the work and you're almost like the back of your brain is doing the work and you're like, “Oh, yeah, yeah. Before you kick them.” And the concentration levels are there and then you can kind of get into that state of flow. And so they were just having this lovely chat, had a beer, talking about stuff, but also memory making in terms of when he came back from his travelling. So I think that's really important. Andrew Webb: Did you know that this is your brain, right? And then your brain on Lego, there are 24 discrete skills that are happening in your brain. So Lego research this, things like fine motor skills, cognitive sort of thinking about things, future planning, my favourite emotional regulation that is not going, “Oh, my God, it's not working. And smashing all to pieces.” So I've seen this as well with children, is that when you give them a Lego, if you gave them jelly and a football, they'll all just. They're a high energy kind of things, right? And that's fine, great outdoors, kids want to burn off energy. Here's a load of balls. Go crazy, right? Or ball pits, trampolines, bouncy castles, those sorts of things. When you get on Lego, what actually happens is it's very hard to be anarchic, to use a wrong word, but a word. It's very hard to be anarchic with Lego because you can't really do it. Andrew Webb: And so you can get a group of kids together and they'll almost self invigilate. And at one point, I ran it at a local toy shop and the parents are all hanging about and like, “I've never seen them so quiet.” They were just in the state of flow. And so, I think, you know, again, back to the. Back to the explorers and the scouts, that was one of the best sessions that those kids had done as teenagers because the reason was they were given permission to play with Lego. They still had the muscle memory from when they were smaller children. They were solving. They weren't just being told to play with Lego, they were actually solving engineering challenges. How can you design a bridge that will take this weight? How can you protect an egg? How can you think about this? Andrew Webb: And so you need to think about the challenge and the what. You need to think about that, the where and you think about the when, as I said, and get those right. You can have a very exceptional visitor experience for not a huge amount of effort. It's not highly costly, it's not highly technical, it's just a bit of elbow grease and a bit of forward thinking in terms of what we might need. And I think that parents appreciate just that minute away where they can. It's almost like a 20 minute babysitter, right, where they can just go, “Don't touch that.” You know, you're walking around a stately home, “Don't sit there, don't touch. Mind the lady.” All that kind of no data that parents give out institutions, they can just take a breather and check their phones and whatever. Paul Marden: And the kids are just having an amazing time. Andrew Webb: Yeah. And the kids are happy. And at the end of the day, as a parent, we all do our best and you just want, you know, them to be playing with something screen free, getting along and learning something. And, you know, that is the win. That is the ultimate takeout. You can layer on your own institution in context and rev up the visitor experience, bring in new visitors, attract a more diverse group of people that perhaps wouldn't normally come to a Regency Rococo style villa or whatever it might be, then that's all to the better, because, you know, you can start to use this in your planning and you can do what Suntton Hoo did? And go, right, well, we've done this and it's really worked. Andrew Webb: And then I can apply for funding for it and I can expand and I can make it permanent and then I can sort of say, well, this now becomes a tool and a string and arbo for our educational. It doesn't have to be split between visitor attractions and development. It can, you know, you can split it between several parts of the institution and use it in different ways, use it for educational purposes as well as visitor experience. So the world's your oyster with a bit of thinking. Paul Marden: With a bit of Lego and a bit of thinking. Andrew Webb: Bit of Lego, yeah. A few bricks and a couple of tricks and you're off to the races. Paul Marden: Andrew, this has been brilliant. Thank you ever so much. Andrew Webb: You're welcome. Paul Marden: I've got one more question for you before we finish. Now, you bottled this earlier on when I said we always have a book recommendation from our guests. And in spite of having the fullest bookshelf I've seen in quite a long time, you've bottled it on a book. But you did offer me a favourite movie. And so what would be your movie recommendation of choice? Andrew Webb: My go to movie would probably be Withnail and I, Richard E. Grant's first film. Every line has came down from God on a tablet. I mean, it is just. Yeah. Richard Griffiths as Uncle Monty, Paul McGann. It's just one of my favourite films and, you know, cult classic that no one's really. Well, people have heard of it now, but again, they even make stuff out with Alan Eyright. So you can go and watch a screening of it at the farm at Crow Crag up in Penrith, you know, and everyone dresses up and everyone comes with Mister blathering sets tea and I come on holiday by mistake and Jessie says, Danny. Andrew Webb: And, you know, fortunately, for better or for worse, I know these are tough times, but people try and find the fun in things. They try and at the end of the day, everyone's looking for a good time, whether we're children or an adult. You want something to just have a laugh and take you away for a moment. And if films and culture but also experiences can do that, then that's all for the good. Paul Marden: Well, look, this is going to be a challenge, but listeners, if you would like a copy of Andrew's film recommendation, then when we release the show message on X, if you can retweet that and say, “Give me Andrew's movie”, then the first person that does that, somehow I will get the movie to you. It might be on VHS, it might be on DVD, but somehow we will get you a movie. Andrew Webb: I found a CD the other day from a bar I used to go to in Clapham in the noughties and late ‘90s. I said to my mate, look, I'm great, put it on. And I went, “I can't.” I haven't got a CD player anymore. I had to go dig through a box somewhere in the study to find a portable CD player that plugged into my computer that could. By the end of it, we're just laugh. Forget it. Paul Marden: Andrew, this has been wonderful. Thank you ever so much. Andrew Webb: You're welcome. Cheers. Paul Marden: Thanks for listening to Skip the Queue. If you've enjoyed this podcast, please leave us a five star review. It really helps others find us. And remember to follow us on Twitter for your chance to win the books that have been mentioned. Skip The Queue is brought to you by Rubber Cheese, a digital agency that builds remarkable systems and websites for attractions that helps them increase their visitor numbers. You can find show notes and transcriptions from this episode and more over on our website, SkiptheQueue.fm. The 2024 Visitor Attraction Website Survey is now LIVE! Help the entire sector:Dive into groundbreaking benchmarks for the industryGain a better understanding of how to achieve the highest conversion ratesExplore the "why" behind visitor attraction site performanceLearn the impact of website optimisation and visitor engagement on conversion ratesUncover key steps to enhance user experience for greater conversionsFill in your data now (opens in new tab)

In this episode I read the classic hilarious Mumsnet thread “p beaker” & also a Reddit post containing cutlery! Hope you enjoy!

Today, Chris Mason has sat down with the Shadow Chancellor Rachel Reeves for Newscast. She's given the annual Mais lecture to financiers in the City of London, where she set out Labour's economic plan if they were to win the election.The Mais lecture is a prestigious gathering where chancellors, shadow chancellors and Bank governors have outlined their principles for running the economy in front of an audience of City financiers and economists.And, we find out about the shortage places at nurseries and childminders for pre-school children. James Cook has been speaking to Rhiannon Evans from Mumsnet. You can join our Newscast online community here: https://tinyurl.com/newscastcommunityhere Newscast brings you daily analysis of the latest political news stories from the BBC. It was presented by James Cook. It was made by Jack Maclaren with Miranda Slade, Maddie Drury and Joe Wilkinson. The technical producer was Hannah Montgomery. The assistant editor was Chris Gray. The senior news editor was Sam Bonham

Hey lovely ones!   All is explained in the opening gambit, but I hope you enjoy the natter, and normality resumes next week x   Love, Kev & Bek x

Have you ever noticed a man explaining something to a woman in a supremely confident way which suggests he absolutely knows more than her about the subject? Well, there's a term for that, which is mansplaining. A recent thread on parenting forum Mumsnet invited women to share their worst examples of mansplaining. Among them were patronising explanations of the offside rule, a gas man telling a qualified engineer to wait for her partner to get home so he could tell him how to fix the boiler rather than her and a male doctor telling a pregnant woman not to worry as C-sections aren't painful! How long has mansplaining been around? Why do men do this then? Are they really all that bad? In under 3 minutes, we answer your questions! To listen to the last episodes, you can click here: How can you avoid bed bugs when you travel? What is microwork? How does pollution affect my mental health? A podcast written and realised by Joseph Chance. First broadcast: 19/07/2021 In partnership with upday UK. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

More than half of mothers have experienced physical or psychological birth trauma leading them less likely to have more children because of their experience of maternity care. That's according to a study by Mumsnet instigated by Conservative MP Theo Clarke. She has founded an all-party parliamentary group on birth trauma to advocate for change following her own harrowing experience during childbirth, where she faced a third-degree tear and emergency surgery.In this episode I sit down with a courageous couple, Angelisa and Veneline Nikolov, who openly share their emotional journey through birth trauma. We also engage in a compelling discussion with Kim Thomas from the Birth Trauma Association,  and I share my own experiences of birth trauma including a complication called shoulder dystocia which left me and my newborn with serious injuries.We delve into the profound impact of childbirth trauma on women's mental health, exploring the flashbacks, physical and mental injuries, guilt, and isolation that can follow. Angelisa and Veneline's candid stories emphasize the critical need for empathy and support for those who have experienced birth trauma.We talk about the attitude of health care workers and our feeling of failure after our traumatic births -and what can be done to help people who suffer from birth trauma and how the system can be improved.Tune in as we explore these crucial issues and call for a more compassionate approach to childbirth and improved maternity care for all women.#BirthTrauma#MaternityCare#EmpathyInHealthcare#MentalHealth#SupportForMothers#ChildbirthJourney#AdvocacyForChange#BirthTraumaAwareness#CompassionateCare#MaternalMentalHealth#ParentingJourney#MotherhoodMatters#NewParents#FamilySupport#WomenEmpowerment#HealthcareAdvocacy#BirthStories#EmpoweringMothers#MaternalSupport#MaternityRights#MaternalWellbeing#HealthcareReform#MaternityExperience#SharingStories#AwarenessMattersSupport the showhttps://www.angelawalkerreports.com/

A Canadian real estate agent was slapped with a $15K fine after home surveillance footage captured him going into a client's fridge between showings and laying his lips on the family's milk container for a refreshing sip of vitamin D. a resident complained about the noise they make walking around their flat and when "chopping tomatoes." The strange list of concerns came to light after the mum of the family in question turned to Mumsnet for advice. Keen to know how far she should go to appease her downstairs neighbor, she explained the woman has had a problem with their noise level for years. Frank Siragusa, a New York man has filed a class-action lawsuit against Taco Bell, alleging that the company misrepresented the amount of beef, beans and other ingredients in advertisements & deceptive photography for its Crunchwrap Supreme and Mexican Pizza items.  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

After having a literal human come out of you, getting little to no sleep and suddenly being entirely responsible for another human being is not exactly conducive to new parents' sex life. But when you are at a point where you want to start having sex again, what do you do?Cecile Gasnault, brand director of Smile Makers Collection, joins us this week to tell us all about the research the company has done into having sex after birth. Mothers - being the ones who have actually given birth - are often worried about having sex after birth and the research shows that they aren't given nearly enough information about when the right time is to start having sex again or how to go about doing it. They might be scared of experiencing pain during sex or causing unnecessary complications in their healing. Cecile tells us what Smile Makers have discovered in their research with Mumsnet and all about their vibrator The Whisperer, the first ever created with new mothers' pleasure in mind. Listen in to hear all the details, you can find more of Smile Makers, the sex toy company focused on women's pleasure, on their website and their Instagram. As always you can find more of us on Instagram, Tiktok, Facebook and Threads @sextraspodcast, on our website or contact us sextraspodcast@gmail.com. This episode is part of our Family & Parenting miniseries, find the whole miniseries here. Or, catch up with previous related episodes like ‘Talking With My Mum' Parts 1 and 2, Why Learn Your Attachment Style?, Family Matters and Our Sexual Genesis.Produced by Mable ProductionsOriginal music by Sacha Puttnam Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this straight-talking podcast brought to you by Intelligence Squared, Chris Hirst cuts through the bullshit and gets to the heart of modern leadership.  In this episode, Chris speaks to Justine Roberts, the founder and CEO of Mumsnet to talk about the journey of building Mumsnet into the phenomenon it is today, along with the unique challenges of leading a community driven business.  Chris Hirst is the author of the award-winning book, No Bullsh*t Leadership: Why the World Needs More Everyday Leaders and Why That Leader Is You. Chris' latest book, No Bullsh*t Change, is published on June 1 2023. His brand new online leadership training programme is available on his website (www.chris-hirst.com)  Connect with Chris Hirst on LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/chrishirst/), Twitter (@chrishirst) & Instagram (@chrishirst_leadership). Watch exclusive content and original videos from Chris Hirst on YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCNC4qT90ArKOuKV8B0LWTWA) This podcast was produced and edited by Isabella Soames. — We'd love to hear your feedback and what you think we should talk about next, who we should have on and what our future debates should be.  Send us an email or voice note with your thoughts to podcasts@intelligencesquared.com or Tweet us @intelligence2.  And if you'd like to support our mission to foster honest debate and compelling conversations, as well as ad-free podcasts, exclusive bonus content, early access and much more, become a supporter of Intelligence Squared today. Just visit intelligencesquared.com/membership to find out more. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Following the birth of his daughter, Elliott Rae was diagnosed with PTSD. Here, the founder of MusicFootballFatherhood (dubbed "the dads' version of Mumsnet" by the BBC) speaks to Ruth Jackson about experiencing God in the midst of suffering. He shares how becoming a father changed his life and theology. Plus, we hear about how Dwayne Johnson - aka 'The Rock' - ended up sharing an article he wrote! For Elliott Rae: https://musicfootballfatherhood.com/ • Subscribe to the Unapologetic podcast: https://pod.link/1622170986 • More podcasts, free ebook & newsletter: https://premierunbelievable.com • Watch Unapologetic YouTube playlist: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL2Ds_nyh5gM_0OQDM3me0ZjLcNg2345GX • For conference & live events: http://www.unbelievable.live • For our apologetics courses: https://www.premierunbelievable.com/training • Support us in the USA: http://www.premierinsight.org/unbelievableshow • Support us in the rest of the world: https://www.premierunbelievable.com/donate

In this straight-talking podcast brought to you by Intelligence Squared, Chris Hirst cuts through the bullshit and gets to the heart of modern leadership.  In this episode, Chris speaks to Justine Roberts, the founder and CEO of Mumsnet to talk about the journey of building Mumsnet into the phenomenon it is today, along with the unique challenges of leading a community driven business.  Chris Hirst is the author of the award-winning book, No Bullsh*t Leadership: Why the World Needs More Everyday Leaders and Why That Leader Is You. Chris' latest book, No Bullsh*t Change, is published on June 1 2023. His brand new online leadership training programme is available on his website (www.chris-hirst.com)  Connect with Chris Hirst on LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/chrishirst/), Twitter (@chrishirst) & Instagram (@chrishirst_leadership). Watch exclusive content and original videos from Chris Hirst on YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCNC4qT90ArKOuKV8B0LWTWA) This podcast was produced and edited by Isabella Soames. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Feminist author Victoria Smith discusses her first book, ‘Hags', about the demonisation of middle-aged women with FiLiA Spokeswoman Raquel Rosario Sánchez. Smith discusses the experiences which raised her awareness to the way middle-aged women are invisibilised and dismissed under patriarchy around the world, as well her understanding of the tropes designed to further vilify this cohort of women. A thoughtful thinker and compassionate writer, this book represents an enraging call to action for everyone, to revindicate our past and create a better future for all women, throughout middle-age and beyond.Victoria Smith is a writer and creator of the Glosswitch newsletter. She has been a regular contributor to the New Statesman and the Independent, focussing on women's issues, parenting and mental health. She has also written for Mumsnet, featured on panels at their Blogfest, and has made appearances on Woman's Hour to discuss female body image. Her newsletter The OK Karen, focused on midlife women's experiences of feminism, was launched in 2020, and she is particularly interested in how experiences of power and misogyny change as we age.Originally from Cumbria, she now lives in Cheltenham with her family. She is working towards achieving full venerable crone status before she hits fifty.You can follow Victoria Smith's commentary on Twitter and read her regular insights on women's rights at The Critic. You can purchase Hags from most bookstores, and you can easily find it at our FiLiA Feminist Library.

Boris Johnson could have been one of the most successful politicians of our time, but the shortcuts he took to get to Downing Street set him up to fail. In this episode, the rise of Boris and the mess he got himself into. Hear what he really thinks of Rishi Sunak, Sue Gray and his own MPs.Guto Harri was Boris Johnson's Communication Chief during one of the most chaotic periods in British political history. He was in the room when the big decisions were made. Join him as he opens the shiny black door to 10 Downing Street and takes you inside.When he first walked over the Number 10 threshold, things weren't normal. A set of circumstances, scandals and chaos that will never be repeated. It was unprecedented.Archive Credits:1. Good Thinking TV2. LBC / Global3. Parliament Live TV 4. PA Media5. UK Supreme Court Live / 24 September 20196. BBC News7. Mumsnet 8. Downing Street Press Conference / February 2022 9. The News Agents / Global 10. AP Archive / ‘Conservative Boris Johnson wins London Mayoral elex'11. The Dame Edna Treatment / ITV / Tiger Aspect Productions12. Have I Got News For You / BBC / Hat Trick Productions13. BBC Newsnight 14. Out4Marriage / ‘Boris Johnson (@MayorofLondon) is Out4Marriage!' / YouTube 15. Pride In London / ‘A Message from the Mayor of London - Boris Johnson | Pride in London 2014' / YouTube 16. On Demand News / ITN Productions17. tomcardy1 / ‘A special song just for you'/ YouTube

Sean and Ashley return for a sixth series of the popular podcast where comedians discuss posts from Mumsnet and AITA forums.In episode seven, Ashley is unable to record and Sean's wife comes on as a guest for a short bonus episode where she immediately makes a Borat joke and we talk about Steve Aoki, things you do for your crush, Vegas, and groomzillas.You can hear Ashley on The Ashley Storrie Show on BBC Radio Scotland at 10 pm every Friday or on the BBC Sounds App.You can also find Ashley and  Sean's sketches from BBC Short Stuff and BBC The Social on the iPlayer, and the BBC Scotland Facebook and Twitter pages. You can find Sean and Ashley on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok @SitDownDad and @AshleyStorrie.Our theme song is "Snap Happy" by Shane Ivers from www.silvermansound.com.If you want to sponsor the show, contact us at awbupodcast@gmail.com, or donate via buymeacoffee.Thanks for listening, and please take a moment to review our show on Apple Podcasts.   

Sean and Ashley return for a sixth series of the popular podcast where comedians discuss posts from Mumsnet and AITA forums.We will be back next week with a brand new episode, but in the meantime, Sean Wilkie and Ashley Storrie present the Are We Being Unreasonable Greatest Hits, including appearances from Viv Gee, Tony Goodall, Raymond Mearns, Holly Jack, Robert Florence, Louise McCarthy, Erin McCardie, Grado, Amelia Bayler, Dulce Sloan, Dando, Rachel Fairburn, Robyn Probert, Elaine Malcomson, Scott Agnew, and Stephen Buchanan (twice).You can hear Ashley on The Ashley Storrie Show on BBC Radio Scotland at 10 pm every Friday or on the BBC Sounds App.You can also find Ashley and  Sean's sketches from BBC Short Stuff and BBC The Social on the iPlayer, and the BBC Scotland Facebook and Twitter pages. You can find Ashley's Twitch on twitch.tv/ashleystorrie You can find Sean and Ashley on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok @SitDownDad and @AshleyStorrie.Our theme song is "Snap Happy" by Shane Ivers from www.silvermansound.com.If you want to sponsor the show, contact us at awbupodcast@gmail.com, or donate via buymeacoffee.Thanks for listening, and please take a moment to review our show on Apple Podcasts.   

Sean and Ashley return for a sixth series of the popular podcast where comedians discuss posts from Mumsnet and AITA forums.In the fifth episode of the series, we talk to actress Kirsty Strain and Writer/Actor/Producer John Stuart about ASMR, village fights, naughty neighbours, and what's in the box?! Also, the Alabama Wet Wipe, Ashley's dog ashes youtube channel, Secret Santa, swingers, re-gifting Ashley's Lego VIP Card, and the Truman complex.You can find the stories we talked about here:https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/4770551-neighbour-has-told-our-village-i-am-a-thiefand https://www.refinery29.com/en-gb/best-am-i-the-asshole-reddit-stories#slide-9You can hear Ashley on The Ashley Storrie Show on BBC Radio Scotland at 10 pm every Friday or on the BBC Sounds App.You can also find Ashley and  Sean's sketches from BBC Short Stuff and BBC The Social on the iPlayer, and the BBC Scotland Facebook and Twitter pages. You can find Ashley's Twitch on twitch.tv/ashleystorrie You can find Sean and Ashley on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok @SitDownDad and @AshleyStorrie.You can follow John and Kirsty on Twitter.And you can watch Dirty Water on STV Player.Our theme song is "Snap Happy" by Shane Ivers from www.silvermansound.com.If you want to sponsor the show, contact us at awbupodcast@gmail.co, or donate via buymeacoffee.Thanks for listening, and please take a moment to review our show on Apple Podcasts.   

Sean and Ashley return for a sixth series of the popular podcast where comedians discuss posts from Mumsnet and AITA forums.In the fourth episode of the series, we talk to fantastic comedian Stuart Mitchell about inappropriate In-Laws, Star Trek with cursing, Abbe Clancy's love for Goblin Pies, how Sean misses lockdown and none of us like going out. And we ask ourselves, are Rice Krispies a reasonable breakfast? What do you order from McDonald's breakfasts? Can you steal from the breakfast buffet?  And what the hell is an American biscuit?You can find the stories we talked about here:https://www.reddit.com/r/AmItheAsshole/comments/12631ba/aita_for_kicking_my_sons_girlfriend_out_of_our/and https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/4772785-dh-thinks-rice-crispies-are-a-suitable-breakfastYou can hear Ashley on The Ashley Storrie Show on BBC Radio Scotland at 10 pm every Friday or on the BBC Sounds App.You can also find Ashley and  Sean's sketches from BBC Short Stuff and BBC The Social on the iPlayer, and the BBC Scotland Facebook and Twitter pages. You can find Ashley's Twitch on twitch.tv/ashleystorrie You can find Sean and Ashley on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok @SitDownDad and @AshleyStorrie.You can follow Stuart on Twitter.Our theme song is "Snap Happy" by Shane Ivers from www.silvermansound.com.If you want to sponsor the show, contact us at awbupodcast@gmail.co, or donate via buymeacoffee.Thanks for listening, and please take a moment to review our show on Apple Podcasts.   You can find the song Ashley wanted to promote here.

Sean and Ashley return for a sixth series of the popular podcast where comedians discuss posts from Mumsnet and AITA forums.In the third* episode of the series, we talk to up-and-coming comedian Amanda Hursy about cardboard cutouts, Alien Wars at the Arches, school trips, goldfish, creepy toddlers, the cat with the clown head, the ghost of James Dean, elf on the shelf (or how we gaslight our kids,) the cum sock puppet, the puppet version of Billy Elliot, and the Jurassic wedding.You can find the stories we talked about here:https://www.reddit.com/r/AmItheAsshole/comments/w79uy4/aita_for_scaring_my_sil_with_a_cardboard_cutout/and https://twitter.com/aita_online/status/1550467052606988288?lang=deYou can hear Ashley on The Ashley Storrie Show on BBC Radio Scotland at 10 pm every Friday or on the BBC Sounds App.You can also find Ashley and  Sean's sketches from BBC Short Stuff and BBC The Social on the iPlayer, and the BBC Scotland Facebook and Twitter pages. You can find Ashley's Twitch on twitch.tv/ashleystorrie You can find Sean and Ashley on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok @SitDownDad and @AshleyStorrie.You can follow Amanda on Twitter.Our theme song is "Snap Happy" by Shane Ivers from www.silvermansound.com.If you want to sponsor the show, contact us at awbupodcast@gmail.co, or donate via buymeacoffee.Thanks for listening, and please take a moment to review our show on Apple Podcasts.   *Although this is the second episode to be released from series 6, it is in fact the third episode of the series. There were some technical issues with episode 2, and it will need to be re-recorded and released at a later date. 

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.louiseperry.co.ukMy guest today is Victoria Smith, journalist and author of a new book Hags: The Demonisation of Middle-Aged Women. We spoke about botox, intergenerational conflict, and why Mumsnet is such a dangerous political force. In the extended version, we also spoke about how ageing affects men's status and why so many young women are onboard with trans activism.

Sean and Ashley return for a sixth series of the popular podcast where comedians discuss posts from Mumsnet and AITA forums.In the first episode of the series, we talk to returning guest Diona Doherty about weird food habits, epilepsy, autism, Gwyneth Paltrow, YouTube boys that do stuff, KSI, Kim Kardashian eats shit? Subway sandwiches, and crisps, are all psychos sexual? How do you eat your body of Christ? Freeloaders and Darman videos.You can find the stories we talked about here:https://www.reddit.com/r/AmItheAsshole/comments/w79uy4/aita_for_scaring_my_sil_with_a_cardboard_cutout/and https://twitter.com/AITA_online/status/1550467052606988288/photo/2You can hear Ashley on The Ashley Storrie Show on BBC Radio Scotland at 10 pm every Friday or on the BBC Sounds App.You can also find Ashley and  Sean's sketches from BBC Short Stuff and BBC The Social on the iPlayer, and the BBC Scotland Facebook and Twitter pages. You can find Ashley's Twitch on twitch.tv/ashleystorrie You can find Sean and Ashley on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok @SitDownDad and @AshleyStorrie.You can follow Diona on Twitter and also listen to her podcast Remember When...?Our theme song is "Snap Happy" by Shane Ivers from www.silvermansound.com.If you want to sponsor the show, contact us at awbupodcast@gmail.co, or donate via buymeacoffee.Thanks for listening, and please take a moment to review our show on Apple Podcasts.   

Caroline Farrow is back with us as we discuss our way through the big stories this week in the news and across the media. Expect free thinking, free speech and plenty of opinion as Caroline let's us know what she really thinks about the topics this episode including..... - Migrants could be housed on old ferries as the government ends hotel stays. - Unelected PM Rishi Sunak bans media from Conservatives' conference. - Hey Waterstones... stop pushing dangerous gender ideology at children! - #LetWomenSpeak: New Zealand tour explodes into violence as hard left men's rights activists show the world exactly who they are. - Violent male paedophile moved to Washington women's prison. - Uproar as Kent Police is slammed for poster classifying rapes as non-emergency crimes. - Watershed moment in the trans debate, sparked by the landmark decision about female athletes. - Humza Yousaf commits to introducing abortion up to birth and sex-selective abortion in Scotland if he becomes the next First Minister. * CitizenGo Waterstones Petition https://citizengo.org/en-gb/fm/210382-waterstones-stop-pushing-dangerous-gender-ideology-children In 2010, frustrated by many of the media headlines and negative coverage of Catholicism, Caroline began a blog in defence of Catholic teaching and to reflect on UK current affairs and world events through the lens of a Catholic woman. What began as nothing more than personal musings designed to explain and propose controversial ethics and life issues to those who had struggled with them, or to de-bunk misleading narratives and headlines, soon mushroomed and popular posts would receive more than 30,000 unique visitors a day. Between 2011 and 2017, she was a member of the organisation Catholic Voices, set up to promote the defence of Catholic teaching in the public square and made numerous media interventions on their behalf and quickly became the 'go to' voice for media organisations looking to represent a female conservative Catholic point of view. Since 2013 Caroline has writes a weekly column for the Catholic Universe and has written for and featured in a number of other publications such as the Catholic Herald, the National Catholic Register, the Conservative Woman, Mercatornet, Crisis Magazine, LifeSiteNews and Church Militant. She used to write on Catholic culture at the now defunct Spectator Arts blog and has been featured in the Daily Mail, the Observer and the New Statesman. In 2013, Caroline was included as part of the first cohort of the BBC's '100 women' and she regularly features on BBC News, Sky News, ITV's Good Morning Britain, BBC Sunday Morning Live, the Big Questions and has made multiple appearances on Radio 4's flagship Today programme, Woman's Hour, the Moral Maze and the Sunday programme as well as featuring in one-off documentaries. Caroline also presented the coverage for March for Life UK for EWTN and has contributed to News Nightly and Celtic Connections. She also frequently contributes to Talk Radio, LBC and BBC local radio as well as BBC Radio Ulster, discussing matters pertaining to Catholicism, feminism and the challenges of motherhood and family life. Caroline has an eclectic career background. She began her professional life as a student accountant for a big 5 firm before succumbing to a desire for travel and adventure and became a member of cabin crew working both long and short-haul routes for internationally acclaimed airlines. Having got the travel bug out of her system, she returned to work within investment banking and private equity in the City of London until her first child was born. Caroline is currently the campaign director at CitizenGO, has 5 children of school-age, four girls and one boy and is married to a Catholic priest who converted from Anglicanism, a few years after they were married. Follow and support Caroline at the following links... GETTR: https://gettr.com/user/cf_farrow Twitter: https://twitter.com/CF_Farrow?s=20&t=Je-7QgQaAve5NCKtELcYNg Website: https://www.carolinefarrow.net CitizenGo: https://citizengo.org Originally broadcast live 25.3.23 *Special thanks to Bosch Fawstin for recording our intro/outro on this podcast. Check out his art https://theboschfawstinstore.blogspot.com/ and follow him on GETTR https://gettr.com/user/BoschFawstin To sign up for our weekly email, find our social media, podcasts, video, livestreaming platforms and more https://heartsofoak.org/connect/ Links to stories discussed..... Migrants https://web.archive.org/web/20230325135434/https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/03/24/migrants-could-housed-old-ferries-rishi-sunak-ends-hotel-stays/ Rishi Sunak https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2023/mar/24/rishi-sunak-bans-media-conservative-spring-conference Waterstones https://citizengo.org/en-gb/fm/210382-waterstones-stop-pushing-dangerous-gender-ideology-children Kellie-Jay Keen https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11901005/UK-trans-critic-Kellie-Jay-Keen-doused-tomato-juice-protestors-Auckland-New-Zealand-rally.html Posie Parker https://twitter.com/salltweets/status/1639480137833140225?s=20 Women's Prison https://reduxx.info/the-worst-one-yet-violent-male-pedophile-moved-to-washington-womens-prison/ victim legal fees https://twitter.com/Glinner/status/1639606190769422336?s=20 Kent Police https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11888161/Kent-Police-slammed-poster-classifying-sexual-assaults-non-emergency-crimes.html gender war https://web.archive.org/web/20230325120043/https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/03/25/week-tide-turned-gender-war/ Yousaf https://righttolife.org.uk/news/humza-yousaf-commits-to-introducing-abortion-up-to-birth-and-sex-selective-abortion-to-scotland  [0:22] So without further ado, Caroline, thank you so much for coming back with us tonight. Always a pleasure, always a pleasure, Peter. Always good to have you. And we are not short of stories, as always. Let, actually, let me, let me just see if I can pull in. Do let me know where you're watching. I'll have the, certainly the GETTR page open for your comments in there. So do let us know where you're watching we'll get to see the international flavour of fuel jumping on. So let's start with the UK and we'll start with immigration. Very hot subject. The title here from the Telegraph is migrants could be housed on old ferries as Rishi Sunak ends hotel stays. People who arrive illegally on small boats will initially be moved into decent but rudimentary accommodation, government said to announce. [1:22] And there was one figure here, Rishi Sunak expected to declare as early as next week, the beginning of the end of asylum hotels which are currently being used to house more than 50,000 migrants at a cost of nearly seven million pounds a day. What are your thoughts on this story that those who come over illegally could be put on boats?   It just shows what a shambolic mess our, immigration system is in. I think it's appalling actually. I mean in some ways I'm sure [1:58] many people would say well it's a deterrent, it will make only those who really have no other choice than to come here, it will make people who are perhaps what they call economic migrants think twice, but it is clearly inhumane, you know, putting people on boats, you know, to live. And it just shows that we really need to have a rethink of our immigration policy, because clearly, the reason that they're going to, well, I say clearly, the reason that this policy has been mooted is because at the moment we're spending £7 million a day housing asylum seekers or refugees. And again, I want to be really careful because when we're talking about these groups of people, we are talking about human beings who do have human rights, who do have human dignity. You know these are these are people wanting to come to Britain to make a better life and I'm not going to slam anybody for wanting to to go to a country to seek a better life for themselves you know that that is you know an inherent an intrinsic human right but equally countries do have the rights to police their borders but we must make sure that we do it justly and fairly. Now if we've got so many people coming to this country that we cannot physically house them, that we have to put them on boats, then we need to have a balanced and grown-up discussion about immigration. [3:27] What our immigration policy should be. We can't clearly just say let's have open borders. It'd be lovely, wouldn't it? It'd be lovely to say everybody who wants to come here can come here and you're guaranteed a welcome and the British people are very tolerant and very hospitable, all of those things are true. It'd be lovely if we could do that, but we are a smallish island, and our infrastructure is already creaking at the seams. So whenever you talk about immigration and whenever you talk about people coming here on boats or people making their way illegally, and you express some concern, you get tarred as a racist or far-right bigot or compared to Hitler's Germany is the latest slur, but there is an issue here. When we have got people that we just don't have, we are spending seven million a day at a time when we are so overstretched economically, when our infrastructure is in chaos, and then we're saying, okay, well, we can't, [4:24] housing people in hotels is not sustainable at seven million a day, just, you know, either in terms of the cost or in terms of how much room we have, so we've got to, you know, put them on boats, then we we need to have some serious policy about numbers, who we can accommodate you know and have and have a procedure for allowing those people who can come here. Who have a legitimate reason to be here, who have ties with this country, and who want to build a new life for themselves and work. We need to facilitate that, but equally [4:58] we can't, much as it would be great to allow every single person to come in, we don't have the infrastructure to do that. And shoving people on boats, I think, is a cruel and inhumane policy. You wouldn't like to live on a boat. We're warned of the dangers of not dehumanising people, but actually when you start putting people on boats or in army barracks, that's exactly what it does. It treats people, not as people, but as a number and a problem. That's not a humane, and I'm a Christian obviously, and that's not a Christian way of dealing with it. So it's a very fraught issue but we need some sensible grown-ups to the table and I think both sides could do with dialling down the rhetoric. So expressing concern about this and saying, you know, okay, what are the numbers we can accommodate? It's not racist. [5:57] Equally, and it's not Nazi Germany either, but equally on the other side of the coin, being really really harsh and firm and calling people names and attacking people isn't the answer either and you know and I do think we we do have to do something to stop people from coming over on these inflatable dinghies and risking their lives you know and it's not good it's not good for political cohesion because it is you know we've seen riots outside hotels which is which is terrible which is not what we want to see and we don't condone you know and And the reason, certainly nobody can condone that, and it must be awful for those people who are inside the hotels when they are subject to those protests, you know, you've got to remember that there are human beings involved. But this is because of the resentment that is building, being built up by these policies, because I think I was reading in the Telegraph, the Red Wall constituencies up north, they are having like 16 times the amount of asylum seekers or refugees that are being housed in the South and the South East. And the other point I want to make, I mean this is a very personal one, [7:14] I'm very open about the fact that my two youngest children have special needs and right now we need to get primary school places for our children and they've been turned down from six local primary schools because there are no places because they're being taken up by Ukrainian children. Now I don't resent Ukrainian children a school place at all and one might argue, well, Caroline, you're middle class, you're educated, you know, it's not as important for your children to have a place as it is the Ukrainian children. And I might agree with you, I might not, but at the end of the day, not everybody's going to have that attitude and be in a position where they think, okay, I'm going to see what I can do to cobble together an education at home. But equally, what it means is you're having to put one child over another, you're having to prioritise children for school places. We've got a crisis in the NHS and there's a crisis in dentistry, so you're having to prioritise one person's need over another. [8:23] So we can't just continue to say, OK, everybody who wants to come here should be able to come here and that's fine, without, you know, some serious thought to the question. No completely and we'll move on but a simple way of fixing it would actually be to, actually process the people probably within weeks and put them back where they came from if they do if they are able to go back but that would be common sense but that would seem to fix the issue. But anyway moving on let's just touch on this subject quickly because I want to go on some of of the others. But I find this interesting and this is Rishi Sunak bans media from Conservative Spring Conference. Press and public barred from attending with party, claiming it is an internal event closed to media. And I know I've been to many UKIP conferences, Caroline I'm sure you've been as citizen go to different political conferences and it is quite essential I think part of the democratic process to for the meditative access to these political conferences. Yeah, I don't think we should gloss over this actually. I think this shows we have a need for a new political settlement. This is almost like something out of Putin's Russia. [9:39] You know, the Conservative Party are, you know, years ago, the Conservative Party have always had amongst, I suppose, politics always been tribal, and the Tory Party have always had a reputation of being the elites and very divorced from the working class. They're not helping themselves with this. In the 80s, Thatcher's Tories were all about, oh yeah, you know, Basildon Man, Wolverhampton Man, you know. I mean, we're in touch with the working man and we're in touch with the working people and we want to help people make better lives for themselves. This just screams we are the elite, we are the elite, we are you know this is this is a party who, [10:23] by the looks of things, are not going to win the next general election, or they might, and this is really unfortunate actually, because the Tory party might win the next general election on the issue of gender ideology, and because Tories can say what is a woman, the Tories are also doing the right thing on sex education lessons, they're not doing enough, we need, I might get onto that later, but we need the review of sex education in classes to be independent. We can't have the Department for Education doing the review or the inquiry because they've been captured for so many years and useless for so many years, you know, they've been captured by Stonewall. But so the Tories are doing the right thing on gender ideology and they're doing the right thing on relationships and sex education, well they're kind of on their way to doing the right thing, whereas Keir Starmer can't even make up his mind what a woman is or what his stance is, and he can see what's happened to Nicola Sturgeon. But actually, the Tories don't deserve to get in. They're going to use this gender ideology and what they've done to suck up some Labour votes, but they don't actually deserve to get in. [11:35] Particularly if they're going to have their conference and they're going to shut off, media and the public and it just smacks of we are the elites and we are deciding, we're in government, we don't actually care about whether or not we get in next time or we're just so complacent we think we're going to get in. And the jargon they're using is like real left-wing Marx, you know, this is a training event, I mean for goodness sake, a training event, when has a conference been an internal training event? Yeah, it smacks of elitism, it's quite. It smacks of authoritarianism as well, you know, Soviet era, you know, group of people over there. No, I think it's very worrying and it speaks of a need, I think, for a new political settlement or a new political party to be more transparent and more in touch. You know, we're just, oh, I'm sick of politicians.   Oh, so am I. So let's move from this story, Let's move on to the work that you're doing in CitizenGo. [12:42] This is Waterstone Stop Pushing Dangerous Gender Ideology at Children, one of your campaigns. And the viewers can see that Waterstone, so yeah, Waterstone's UK's leading high street book retailer has shortlisted the book entitled My Trans Teen Misadventure by Lewis Hancock, a transgender identified female for its prestigious children's book prize due to be awarded 30th of March and this is aimed at 14 year olds. It's unbelievable that Waterstones would be pushing a book like this for their children's book prize and it's wonderful to see obviously the support to this petition has gained but tell us about this campaign Caroline.   Well okay it's not actually the first time Waterstones have done this so just before I started Citizen Go in 2019, they had another book that was about a boy who wanted to be a mermaid, and that was written by an LGBT. I think he might have been a transgender identified man, I'm not entirely sure, but certainly someone who identified as a member of the LGBT community and It was all about this boy who wants to be a mermaid and a drag queen and they nominated that as well. [13:59] And I think clearly the head of children's is obviously fully on board the woke gender train. Now the reason that this book caught my attention is because it actually has an adult advisory, on the back. So it's been nominated for a children's prize but with an adult warning advisory on the back. And I don't know if you've been into Waterstones but they have their book of their weeks, they have their promos. And being nominated for this book is, for this award is a real honour. It's really prestigious, it's going to make your book sales rocket and it's going to make your profile rocket. Now Waterstones are a high, as you know though, the UK's leading bookseller. They're really trusted, you know, sometimes you want something to read and you go [14:50] into Waterstones and you see what they're recommending and you're like, oh right, okay, I'll have a look. Now these books are being placed on tables where there's a high footfall of children and adolescents as well, so but in that kind of child and adolescence area and you'll see on the table, we recommend this book. Now the thing is, as you know I've got many children, I know exactly what they're like and they will be attracted to a book and they won't see, oh, that's for older readers. So this book has a cartoon on the front. Welcome to Hell, My Trans Teen Misadventure. It's the sort of thing that my 8-year-old son might pick up, because it looks like Horrid Henry or something. Do you know what? It appeals to a younger demographic. He would pick it up, and he wouldn't look at the warning on the back. And then he flicks through, and he sees these cartoons. Now, all children love cartoons. My children are no different. They like the Beano. They like Bunny and Monkey and Dogman. And all children like cartoons. And that's fine. And Waterstones sell these nice cartoon books. So he would see that, or my 10-year-old daughter might see this, and they'd flick through it. [15:59] Then you've got that picture, which I've got illustrating the petition, which is basically the author of this book is projecting her own experience as a woman who wanted to be a man when she was an adolescent. And it's just encouraging teenage girls to just self-hate on their bodies. So breasts are two fatty lumps that need to be gone. [16:23] There's stuff about hairy legs, you know, and then it's, you know, it points to her pubic area and it says, don't go there, an imaginary willy. I mean, no, it's just validating every single hitch from hell. Teen girls, almost every teen girl has some neurosis or anxiety about her body, that's entirely and 100% natural. This book is sowing the seeds of self-doubt, of hatred, and it's validating that and it's saying, oh, the female body is disgusting and something not to be liked. [16:57] And, you know, there's no way that just a 14-year-old would read that. Probably actually, many savvy 14-year-olds would go, oh, that's a comic book. I'm well beyond. They might actually turn their noses up at it because it looks maybe a little bit too babyish. So it is clearly designed to appeal to a younger demographic. But even if you were 14 and older, it's validating teen girls' anxieties about their body. But worse still, Waterstones then came out with, oh, this is one page out of context. No, there's another cartoon where it shows a girl being injected with either puberty blockers or cross-sex hormones. And she was going, yeah, yeah, just in time for uni. So it's kind of telling girls, oh, my goodness, you've got to get this done before you go to uni. And then you have the nurse. She's learning something from the experience. And then they mentioned Keira Bell, the detransitioner. And they were saying, oh, yeah, there was this girl. And she really regretted it. And she took them to court and made it much harder for everyone. But fine, it's all been sorted out now. And you can get puberty blockers. [18:08] And this other girl who has a beard and is now allegedly a man says, oh, yeah, this was the best thing I ever did. That's not a balanced discussion at all. That's just pushing gender transition at children. And when we see countries around the world putting the brakes on and saying, actually, there isn't the evidence to show that this is safe. We're quite concerned about the long-term health effects, you know, effects on bone density, on brain development, you know, all those things. As puberty is a time when your body is laying down the foundations for the rest of your life. [18:42] It's a completely natural process and sort of stopping with it has never ever been done before in human history and you know, if it ain't broke, don't fix it, is the phrase. But certainly there are a lot of concerns, long-term health concerns about puberty blockers. We're seeing young girls now with osteoporosis and arthritis, you know, and you take testosterone as a woman and it's It's very difficult to come back from that. But there's no balanced discussion. It's just propaganda. And what gets me about this, if this was like Asterix, for example, another great cartoon book. So in great literature, it's not cartoons. This is not a book that would be read in a classroom. It wouldn't be studied for GCSE literature. It has absolutely no literary merit whatsoever. Fine, of course, Waterstones are going to sell cartoon books because they sell and they're fine. And we have a phrase in our house, donut books. So certain authors and certain books, they're allowed to, you know, my kids are allowed to read them. Of course they are, but it's like a donut. You know, you don't have too much of it. So David Walliams being one of those, yeah, don't get me started. [19:59] But you know, that's, so the cartoon books are like the donut books. They're not the books that you would study all the time. And certainly, you know, not really about, and yet Waterstones have thought this worthwhile to put on a children's prestigious literature award. [20:20] I suppose Harry Potter came out too late, but you know, everyone would have sneered at Harry Potter, but, and they did, when Harry Potter came out, everybody sneered at it. Oh, it's not great literature, blah, blah, blah. you know, Harry Potter should be on there or, you know, it's not the magician's nephew, is it? [20:37] It's not C.S. Lewis. It's just a very crude cartoon book pushing gender ideology. And actually [20:46]i've been blown away by the success of this petition. This has been the most successful petition I've run, I think, in the past year, you know, and the numbers just exploded. And yeah, I'm going to keep plugging it and we are going to do some offline. What I would like to do is get a decent children's book and see if I can get a decent children's book into schools and libraries because this is a problem. Once this book goes on this list, then schools go, oh yes, it must be very good, mustn't it? Waterstones say, and same with libraries. So actually, I think there's a case for countering their propaganda with some better propaganda. And the other thing, actually, sort of, Peter, while I'm on Waterstones, the other thing is that they appear to have been suppressing two books, one by Helen Joyce called Trans and the other by Hannah Barnes called Time to Watch or Time to Wait. And it's an investigation of the Tavistock gender identity clinic. And lots of people have been going into Waterstones and asking for copies of these books and finding that Waterstones staff have basically hid them out back. And that, you know, they can't get them. I went into Waterstones in Godalming and asked for them. [22:12] You know, and yeah, no, I don't have any of those. No, you'll have to order them. And certainly some of the more woke stores in London, there's been reports of staff hiding them away. So yeah, Actually, Waterstones, you are a leading high street retailer and you enjoy a lot of customer trust. [22:38] Let me, the viewers and listeners can go to citizengo.org and go and have a look at those petitions. Sign it, but also put it on your social media profile, send it on to others. Don't only you go and click on sign up, but make others aware of it as well. And then you'll be passing the word and raising the concern of this and also introduce some people to Citizen Go. So go and do that. When you finish watching this, have a click on it and make use of that. Now, let's go and look at Down Under, New Zealand. Can you call New Zealand Down Under? I think you can. I don't know. I don't want to get into that argument between Aussies and the Kiwis, but UK trans critic, Kelly J Keane, there are a whole load of issues I have even just with the headline, but anyway. [23:30] UK trans critic Kelly J Keane or Posie Parker is doused in tomato sauce and evacuated by cops before she can speak during the latest rally in New Zealand as she considers cancelling the rest of her tour. And the little bullet points here are Kelly J. Keen was doused with tomato juice, said she fears for her life, fears for life in inverted commas, meaning that I don't know why they're trying to take away from that, or and then transphobe may cancel the rest of her tour, again inverted commas, the Daily Mail calling someone who stands up for the rights of women to be women a transphobe, and then puts in men in Nazi clothing also join protests, again the Daily Mail linking her with that which is complete nonsense. But obviously people can go on to Posey's Twitter account can see the violence which she has faced. [24:27] Talk to us about this, Caroline, and I know you've, I think I saw a tweet from you back 2020 when you were voicing support of Posie Parker and what she is trying to do, to stand up for women and to say that men have no right in those spaces and a woman is a woman, full stop. But tell us about this. [24:49] Well, I mean, Posie's been, or Kelly, Kelly J, has been working since sort of 2017, 2018, which was when I first met her. But yeah, she did a, so she does these events around the country called Let Women Speak. Now, these events are amazing, they empower other women. So it's an open mic event, it's a bit like some speaker's corner. So she goes and she, it's not her preaching at people, she allows women to go and take the microphone and tell their story. Now, Posey does not discriminate at all. If you're a woman and you want to have the mic, she doesn't pre-screen you, she doesn't say what are your views on this, that and the other. If you want to talk about female emancipation, well it's not even emancipation, but if you want to talk about your story about why you think men shouldn't be allowed in changing rooms or your daughter's been getting changed in Primark and she's had some man come in, she's all about, or you're a victim of of domestic violence and whatever it might be. She's all about empowering women to tell their stories. And she doesn't tell you what story you should tell. This is about helping women to find a voice. [26:04] And now, of course, a lot of people don't like that because let women speak. They don't want women speaking. And they say it's terribly transphobic. Well, I don't actually know. The first time I was called a transphobe. [26:19] I remember it was in 2011 and I just laughed, I thought this is a made-up word. [26:25] What are you talking about, a transphobe? and it is a made-up word and basically anybody who, stands up for the rights of women to have single-sex spaces and to have single-sex associations gets called a transphobe because you know men who identify as women want to be in our spaces and want to be in our groups because it gives them validation. Yeah, I'm a real woman, I'm using your spaces, I'm in your clubs, you know, it gives them the validation that they want and they need and they require, but at a massive cost to women. So it comes at a cost to religious women. [27:04] You know, particularly Jews and Muslims who, you know, aren't allowed to share those spaces, so it drives religious women out of public life. And it comes at a cost to rape victims or domestic abuse victims, people who've had a really bad experience with male violence, with rape, and they just are very, very traumatized by men and they just don't want men in their spaces. Or just normal, I say normal, but just ordinary women and girls who don't have a history of trauma but just feel very, very uncomfortable. And we're just told, no, no, no. You should accept men in your spaces. You should accept men in your sports. I remember a few years ago doing a radio interview. And I was talking about the fact that my, I think she was about 13 then. My 13-year-old daughter had been made to feel very uncomfortable because she was getting fitted for a bra. and there was men milling about. And somebody said to me, well, what have you done, Caroline, to make your daughter hate men. [28:13] It's like, no, I don't. This isn't about hatred. This is about girls' natural boundaries. And you ask any parent of any ordinary, well-adjusted teenager, when they're little, yes, they will toddle around the house with no clothes or very inhibited. And then they hit sort of 10, and the bathroom door shuts. And they start finding their own privacy, their own boundaries. And they're drawing up their boundaries. And you have to respect that. We all have our own boundaries. But actually, what we are being told is, you must be kind. You must be kind. You must be nice. And you must let your guard down. So if you're getting changed in the gym and you're getting naked, and there's a woman in there with a penis, it's your fault if you've got an issue with that. [29:01] So Posie is just, actually, Posie's just a normal wife and a mom. And Posie's been in the very fortunate position that she was a stay-at-home mom. She didn't have to work. And she got very, and she's always counted herself, actually. This is why it's really strange that she gets called right wing. She always countered herself as a lefty. She was always like, yeah, I'm a left wing woman. I'm a lefty atheist. Again, she gets pilloried because she associates with the likes of me, who doesn't agree with abortions. They're like, I mean, these, and you get this as well. even from the left-wing feminists, trying to tell her, trying to police who she should and should not be friends with, who she should and should not associate with. You know, everybody's sort of trying to tell, take Posie's autonomy from her, tell her, you know, oh, if you want to be a good little feminist, this is what you should do. And Posie, you know, [29:58] Is a marketing genius and all power to her. She's gone out there and she's got the message out there and of course, you know when you're on target because you're getting a lot of flack. So Posie has got a load of flack from the left-wing feminists who've been tarring her as a right-wing Nazi bigot and then of course that's been picked up by the trans activists. literally she's She's been in the position of just, because she didn't have to work, and she got drawn into this debate. But she's put her heart and soul into this. And just being able to put, she thought of putting woman, adult, human, female on billboards and on the t-shirts. And she's gone global. And good luck to her. And I'm not convinced, actually. So in Australia, what happened was she went to Australia, a bunch of neo-Nazis turned up and they were doing Hitler salutes. Now, I'm not sure, I don't know, but I almost wonder if this could be an Antifa... [31:09] Because who does that in this day and age? Who does that? I mean, I didn't even know that that was a thing. People going out, goose-stepping. I shouldn't laugh because the Nazi salute is not funny, it's heinous, it's traumatic and what it's associated with. But this is not, and normally, I mean I don't know, I don't associate, contrary to popular belief, I don't know anyone who identifies as hard right or far right. I don't know any neo-nazis or any fascists. But I kind of think, don't these sorts of people stay in the shadows? Because they know that their beliefs aren't mainstream and aren't going to be accepted. I mean, who does that? It goes out like... [31:59] But Caroline, do you not see it out when your local Sainsbury's or Tesco's and suddenly see 20 Nazis all lined up? Oh no, none of us ever see that. So you're right. The only way I can understand is that its staged , that's the only way it makes sense. It's just so bizarre. And so she got all the flack, you know, for them turning up and she should have, apparently she should have immediately told them to go away. Right, okay, so Posie's five foot one. [32:26] You may have, she's a diminutive. I'm sure she won't mind me saying this. Potted Posie, no, she's a small lady. I'm not tall and she's sort of way below me. You know, so this diminutive little lady has to see a bunch of Nazis doing like a Basil Fawlty salute and tell them to go away. I don't think so. And it wasn't, whoever they were and whatever their motivation, I mean, far right people aren't going to support feminists anyway. They're not aligned with feminists. They have a very misogynistic outlook on life. And I think they were, if they were genuine far-right people, then they were obviously just leveraging, I think what the far-right are trying to do is leverage some of these issues that, you know, conservatives are concerned about, in order to maybe try and legitimize themselves and to try and get conservative support. But, but I'm, yeah, I'm very doubtful that they were genuine because it's, [33:31] As you say, it just doesn't ring true. I mean, who would be saluting to Hitler and why, you know? It's play acting. And one thing, if I can say, that I have admired Posie from afar. We were accused, or she was accused of being part of us, I think, because some of our team went to film an event down in Brighton. I think I have bumped into Posie once and talked to her for maybe 40 seconds. This was years ago, she probably had no idea who I was, and we went to film that thing in Brighton, the stand-up for women, and it was a public park, so we filmed, and suddenly the story is, and it's unbelievable, but yeah, I don't know Posie, Posie doesn't know me, good luck to her, we wish her the best from afar, but it's obviously these, the media, both kind of on the left and and then in the far right, they all try and paint a certain picture that isn't true, just to target their... [34:32] Yeah, and I think what's happened is very frightening to her. It must have been really frightening. Some of the pictures, people with their hands sort of on her throat. It turns out, I think it was security trying to get her away. And she said, you know, if I'd fallen over, I didn't think I was going to get up. And just the sheer naked aggression. And what was she doing, right? What was she doing? She was just saying, women can have a voice, women can speak. We don't want men in our changing rooms. We don't want men in our sports. And of course, we've had a good result with Athletics Federation yesterday as well. I think the tide is, I've said this for years, the tide is beginning to turn. But actually, it feels that there is being a significant shift. But it's awful for her, actually. Awful. and awful for the women of New Zealand to live in. But we'll move on, but just one thing to leave the viewers is the first line, the first sentence, it gives the headlines and then it starts off in the article. This is the Daily Mail. The first word they use in the article is controversial, anti-trans. [35:43] It's controversial standing up for women's rights, women's only spaces? The Daily Mail have lost the plot. If any of you think actually the Daily Mail are on the side of common sense, that is utter nonsense. They're not. They're on the side of whatever is a good story for them and sells papers.   And actually you have to ask as well, when people say transphobe, like you know, they say, what do you mean? I'm not irrationally scared or whatever. You know, [36:08] what rights do you, does the transgender, transsexual community not have that they want? And I guess their answer is, we want everyone to accept that we are women, that we are the sex that we say we are. Now there is an argument, yeah, okay, I'm sure at work, people can use your new name and they can maybe use your new pronoun and people can treat you with dignity and respect. But there needs to be a balancing exercise in terms of common sense. And when somebody is being made to feel like they can't go to the loo all day at work because they feel very uncomfortable, then there needs to be sensible accommodation made. And it shouldn't be a case of, you know, the woman who's feeling uncomfortable because she's got a man in her changing room or whatever, it shouldn't be her that's made, you know, to feel uncomfortable. There needs to be, and none of the activists, a very sensible solution would be, well, let's have a third space, okay? Let's have men, let's have women, and let's have a third gender neutral. But the activists don't want that. [37:27] No, they will not stop. That is the frightening thing. Let's look, because this is one of the outcomes. We've got five minutes to spare, we'll do another four. We've touched on this, and again, sometimes you end up repeating the same stories, but just with different characters in different locations. And this is the worst one yet. Violent male pedophile moved to Washington Women's Prison, And there were some, yeah, here's the figure. So, Jolene Karisma Starr, born Joel Thomas Nicholas, is the latest male transfer to the Washington Correction Center for Women, which currently has approximately one dozen male inmates being housed in the facility. Just there, I can see the problem. A dozen male inmates in a woman's prison. But, Caroline, we see this regularly, probably every other week, another story of different parts of the world where a man, often who has been charged with rape or sexual assault of a woman, ends up with a group of women. There is no way you can describe [38:43] the suffering that then continues and the position that you put women in, putting a man who's doing that in a woman's prison. Yeah, and it's not just the other female, I say other female, it's not just the female inmates that that person is terrorizing, it's also the female prison guards because they have to do intimate searches and all sorts. And so you're not just putting, and of course, every woman, regardless of whether or not she's an inmate, deserves dignity, respect and safety, but it's not just the inmates that are being put at risk, it's also the female prison staff. And the other thing you have to remember that is in women's prisons, most women who are in prison are not there for violent crime. [39:31] Female offending has a very different face to it to male offending. Now I know that there are women in prison for violent crime but I think the proportion, I think it's something like 75 percent, there's a very good website, Keep Prisons Single Sex, and I think it's something like over 75 percent of women who are in prison are not there for, it's for non-violent crime. [39:57] So you've got a very vulnerable demographic as well because most women in prison are disproportionately affected by domestic violence or they've had difficult lives, which is why they have ended up in prison. And we did another campaign this month, you may have seen, for Barbie Kardashian, a very violent 21-year-old who I can't repeat the things that he said about what he wants to do with his mother. He's threatened to rape, torture, and murder his mother. He's got a history of violent assault. He tried to kill a female social worker who was looking after him. And of course, Irish media, you're not allowed to talk about him in Irish media. They got an injunction out. And there's an Irish outlet called Gripped, who'd published a very detailed and telling history. And even though Barbie Kardashian, I mean, even the name just shows, tells you what he thinks of women. I can't remember what his real name is, but everyone knows him as Barbie Kardashian. [41:05] I think it's Alexandro something or other. I think it's Alexandro Gentile. But yeah, he's now known as Barbie, And he's this very, very violent prisoner, when he was jailed the guard I said, we're very worried, he still poses a significant threat to public safety and to women's safety and he's been jailed in women's, in Limerick [41:28] Prison. And when you look at his life, he's had a terrible life. He was brought up with abusive parents and his father co-opted him into domestic abuse of his mother and he's clearly very disturbed, very violent, very dangerous. So yes, you can have a slight bit of sympathy for a very disordered mindset. But it's not safe to put a man like that in close proximity with women who've already, you know, if you're a woman in prison, then you've had, most of the time, you've had a very hard life. [42:05] I'm not going to say that women should never be in prison or anything like that. But you have to accept that you're dealing with a very vulnerable demographic and they're being put at risk and so are the female prison guards. It has to stop. And in fact, if you haven't signed a Barbie Kardashian petition on Citizen Go, please do so. Because actually, every single day that goes past and these men are in our prisons, what's going to happen? What's going to have to happen before people realise the folly of this? Let's just bring up this tweet. We'll see how much you want to admit. This is Graham Linehan. And some good news, at Flying Lawyer 73 has lost another case and owes his latest victim legal fees of £15,000. I believe now he owes between 80 and 100 grand to solicitors from a series of failed cases. Again, why is he allowed to continue doing this? Now you probably have an idea what this is about, but when people can spend this amount of money on nonsense through the legal system. [43:14] It makes you kind of wonder, well, where are our tax money going? Are they paying for it themselves? So, do you want to touch on this before we move on? Briefly. So, Flying Lawyer 73 is Stephanie Hayden. Stephanie Hayden is the transgender-identified male who was responsible for my arrest in October, and he's also been responsible for the arrest of two other women. Kate Scottow, who was arrested, she was a breastfeeding mother, she was arrested in front of her autistic children, and I was arrested in front of my autistic children, and Bronwyn Dickinson, another woman, he got arrested. What Stephanie Hayden does, so Stephanie Hayden is a transgender identified activist who in 2018 came to prominence. [43:59] Basically trying to do a version of lawfare, so would go around trying to get people cancelled, he got people kicked out of their university positions. He tried to sue Mumsnet. It just made an absolute nuisance of himself. And he said, oh, I'm standing up for transgender rights. Now, anytime anybody says anything about Stephanie Hayden that Stephanie Hayden doesn't like, he reports them to the police and he sues them. And he claims when he reports them to the police, he trumps up the charges. So he told the police that I had posted memes about him on a forum. I hadn't. But the police were stupid enough to go, oh, gosh, that's terrible, isn't it? And came and seized my devices looking for evidence. They still haven't found it because I didn't do it. So he uses his transgender status as leverage with the police and gets the police to act as his personal militia. The police forces aren't joined up. So Surrey police were quite surprised when I told them, you know he's had two other women arrested for this. Were like, well Caroline, save it for interview. She said, all right, save that for interview. [45:08] So it's not joined up and what Stephanie Hayden does is a two-pronged approach. So he'll try and have you arrested. He had the police called out to Graham Linehan as well and he will then sue you. He's suing me for the third time. And he sues you because he doesn't have a, to the best of my knowledge, he doesn't have a job. He calls himself a lawyer, but he's not a regulated or qualified or insured barrister, solicitor or legal executive. So he's eligible for the help with fees scheme, which is for people on low income or on certain benefits. So he will take out a claim against you in the high court and he's exempt from court fees. So if you sue somebody, it's typically about 5% of the claim and he sues for unlimited amounts. So he is about a 5,000 pound court fee. And that's in place to act as a barrier to stop vexatious claims. Stephanie does not have that barrier. And because Stephanie has a law degree, they then act as a litigant in person, which they appear to enjoy very much because they go to court and they start calling Barrister as malignant friend and everyone else just cringes and dies with embarrassment for them, honestly. [46:28] So and prior to suing, he's suing my boss at the moment. My boss said, oh, I've made it. You're not anybody in the UK. You're not doing effective work, unless you're, no, joke. He'll probably be transcribing this and saying, oh, they deliberately. So he's suing me for the third time. and he says, oh, you know, she's forcing me to sue her. [46:51] Yeah, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, he's bringing his claim, you know, she's forced me to do this. And so he forces, you rack up a lot of legal fees defending yourself because most people, you know, can't defend themselves in the high court, and it's all about [47:07] do you know the procedure? Anyone who's been through a court case knows it's not necessarily about evidence or rights and wrongs. It's do you know the procedure? And Stephanie Hayden clearly does. And yeah, and his behaviour in litigation, but before, it's quite bad as well. Oh goodness, it's quite shocking. But before he sued all these gender critical people, he was at Birkbeck University studying for law degrees, a mature student, and he sued, you just don't want this bloke in your orbit, because he sued all his fellow students as well and he sued the Students' Union because there was some argument about internal politics, he sued his landlady, he sued his, you know, and he has a history as well as he, if he doesn't pay his rent, then, you know, they obviously then take him to court for the unpaid rent and he sues them back for harassment. So amongst his former claimants are two landlords. And it's just really frustrating because he can just keep going to the court, filing another claim. [48:17] A master, you know, an admin judge will just briefly look at it and just check that it's procedurally right and they stamp it. And this is then, you know, taxpayers' monies, both in terms of the court fees and in terms of court time that's being wasted on these frivolous pursuits. So he sued an organisation called the Family Education Trust because they had retweeted somebody and made a comment which he thought could be about him and it was to do with vexatious litigants wasting money. So they retweeted something, it was up for less than an hour and he sued them for defamation and the court, the judges dismissed it and said that the the claim was fanciful, was devoid of reality and hopeless and he has to pay their legal costs. But he already owes various other people, including Associated Newspapers, who reported on when he got another woman arrested, they reported on the fact that he'd got another woman arrested, and he said, oh, it's defamation and harassment, sued them, lost that one, and he owes them like 30,000. So he owes, you know, for most people, if you owed that amount of money, you wouldn't sleep. [49:32] So I think there's a real issue here. I mean, this isn't just about my particular issues or my vendetta, but there's a real issue with the system that somebody can exploit the court system [49:47] in this fashion and when you can't get legal aid, you know, people are scrabbling for legal aid, and yet, you know, the system wasn't set up or clearly it never envisaged the help with fee schemes that it could be abused in this way. What it's done about it, I don't know, And presumably Peter, all of this, for somebody who really despises me, so Stephanie Hayden [50:13] every time I'm on any media outlet, every time I've been on GB News, he's made a complaint to Ofcom. For somebody who says he's so harassed by me and he's terrified and me saying things, you know, me just telling the truth that this is... [50:27] a dodgy character, puts him at risk of violence and what have you. For someone who claims that I'm harassing him, he follows my every online and mainstream media move. Yeah, so I know that this will probably be played back in court or to the police and I'm not saying it to cause any alarm or distress. I think this is actually a public interest issue, particularly when it's somebody trying to make themselves a media figure. So, you know, yeah, I think, yeah, I think it's public interest and I think something needs to be done. So, yeah, there we are with that one. Yeah. Well, let's finish with this story, which is a good story. This is in the Telegraph. The week has turned in the gender war. There's been a watershed moment in the trans debate sparked with a landmark decision about female athletes, which you mentioned earlier, Caroline, and that's the World Athletics Council, which have ruled that only those born as women can compete in [51:36] women's sports, which did seem quite common sense to most of us, but yeah, they have ruled that common sense will prevail. So it is a positive story, and I think the article talks about that this could actually spread into other areas and bring that, I guess, sense of common sense to the debate in other parts of society?   Yeah, I hope so. And, you know, I think. [52:04] what's been really, this has been quite a grassroots movement right from the start, you know, like we talked about Posie Parker. [52:14] But we can see there a picture of Sharron Davies. And it's just really gratifying that we've had JK Rowling and Sharron Davies. And some of these really big names speak out because someone like me, someone like Posie, we get called right wing bigots, transphobes. [52:37] But you see someone like Sharron Davies, who she feels really or Sharron Davies, isn't it? Sorry, I called her Davies. She feels very strongly about this because she was cheated out of a gold medal her entire career because of women on testosterone, these German athletes who were doped up. So she feels very strongly about fair play for women in sports. And it's very hard to portray Sharron as being a conservative bigot, for want of a better word, or for being right wing. And I think it's incremental. This was always going to be death by 1,000 cuts, because gender ideology had got so big. And it had got captured into every area of society. We said earlier, we've seen it in education. We've seen it very chillingly, as I know and Harry Miller saw and various other people have experienced. We've seen it embedded into the police service. [53:45] We've seen it embedded into every element of society. [53:52] So as a telegraph sort of op-ed made clear, it was either we kind of go along with this and we say, you know, people like Caroline, people like Posie are, you know, outrageous bigots, or actually, you know, we push back, you know, it didn't even say we pushed back, but we had a choice to be made. And I think, finally, we deviated off down the path of madness. And slowly, I think we're coming back. And I think the pendulum is swinging. And I don't, there's always a danger, isn't it? The pendulum goes. I think what we had was, we had the laws of 1957, when homosexuality was criminalized. And we've swung all the way from there, where being gay would get you locked up, and again, [54:48] that was low-hanging fruit. It was much easier for the police to arrest somebody who was cottaging in the public loo. Now, that is an offence to public decency, but it's much easier to get someone doing that than the serious criminals, whereas these days it's much easier to get someone saying the wrong thing online. So we've gone from a position where people were unjustly repressed. For someone who's often called a homophobe, I feel very strongly about the decriminalisation of homosexuality. I believe that it's a private act of morality and what you do in your bedroom, as long as it's, you know, the usual caveats with consenting adult, and doesn't involve children or animals, that's your affair. What you want to get up to in your bedroom is your affair. And as a tolerant liberal, I have no interest in telling people what they should be doing in their bedrooms. Even as an Orthodox Christian, I don't have care of souls. It's not for me to bring people to Jesus by telling them what they should do in bed. So I feel very strongly that homosexuality shouldn't be criminalized. But we've gone from a position where, because we had a section of society who were unjustly repressed, the pendulum has swung all the way over there, [56:16] to the other side. And people have sort of reacted so strongly to the oppression. It's the same with critical race theory as well, in that we've still been acting in 2022, like we're a deeply homophobic or a deeply racist society. And we're not. I think there has been, [56:36] I would say, at least for the last 20, 30 years, there has been a lot more tolerance. And rightly so, people shouldn't be persecuted. But there's still this feeling, oh, there's this terrible persecution. So we have to flood children with all kinds of propaganda and tell them how to wash after sex. And it's kind of been part and parcel of sexual liberalism as a movement, sexual progressivism, sexual libertinism. So we've gone from repression to libertinism and I think we need to sort of [57:12] move somewhere back near to the middle. And you know, I said this on my Twitter feed and I mean it, I think it's been really hard for, there have been very many sensible lesbians and gays out there that have been calling out their own community and that's been, that's courageous really actually to say, hang on a minute, I didn't sign up for this. I didn't sign up for people claiming to be a different sex. I didn't sign up for the grooming of children. You know, this doesn't help. This isn't, you know, this kind of drag queens into primary schools perpetuates every single negative stereotype that they've been trying to counter for years and years. So I'm hoping that it will, I think we're beginning to see a correction, but nobody can sit on their laurels, you know, and certainly as New Zealand shows, there are still countries, [58:11] New Zealand, Australia, America and parts of America still deeply enthralled to this nonsense and we need to really have a think about, you know, we need this independent investigation into sex ed in schools. So, yeah.   Well, let's see if a so-called Conservative government actually get around to doing that, but there's a whole other discussion. Caroline, as always, thank you so much for joining us and giving us your thoughts on those stories.   Oh, always a pleasure. Thanks so much for having me, Peter.   Not at all, and I encourage our viewers and listeners to go and make use of citizengo.org and do look at those petitions, do sign them and do pass them on to your friends and encourage them to do the same. And I think on that, I wish everyone watching a wonderful rest of your Saturday. Have a great Sunday. And we'll be with you on Monday evening for a special that something that we've been working on for the last two years behind the scenes. And I'm so excited that we can finally discuss it. [59:15] And that is tune in Monday 8 p.m. And we'll talk about it then. So look forward to seeing you then 8pm UK or 3pm Eastern or noontime if you're over in the Pacific on the West Coast. So we'll see you on Monday. Thank you so much and good night to you all.

“Being a dad is a role that we play, we are people first. A dad is something that I have become but I'm a man first. To look at it from what kind of dad you want to be without looking at what kind of man you want to become is the wrong way around. You need to define what kind of man you want to be first and that translates to parenting.”- Elliott RaeWho is Elliott Rae?Elliott Rae is one of the UK's most prominent speakers on fatherhood, masculinity and men's mental health. He is the founder of the parenting platform MusicFootballFatherhood, called the ‘Mumsnet for Dads' by the BBC. MusicFootballFatherhood is the UK's most exciting parenting and lifestyle platform for men. MFF is all about open conversations surrounding fatherhood, work-life balance, mental health, raising healthy and well-rounded children, money management, relationships and of course music and football. He previously worked in the Civil Service where he held senior Diversity, Equity & Inclusion roles and his last role was as the Head of D&I delivery at HM Treasury.He's been heavily involved in many research projects relating to fathers in the workplace, notably the 2018 Equal Lives report by Business in the Community and the Fathers in the Workplace toolkit by the University of Birmingham where he spoke at both of the launches. He was recognised by the United Nations for his work engaging men in gender equality and was awarded the UN Women UK's #HeForShe ‘Changemaker of the Year' award in 2019.Elliot Rae's DAD journey Elliott founded the MFF platform as a self-therapy after being diagnosed with PTSD as a new dad after the traumatic birth of his daughter. In his new book ‘DAD', an Amazon Top 10 bestseller, Elliott and 19 other dads shared their stories that represent the diversity of modern fatherhood and challenge the traditional ideas of masculinity.In January 2022, Elliott presented the seminal and primetime BBC One documentary ‘Becoming Dad'. This was the first show of its kind to bring issues around dad's mental health and work-life balance to the mainstream.Elliott as a speaker, author and social changemakerElliott specialises in helping organisations support fathers, improve men's mental health and engage men in conversations around gender equality.If you are trying to encourage more open conversations about masculinity and allyship and engage more men in your DEI activities, Elliot can help you. Connect here with Elliott.Key Leadership learning moments (timestamps)02:35 - Elliott Rae is not Fond of Introductions03:18 - Elliott's Philosophy - Keep On Putting the Work!05:16 - Elliott's Young Competitive Spirit06:39 - Elliott the Biggest Fan of Football Stars10:31 - His Biggest Supporters, His Parents16:13 - Elliot's Dad Tips for a Happy Marriage19:13 - How to Deal with Ego Effectively as a Man?22:06 - Hurdles in Unleashing Elliott's Full Potential26:01 - Elliott's Journey as a Modern-Day Father27:44 - What it Takes to Be a Good Man?30:22 - Being a Man vs. Being a Dad35:19 - Elliot's Traumatic Experiences39:48 - Mental Health Problems Surfacing - Elliott's Plight46:29 - MFF Origin Story56:07 - The Grit and Determination to Continue Against All Odds01:01:57 - The Numbers Game vs. The Influencer Game01:06:28 - Sope's Key Take Aways On Elliott's Interview01:09:36 - Elliott's Definition of LeadershipElliott's links:LinkedIn‘Dad' Book WebsiteFollow the podcastIf you've just stumbled across this podcast episode by chance, please click here to follow it so you never miss a future episode.If you want to learn more about this podcast, and myself, Sope Agbelusi, you can do so using any of the links below.Connect with Me Website Instagram  LinkedIn  Twitter YouTube Email: hello@mindsetshift.co.uk I am always keen to hear your thoughts and connect with the community of listeners. If you have any comments, feedback or thoughts, please drop me an email at https://mindsetshift.co.uk/#ask-me-anything

Being a dad is a role that we play, we are people first. A dad is something that I have become but I'm a man first. To look at it from what kind of dad you want to be without looking at what kind of man you want to become is the wrong way around. You need to define what kind of man you want to be first and that translates to parenting.- Elliott RaeWho is Elliott Rae?Elliott Rae is one of the UKs most prominent speakers on fatherhood, masculinity and mens mental health. He is the founder of the parenting platform MusicFootballFatherhood, called the Mumsnet for Dads by the BBC. MusicFootballFatherhood is the UKs most exciting parenting and lifestyle platform for men. MFF is all about open conversations surrounding fatherhood, work-life balance, mental health, raising healthy and well-rounded children, money management, relationships and of course music and football.He previously worked in the Civil Service where he held senior Diversity, Equity & Inclusion roles and his last role was as the Head of D&I delivery at HM Treasury.Hes been heavily involved in many research projects relating to fathers in the workplace, notably the 2018 Equal Lives report by Business in the Community and the Fathers in the Workplace toolkit by the University of Birmingham where he spoke at both of the launches. He was recognised by the United Nations for his work engaging men in gender equality and was awarded the UN Women UKs #HeForShe Changemaker of the Year award in 2019.Elliot Raes DAD journeyElliott founded the MFF platform as a self-therapy after being diagnosed with PTSD as a new dad after the traumatic birth of his daughter.In his new book DAD, an Amazon Top 10 bestseller, Elliott and 19 other dads shared their stories that represent the diversity of modern fatherhood and challenge the traditional ideas of masculinity.In January 2022, Elliott presented the seminal and primetime BBC One documentary Becoming Dad. This was the first show of its kind to bring issues around dads mental health and work-life balance to the mainstream.Elliott as a speaker, author and social changemakerElliott specialises in helping organisations support fathers, improve mens mental health and engage men in conversations around gender equality.If you are trying to encourage more open conversations about masculinity and allyship and engage more men in your DEI activities, Elliot can help you. Connect here with Elliott.Key Leadership learning moments (timestamps)02:35 - Elliott Rae is not Fond of Introductions03:18 - Elliott's Philosophy - Keep On Putting the Work!05:16 - Elliott's Young Competitive Spirit06:39 - Elliott the Biggest Fan of Football Stars10:31 - His Biggest Supporters, His Parents16:13 - Elliot's Dad Tips for a Happy Marriage19:13 - How to Deal with Ego Effectively as a Man?22:06 - Hurdles in Unleashing Elliott's Full Potential26:01 - Elliott's Journey as a Modern-Day Father27:44 - What it Takes to Be a Good Man?30:22 - Being a Man vs. Being a Dad35:19 - Elliot's Traumatic Experiences39:48 - Mental Health Problems Surfacing - Elliott's Plight46:29 - MFF Origin Story56:07 - The Grit and Determination to Continue Against All Odds01:01:57 - The Numbers Game vs. The Influencer Game01:06:28 - Sope's Key Take Aways On Elliott's Interview01:09:36 - Elliott's Definition of LeadershipElliotts links:LinkedInDad BookWebsiteFollow the podcastIf youve just stumbled across this podcast episode by chance, please click here to follow it so you never miss a future episode.If you want to learn more about this podcast, and myself, Sope Agbelusi, you can do so using any of the links below.Connect with Me Website Instagram LinkedIn Twitter YouTube Email: hello@mindsetshift.co.uk I am always keen to hear your thoughts and connect with the community of listeners. If you have any comments, feedback or thoughts, please drop me an email at https://mindsetshift.co.uk/#ask-me-anything

 “Being a dad is a role that we play, we are people first. A dad is something that I have become but I'm a man first. To look at it from what kind of dad you want to be without looking at what kind of man you want to become is the wrong way around. You need to define what kind of man you want to be first and that translates to parenting.”- Elliott RaeWho is Elliott Rae?Elliott Rae is one of the UK's most prominent speakers on fatherhood, masculinity and men's mental health. He is the founder of the parenting platform MusicFootballFatherhood, called the ‘Mumsnet for Dads' by the BBC. MusicFootballFatherhood is the UK's most exciting parenting and lifestyle platform for men. MFF is all about open conversations surrounding fatherhood, work-life balance, mental health, raising healthy and well-rounded children, money management, relationships and of course music and football. He previously worked in the Civil Service where he held senior Diversity, Equity & Inclusion roles and his last role was as the Head of D&I delivery at HM Treasury.He's been heavily involved in many research projects relating to fathers in the workplace, notably the 2018 Equal Lives report by Business in the Community and the Fathers in the Workplace toolkit by the University of Birmingham where he spoke at both of the launches. He was recognised by the United Nations for his work engaging men in gender equality and was awarded the UN Women UK's #HeForShe ‘Changemaker of the Year' award in 2019.Elliot Rae's DAD journey Elliott founded the MFF platform as a self-therapy after being diagnosed with PTSD as a new dad after the traumatic birth of his daughter. In his new book ‘DAD', an Amazon Top 10 bestseller, Elliott and 19 other dads shared their stories that represent the diversity of modern fatherhood and challenge the traditional ideas of masculinity.In January 2022, Elliott presented the seminal and primetime BBC One documentary ‘Becoming Dad'. This was the first show of its kind to bring issues around dad's mental health and work-life balance to the mainstream.Elliott as a speaker, author and social changemakerElliott specialises in helping organisations support fathers, improve men's mental health and engage men in conversations around gender equality.If you are trying to encourage more open conversations about masculinity and allyship and engage more men in your DEI activities, Elliot can help you. Connect here with Elliott.Key Leadership learning moments (timestamps)02:35 - Elliott Rae is not Fond of Introductions03:18 - Elliott's Philosophy - Keep On Putting the Work!05:16 - Elliott's Young Competitive Spirit06:39 - Elliott the Biggest Fan of Football Stars10:31 - His Biggest Supporters, His Parents16:13 - Elliot's Dad Tips for a Happy Marriage19:13 - How to Deal with Ego Effectively as a Man?22:06 - Hurdles in Unleashing Elliott's Full Potential26:01 - Elliott's Journey as a Modern-Day Father27:44 - What it Takes to Be a Good Man?30:22 - Being a Man vs. Being a Dad35:19 - Elliot's Traumatic Experiences39:48 - Mental Health Problems Surfacing - Elliott's Plight46:29 - MFF Origin Story56:07 - The Grit and Determination to Continue Against All Odds01:01:57 - The Numbers Game vs. The Influencer Game01:06:28 - Sope's Key Take Aways On Elliott's Interview01:09:36 - Elliott's Definition of LeadershipElliott's links:LinkedIn‘Dad' Book WebsiteFollow the podcastIf you've just stumbled across this podcast episode by chance, please click here to follow it so you never miss a future episode.If you want to learn more about this podcast, and myself, Sope Agbelusi, you can do so using any of the links below.Connect with Me Website Instagram  LinkedIn  Twitter YouTube Email: hello@mindsetshift.co.uk I am always keen to hear your thoughts and connect with the community of listeners. If you have any comments, feedback or thoughts, please drop me an email at https://mindsetshift.co.uk/#ask-me-anything

Rishi Sunak has been criticised for dropping Liz Truss's plans to expand and deregulate childcare. Today's Nick Robinson discusses how childcare can be made more affordable with Christine Farquharson, Senior Research Economist at the IFS, Justine Roberts, founder and chief executive of Mumsnet, and Robin Walker, MP, Chair of the Education Select Committee. (IMAGE CREDIT: Dominic Lipinski/PA Wire)

A Glitch in the Matrix Stories 2 Hour CompilationWhat does it mean when there's a glitch in the Matrix?A phrase first coined in the 1999 film The Matrix—which posited the idea that humanity is living in a giant computer simulation—over the years a "glitch in the matrix" has become shorthand for an example of an unusual occurrence that cannot logically be explained.People's 'Glitch in the Matrix' Experiences Baffle the Internet: 'Spooky and Unsettling'People have been sharing stories about times they have experienced a "glitch in the matrix" and some are proving simply too strange to explain away.A phrase first coined in the 1999 film The Matrix—which posited the idea that humanity is living in a giant computer simulation—over the years a "glitch in the matrix" has become shorthand for an example of an unusual occurrence that cannot logically be explained.During a recent discussion on Mumsnet, which garnered over 700 comments, users were invited to offer up their own experiences of a "glitch in the matrix" and the responses did not disappoint.What does it mean when there's a glitch in the Matrix?A phrase first coined in the 1999 film The Matrix—which posited the idea that humanity is living in a giant computer simulation—over the years a "glitch in the matrix" has become shorthand for an example of an unusual occurrence that cannot logically be explained.People's 'Glitch in the Matrix' Experiences Baffle the Internet: 'Spooky and Unsettling'People have been sharing stories about times they have experienced a "glitch in the matrix" and some are proving simply too strange to explain away.A phrase first coined in the 1999 film The Matrix—which posited the idea that humanity is living in a giant computer simulation—over the years a "glitch in the matrix" has become shorthand for an example of an unusual occurrence that cannot logically be explained.During a recent discussion on Mumsnet, which garnered over 700 comments, users were invited to offer up their own experiences of a "glitch in the matrix" and the responses did not disappoint.

Glitch in the Matrix Stories 2 Hour CompilationWhat does it mean when there's a glitch in the Matrix?A phrase first coined in the 1999 film The Matrix—which posited the idea that humanity is living in a giant computer simulation—over the years a "glitch in the matrix" has become shorthand for an example of an unusual occurrence that cannot logically be explained.People's 'Glitch in the Matrix' Experiences Baffle the Internet: 'Spooky and Unsettling'People have been sharing stories about times they have experienced a "glitch in the matrix" and some are proving simply too strange to explain away.A phrase first coined in the 1999 film The Matrix—which posited the idea that humanity is living in a giant computer simulation—over the years a "glitch in the matrix" has become shorthand for an example of an unusual occurrence that cannot logically be explained.During a recent discussion on Mumsnet, which garnered over 700 comments, users were invited to offer up their own experiences of a "glitch in the matrix" and the responses did not disappoint.

Chloe Sweden is the Founder and CEO of Plants and Perks, a service for rewarding employees with sustainable perks. Chad talks to Chloe about supporting employees on plant-based sustainability journies by gifting free samples and high-value prizes, choosing a co-founder, and being strategic with the types of businesses they've approached. Plants and Perks (https://www.plantsandperks.com/) Follow Plants and Perks on Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/@plantsandperks/), Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/plantsandperks), or LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/company/plantsandperks/). Follow Chloe on LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/chloe-sweden-014/). Follow thoughtbot on Twitter (https://twitter.com/thoughtbot) or LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/company/150727/). Become a Sponsor (https://thoughtbot.com/sponsorship) of Giant Robots! Transcript: CHAD: This is the Giant Robots Smashing Into Other Giant Robots Podcast, where we explore the design, development, and business of great products. I'm your host, Chad Pytel. And with me today is Chloe Sweden, the Founder, and CEO of Plants and Perks, a service for rewarding employees with sustainable perks. Chloe, thank you so much for joining me. CHLOE: Thank you for having me. CHAD: So you officially started Plants and Perks, at least according to your LinkedIn, in July of 2020. But I'm sure, like many entrepreneurs, you incubated the idea. The idea was in your head for longer than that. So, where does the idea from Plants and Perks come from? And when did you start to noodle it? CHLOE: It's a really, really good question. I also think that the LinkedIn algorithm isn't 100% correct. CHAD: [laughs] CHLOE: And it always seems to add time. I always get this sort of like, "Oh my God, you've been doing this for like two years?" I'm like, "No, I'm sure it can't be. It must be shorter than that." So Plants and Perks, Plants and Perks originally started out life as the Green Shoot Institute, which, I think, if you Google us, still there's remnants of the Green Shoot Institute that exists. That is still our company holding name. And that was kind of, I guess, the first thought of the idea. I was at the time heading up commercial relationships at a large parenting platform in the UK. And we had started to go on our own plant-based journey, so thinking about cutting back on meat and dairy consumption. I guess that was sort of my own personal journey that started to make me, as a parent, and as a consumer, and as a senior leader within business to, start to think about things outside of myself, and my family, and my business. And really, that was kind of the spark of thinking about how we, as employers, don't really do much to support employees on the plant-based sustainability journey. That was the sort of the embryo of the idea. And that came from the fact that I had spent 20 years of my life in advertising, marketing, and then ten years within that in talent as a former head of talent and culture really thinking about how we embed talent and how we help employees, and how culture is so important to businesses, and how we get employees really to be the face of our brands. But we don't really do much to invest in people beyond the kind of traditional benefits that exist but also in terms of training and things like that. That was kind of where things were coming together, sort of thinking about the future of work and thinking about how people go through these huge life moments and how the businesses really support them. So that was kind of the start. I won't give the whole game away, but that was, I guess, the beginning of a kind of, hmm, there's something there. And I didn't really know what it was at the time. But yeah, I guess it wasn't so much before I actually incorporated the company. I incorporated in September 2020. That's what it says on my Company's House printout that I have on the wall just to remind me of when that momentous day happened. But pretty quickly, from coming up with an idea, I incorporated the business and just went, this is something I have to do. CHAD: Yeah, the feeling of this is something I have to do is something that I've felt myself and that I hear from a lot of entrepreneurs and guests of the show. You were working at Mumsnet at the time. How did you start while also having another job? CHLOE: Not just having another job, running a large sales team, and homeschooling two children during a pandemic. CHAD: Oh, homeschooling. Okay, yeah. CHLOE: And my son was definitely diagnosed with having additional needs at the time as well. I guess it was all of those things that kind of came together that made me realize, I mean, I had joined Mumsnet actually to head up Mumsnet's talent function, which was all about creating a flexible working product platform for parents and those looking for flexible jobs to bring them together in a marketplace. But Mumsnet wasn't going to actually continue to invest in that product, and I moved to a more commercial role. But I moved there to build a product. And that's what really triggered it for me. I realized in that moment when I'm homeschooling, and I'm running a large sales team, and I'm doing all of these things, that wasn't why I moved to this role. I actually moved because I'm at the point in my career where I want to build something, that I have it in me to create something, and build, and connect people, and do something bigger than myself and bigger than a day-to-day job. And so that itch was there. I was also, as part of that role, going out and speaking to heads of HR in large enterprise organizations and talking to them about what was troubling them. And funny enough, looking after their working parents was not troubling them, but sustainability came up a lot, and general well-being came up a lot. And so that was kind of, I guess, it started the percolation. But really, I guess with most things, the idea came about in its most embryonic stage, and then I took it to market really quickly. I basically gave it a name and then just reached out on LinkedIn to anybody I knew and people I didn't know as well just literally reached out to those people. And I spoke to one person who I won't name her or the company but probably one of the largest global companies in the world and at a very senior level. And she was actually working out of the States. And she said to me, you know, "This is new. [laughs] You need to do this. Nobody is doing this. We need this in our lives. And I haven't heard of anybody doing this in the States. You need to go and build this." And that was, I guess, the impetus to do it. And so I worked weekends. I actually was working four days a week at Mumsnet. But my fifth day, I was working full time for Mumsnet but not being paid. And so I clawed back my fifth day where I wasn't being paid, and I worked all weekends, and I worked all evenings. And I just worked and worked, and I haven't stopped until this conversation. [laughs] CHAD: To actually work on it, did you start to gather a team, a group of people? Who were the first people that you brought on to help you? CHLOE: So my co-founder, Ellen, we were on the senior leadership team of a creative agency. I was the head of talent and culture. She was the head of operation. So we had worked side by side in this organization. So we kept in touch. And she had contacted me about some health issues. And we were talking about cutting back on meat and dairy as one of the things that she could look at, given my own experiences with it. And that really bonded us. And because I am marketing, sales, creative, and she is digital, tech, product, it kind of made sense, in the beginning, to bring her on. And I just said to her like, "I'd really like you on this journey with me." And she resisted it for quite some time. [laughs] We are very different personality-wise, very, very different. I'm yes, she's no, and so in that way, we're very much yin and yang. CHAD: Oh, but I think that that can be the perfect combination for a co-founder team. I know that I've needed that in the past for myself. Someone who balances the risk-taking with reality can be very helpful. CHLOE: Yeah, absolutely. And I think I'm actually not a risk taker, but I am a natural optimist. And so I'll have a meeting, and I'll be like, "It's amazing. It's solved all of our problems." And she'll be just like, "No, it hasn't. What's changed? Nothing's changed. There's no contract, nothing signed," [laughs] which I think in the moment is really not helpful. [laughs] But it's really helpful as we grow the business. It really is a good balance. I bring all of that energy and drive to get us very quickly to the next level. And she brings all of the understanding, all of the pauses, all of the rigor, all of the data, all the things that are just the complete opposite of me. So I brought her on pretty quickly. And then we had a bit of a false start around getting a CTO on board. But we knew we needed to build the product quickly. And in the end, we built the product ourselves on a no-code/low-code platform, just the two of us. And I recommend any entrepreneur to do that because you learn a lot. [laughs] CHAD: Is that the reason...so you learning...because I think that that is super important, whether it be someone like yourself actually building the product or just being very close to it. When I've seen entrepreneurs get too far away from the product too soon, they end up regretting it later on. CHLOE: Yeah, I think -- CHAD: Or building the wrong thing. CHLOE: Or building the wrong thing. I do really believe in you've got to do every job in order to then understand who you need to hire and to then have an appreciation of that role. So obviously the product evolved very much and very quickly. We were very lucky that one of our first clients was Lacoste, who we launched to here in the UK with our MVP. But we also did some other paid consultancy work with Uber and with other clients as well. And then PopSockets came on in the States as well. We weren't ready to launch in the States, but they really wanted us to. So we're like, you know, let's do it. [laughs] CHAD: I noticed those three names on your website. And I do think that social...being able to have those testimonials there with names people recognize lends a lot of credibility to the product. CHLOE: And they were my first three clients, [laughs] genuinely my first three clients. CHAD: So, did you seek that out, or did it just happen? How did that work out? CHLOE: Obviously, my background is commercial sales, so it's not something that I shy away from. It was connections; it was talking to people. And we were recommended to PopSockets, which was amazing. They came on as an early investor as well, which was phenomenal. Again, having clients who love what you do so much they want to invest is brilliant because you get to have some really interesting conversations and backers in your corner. But yeah, of course, we've been quite strategic with the types of businesses that we've approached, but we are very lucky that we are attracting the right type of businesses as well, which is lovely. I mean, talk a little bit more about what Plants and Perks does, but the way in which we have evolved the product and evolved the types of clients that we're talking to is not an accident. And I think it goes back to the conversation we were just having about building the product yourself. Really being in the weeds, I think, is really important. Now, it's going to be a challenge to me as a founder moving forward to make sure I'm extricating myself from the weeds as time goes on, although I'm pretty happy to step away when needed. [laughs] But knowing that and being able to talk to your clients and being really clear, well, this is what this client likes; this is what's happening here; this is what's working well here, I think is really important. You've got to know your product. You've got to know your audience. We've got two...actually, we have three clients, technically. We have clients; we have employees; we have client employers; we have employees; and we also have Perks' partners. We have sustainable...we promote sustainable products and services on our platform. So we also have partners as well as our clients. And I think you've got to know them all really well. Now, I was a head of talent and culture, so I know the employee piece quite well because I was always advocating for the employee. I spent 20 years downsizing, so I ran client accounts. So I know how to look after clients, I guess, from that perspective and work in large organizations. I also used to literally do the marketing for PepsiCo and Wrigley's and big brands. So I can do the partner piece quite well. And I think it's really important that you've done that and you've lived through it. And I've never built a tech product, but I did literally roll my sleeves up and get stuck in to build the MVP, which was kind of the bit that I was missing. Now, I haven't built the app; that is beyond me. [laughs] But luckily, we've got a brilliant team around us now, which we've built up since our last raise that's enabled us to get that talent in. And yeah, and it's just been an amazing team effort to get us to where we are now. CHAD: That's great. I want to dig into more about what the product actually is. But you've already alluded a couple of times -- CHLOE: No, let's keep it mysterious. [laughter] CHAD: You've alluded a few times to the evolution. And one thing that's stuck out to me as you were talking about that is that going to the website now; it's not specifically about eating less meat and dairy. You're talking more about sustainability. CHLOE: Yes. CHAD: I'm sure that's still a component of it. CHLOE: 100%. CHAD: But what drove that change? CHLOE: Oh my God, [laughs] about a two-week period where we had an existential crisis. I think this is really interesting, I think, for our journey, and I think us as founders as well. So we ideologically always believed in the reduction of meat and dairy as the number one thing you can do for personal and planetary health. That's it. Like, that was it. We were all about eat plants, get perks. We encourage employees to cut back on their meat and dairy consumption, and we reward them with plant-based perks. That was the product. That was the concept. Tested really well. People really bought into it. People liked that they were being rewarded with perks. They absolutely understood that it is unsustainable to consume meat and dairy in the way that we are moving forward for the planet and also for personal health. So when we're having these conversations, everyone was like, thumbs up, get it, love it, buy into it, it's all great. And then what was happening is that I kind of got to a point where I was like, we've had all these really positive conversations, but no one's biting. Everyone's sort of saying yes to me and then nothing. I'm actually really proud of us as a team for very, very quickly going and identifying the problem and fixing it because we could have stuck to our ideological guns and gone, no, no, no, but we are all about the reduction of meat and dairy consumption as the number one thing. But no one was telling us that it was that that was the problem. What we had to do was read between the lines because nobody would ever tell us that. But what they would say was, "Well, how would it land with a 58-year-old man working in our distribution center?" And we're like, "Really well, why?" [laughter] But I had to understand what was coming behind that question. And what was coming behind the question was I don't want to launch a benefit where I feel like we're judging somebody's life choices. Like, that's not going to wash. So the people we were talking to were super keen on it, then when they took it up the line, they were essentially saying, "Well, this is a plant-based benefit, Plants and Perks." And I think that's where the sort of record scratched, and it didn't go any further. But no one was feeding this back to us. This we had to discover ourselves. And so we had this kind of existential crisis where we're like, well, we've always been about sustainability, like, absolutely the reduction in meat and dairy is all because it's unsustainable for us to consume meat and dairy and fish in the way that we are. So why don't we broaden ourselves out to more? We already held sustainable products and services on our platform anyway. It was just the language; it really was. It wasn't actually as big a pivot as it sounded. It really was just softening the language. So we don't talk about plant-based; we talk about planet-friendly. And we just kind of expanded out some of the articles and content that we contained anyway. And that unblocked everything, like genuinely overnight unblocked everything. So it became something that what we were hearing was that companies wanted to introduce a new green benefit, and now they felt that they could because there wasn't the kind of...and we always said that this is non-judgmental. This is completely supportive. These are very small changes that you could make. You don't have to sort of introduce me to it. But now it makes sense to everybody. And I think we as a business just needed to go through that moment where we were like, is this the type of business that we want to be running? Is this the business that we want to be owning? And we were like, absolutely, because this is still...our mission actually didn't change at all. Our mission is to help a million employees live healthier, more sustainable lives. That has not changed. And so the fact that our mission hadn't changed, it was just some of the language needed to change to make it more palatable to a wider audience, that's fine. We could live with that. CHAD: Yeah, that's great. So now, what does that actually mean in terms of what the product is? Companies sign up. CHLOE: Yep. CHAD: And what do employees do? CHLOE: Yeah, so it's a really good question. So the other sort of big moment, I guess, inflection point that we had is that we introduced a freemium model. And that, from a product perspective, was quite a big thing because I started realizing in conversations as well we were giving too much value away. And actually, some of the value that we were giving away clients didn't necessarily want. Some clients really wanted it, and some clients didn't need it. And so we introduced three different products. So we introduced free, so we now have a completely free Plants and Perks app that any employer can take on for their employee base. And it will give them discounts of sustainable products and services. It will give them article content on how to live more sustainably, embrace more sustainable living. And it will give them planet-friendly recipes on essentially more sustainable, healthy ways to eat. And that's the core free product that we've created. CHAD: And are you still making revenue on that through partner relationship? CHLOE: Yeah, absolutely. So, although, you know, we're not about excess consumption. What we are about is...I think what we really realized is with Plants and Perks; we are bang smack in the middle of a cost of living crisis. And actually, what we can do is level the playing field when it comes to green and sustainable products. There's kind of like this green tax that gets applied. And what we're trying to do is very much look at price parity. So what we talk about is it's harder than ever to make the most sensible choices when costs are spiraling all around us. And so what the reductions of planet-friendly products does is enables you to just try things that you might not have tried before because of cost, and it mitigates against that. So we do go into relationship with partners, and they can promote their products through the platform. But there are also chances for employees to put their reviews and tell them what they think. So it isn't just set up for advertisers in that way at all. But what we found is there's an amazing thing which is that brands need to connect with a new, wider audience. They don't just want to talk to early adopters within the sustainability or plant-based space. And we are talking to every man and every woman in large-scale organizations. So it's actually quite difficult to access those people if you're these niche brands who may not even have listings necessarily in large retailers yet. Or if you do have distribution, it's really difficult to get a sell-through. So we enable those partners to offer sampling, to offer freebies, to offer significant discounts, and to offer in-store redemptions as well. So we are offering quite a significant route to market for sustainable and plant-based products and services. CHAD: That's great. Okay, and so what is the second tier up? CHLOE: The second tier is plus and what that gives you is we start to give employees plant points, and you collect plant points. It's incredibly gamified. You can collect badges. Every action you do basically has a reaction. So when you read an article, you basically can answer some questions on the article, and you'll be rewarded with points. You can rate a recipe; you can like a recipe, try a recipe. You can buy a product or a service. You can also get a free...in the UK, at the moment, you'll be able to get a free meal once a week, like a free lunch through one of our partners, and loads of freebies as well. So the value is much more significant in the plus model. That's kind of our core offering. And we talk about rewarding employees with sustainable perks. And during the time at the moment, employers are really looking for ways in which they can support their employees through the cost of living crisis. How can we give our employees free stuff, interesting stuff, whilst also helping them on the sustainability journey? And so therefore, this is something that genuinely really works for both employers and employees. So that's the plus model. CHAD: One thing I noticed as you lay out the benefits that you get under this model, I'm surprised then by the per-employee cost. It seemed very low to me [laughs] when I saw it. Can you talk more about that? CHLOE: Yeah, so that is a from price. And I do think I need to make it; I mean, I do say it's from, and I think I do say there's a bit of an asterisk. I do think I need to potentially change it as well. So it's good [laughs] feedback because I think quite a few people say that. So that is for large-scale employers. So we are talking to large retailers with 20,000, 30,000 40,000 employees. So that is the cost that they would pay. It is a sliding scale back from that cost. But, I mean, we've purposely priced ourselves to be reasonable. We are a mission-led company, and for any investors listening, don't worry; we are also revenue-generating. CHAD: [laughs] CHLOE: But for us, it's really important that we are an affordable benefit. We're very aware of the costs on everyone. So, for sure, that price is pretty low. But we think that it represents quite good value, incredible value for the client. But it's something that makes sense for them to bring on. It should be a no-brainer; that's basically what we say. Like, it's a no-brainer. In terms of the amount of freebies that you're getting for your employee, it's certainly a no-brainer in terms of the return on investment. On the pro version, by the way, the added value on the pro version is that it's fully ring-fenced for that organization. So it's fully branded. They get full account management. It looks like their platform, essentially. And employees can talk and access the information together. So it might be that Bob in IT in Denver has uploaded a photo of himself cycling to work, and somebody else can comment on it. Somebody else has uploaded a curry recipe in Scotland, and someone else has gone, "Well, I tried that recipe." "But, you know, how was it? How much chili did you put in it?" So people are kind of joining together and really creating that space to talk about sustainability in a much more accessible way. So that's the pro version. And also we're then building on sustainability metrics and also sustainability reporting. So we'll be able to talk about employees' own carbon footprint and also how that scales up to the overall company's sustainability goals. CHAD: You mentioned that the mission is to help one million employees on their sustainability journey. Can you tell me where you are [laughs] along that metric? CHLOE: Yeah. So, look, the app launch is tomorrow, so [laughs] ask me in a couple of months. And we're really...actually; we're genuinely new. CHAD: You've been in private beta, I guess, is the way to describe it. CHLOE: Yeah. We're basically with the MVP. We've been helping a couple of thousand employees up until this point. We got around 25,000. About 30-plus companies join our waiting list, which was then around 25,000-30,000 employees that represented. We've just confirmed that we're going to be launching with a very large retailer in the UK as well, so that will then -- CHAD: Congratulations. CHLOE: Thank you. That will then double, so it will be about 50,000 employees that we'll be hitting this year. And then we are in quite far down the line talks with quite a few other companies that would take us to potentially just under our target, which, by the way, the million employees is not like it's a target for 2022. It's like a...it's our ongoing mission. [laughs] CHAD: Right, a long-term vision. CHLOE: It's a long-term vision. So we're significantly further ahead than I thought we would be on that. I mean, look, what we've said from the start is the million is a sort of fairly arbitrary number but what it is is it's scale. So we're not here just to look after, you know, we're not here just to help very, very small companies; we can now with our free product, which is great, but it gives us that scale. And it shows that we, as a business, want to be global, want to be talking to enterprise clients and then helping them live healthier, more sustainable lives. For us, it's both of those things. You can't just live a healthy life, and you can't just live a sustainable life. It needs to be a life of purpose. And so the mission really keeps us true to those things. MID-ROLL AD: Now that you have funding, it's time to design, build and ship the most impactful MVP that wows customers now and can scale in the future. thoughtbot Lift Off brings you the most reliable cross-functional team of product experts to mitigate risk and set you up for long-term success. As your trusted, experienced technical partner, we'll help launch your new product and guide you into a future-forward business that takes advantage of today's new technologies and agile best practices. Make the right decisions for tomorrow, today. Get in touch at: thoughtbot.com/liftoff. CHAD: You mentioned you have essentially three client bases: you have the employers, the employees, and the partners, which essentially means you have a multi-sided marketplace. CHLOE: Yes. CHAD: And one of the challenges of building any marketplace, especially the more sides you have, is bootstrapping it, you know, creating a momentum. The partners want to know, hey, how many people are on the platform that we're going to be bringing into? And in the early days, you don't have much to offer there. So how have you made that work? CHLOE: Well, so firstly, we don't see ourselves as a marketplace, which we should. [laughter] We should see ourselves as a marketplace. Secondly, I learned all about building a marketplace because, in 2010, I launched a dating app before there were apps. Actually, it was a dating website...and completely on my own. It was complete madness. And I totally did not understand the power of a network. I didn't understand the marketplace dynamic. I didn't understand that you needed buyers and you needed sellers. You needed, in this case, men seeking women and women seeking men. [laughs] You needed both sides of the equation. And you needed volume on both sides straight out of the gate. I just didn't get that. I was like, build it, and they will come. [laughs] And so I was fully burnt from that experience. So that was still ringing in my head. So I think what was important was building up, firstly, building up our partners. So it was really, really important to build up the number of partners that we have on the platform. And for them, it's a completely low-risk strategy. It's like, come on the platform and offer discounts and people who are interested in sustainability. Like, that's really easy. We can do that. And then for the companies, we've got everything...beyond the partners, we still have loads and loads of value. We still have value in the articles. We still have value in the gamification. We have value in the recipe. So there's still value even if there wasn't value in the perks. But what we've done is we've been able to build up both sides. So actually, we've got over 200 brands, which represents about 45,000-plus individual discounts on the platform. And now we're building up the number of employees. Now we're able to revenue generate more off the partners because we've got the volume on the other side. CHAD: You mentioned that you are primarily focused on the UK now. But you've had interest from the U.S. and demand that you've not rejected. What does that look like for you now? And how do you balance that going forward? CHLOE: Yeah, I have got quite a lot of interest from the States. And it's really hard not to be pulled over there. And we see a lot of interest from there. We have to -- CHAD: Why are you holding back? CHLOE: Because we just don't have the team size at the moment, and we need to get the...there's two things really. Well, there are a number of things. There are about 22 things. [laughter] I know I said there are two things; there are like a million reasons. We need to make sure that we've got the best product possible; that's number one. We need to test in our home market. We need to make sure that we've got the robust mechanic with the Perk's partners and with the employees. We need to get all of that working really well because the States is a completely different market because of the nature of the products and services. We're not on the ground there. So it's easier for us to have really good relationships with partners now. There's going to be a conference on Wednesday in London, so I'm going to be meeting a lot of our partners there; super easy. It's like 20 minutes on the train for me. Harder to go to the States and make sure that we have really robust relationships with partners there; not impossible, just it would be time and effort to be able to build it in the States. I think we'd be able to find the clients actually more easily or, I guess, quicker if that makes sense because I think there's a need in the States. And then there are just cultural nuances. So we just need to make sure that all of our content is really relevant culturally. So PopSockets, we are with PopSockets in the States, and I think they're quite fairly near you in Boulder. So we are already aware of some of those cultural nuances. And our editorial teams are quite good at making sure that we're representing that. So, yeah, so I think it's just about making sure that we do a good job of it. The hard thing, I think, is actually launching across Europe because of the language barrier and because of the very different cultural nuances when it comes to sustainability, local government policy. CHAD: Also, expectations around employee benefits and how they work. CHLOE: Exactly. Expectations around employee benefits and also attitudes to food as well because obviously food is still a part of what we do, and so all of those things actually make Europe slightly harder. So I think, for us, it would be a launch to the U.S. before we would go to continental Europe, but, again, not impossible. Interestingly, our clients massively want us to be global quickly because they are all looking for global benefits. They want to be able to homogenize their benefits offerings globally. They do not want to have one thing being offered in the UK, something being offered in the States, especially when it comes to benefits. Things like pensions, things like healthcare are so different in those countries, and they won't change. Just in terms of how many holiday days you guys have versus us, they can't make it a level playing field on many things. So if they could have a level playing field when it comes to sustainable benefits, they would love to do that. So there is a real need driving us to go global very quickly. And, look, going right back to the conversation we had at the beginning, I'd do it tomorrow. I'd move my family to the U.S. and just start building it. But my very kind advisors are like, slow down. [laughs] Get it right in the UK. CHAD: Well, I think that is a good indicator that you do have a marketplace business because all of the pressures around scaling are the same ones that marketplaces have. CHLOE: Yeah. [laughs] CHAD: And marketplace businesses very often benefit from in the early days focusing on specific markets. CHLOE: No, you're 100% right. I think I've had an epiphany on this podcast [laughter] that I'm running a marketplace. CHAD: I want to come back to the actual tech of the product as we wrap up here. I'm super impressed that you used a low-code platform to build the MVP yourself, and that has taken you through today. So how did you go about moving beyond that? CHLOE: [laughs] So we always knew we'd have to ditch it, so we were very aware. And that's the beauty of doing an MVP which is you don't fall in love with it. So that was great because we knew we were going to ditch it. We didn't fall in love with it. So how did we go about it? So we've got ourselves...we got a CTO on board that Ellen had worked with before. And we've got an amazing UX-UI designer. And we've got some devs. And we just ran at it. We just said, right, what are we taking from the MVP that we want to put into...and we knew it had to be an app really quickly. We actually weren't going to develop the app this year, but then it was sort of, you know, the demand there was all for the app. So we've gone app first. So we just said, "What's important from the MVP that we want to be taking here?" We knew that perks was going to be the first thing that we wanted to launch with because of the cost of living crisis. And we wanted to make it really about perks, which is why I know it sounds silly when it's obvious to you that we're a marketplace. It actually isn't that obvious to us because before perks, none of those things are marketplace. All of the other products and services that we offer aren't marketplace. CHAD: You mean the content and that kind of thing. CHLOE: The content, the gamification. We've got a whole thing coming down the line all about how to calculate your carbon footprint. Like, none of that is marketplace. But because we've really leant heavily on the perks because we know that there's a massive need for that, I guess that's why it's a surprise to me [laughs] that we're a marketplace. But yeah, so we knew we wanted to get perks out first. So then we built a product with perks at the heart because that was testing really well. And then yeah, and then we've just kind of literally just gone hell for leather head down. The team has been in build mode. We've been in sell mode and creation mode. And, yeah, we've just gone really, really fast. It's not in our natures to sort of go slow on these things. And we just need to be out there. People love what we're doing. And now it's the real test. Now it's literally employees now getting access to it, and that's the scary time. CHAD: Has it been what you expected actually, you know, building custom software in terms of time, and cost, and that kind of thing? Or has it been different than what you expected? CHLOE: Yeah, that's a good question. So I guess over the years, I've had the opportunity to build products internally in companies. You're always in a waiting list for other people that need other stuff. So in a way, it's been quicker because it's my team, and they've got nothing else to concentrate on except this. I'm really open with what I don't know. So I'm like, okay, could I do, just out of interest, how easy is it for us to switch off that function and launch this? Is it a week? Is it a month? Is it like a year? Like, I just have no idea on timings and scale on that. So I try to work that out quite quickly. But I think it's been quicker than I thought it might be. And if you've got an internal team, then it's cheaper. As soon as we started to look at external teams, it was prohibitively expensive and no control. And I think we knew quite early on that we wanted to build it internally. CHAD: How has it compared to the process of using the low-code tool to get started? CHLOE: [laughs] In a way, if I had an idea, it was up and live an hour later...[laughs] and, you know, I guess there's much more pushback now. It's like, "Do you really need that feature?" And I'm like, "Yeah, you know, just do it. What's so difficult?" So I guess I've had to put more rigor and thinking behind some of the features and functions that we now have versus just sticking it up there. I mean, look, we were really, really frustrated with low-code. We were really frustrated with what it could do. It is so limited really in what we were trying to do, but it got us to a certain point. I'll always be forever grateful to it. [laughs] And my partner and I were able to completely tag team on it. So I would do all of the front end, and she'd do all the back end. It worked really well from that perspective. But we've got a great team now who are really engaged in what we're trying to do and trying to achieve. I guess I want everything yesterday. So as with most things, I'm getting updates going, "This is broken, and I'm having to turn this off for the launch." And I'm like, "No, I want it there. I want it in there." CHAD: So, on that note, why do you have a specific launch date? CHLOE: We've got a client we're launching to next week. [laughter] So we're launching -- CHAD: So you've made a commitment to launch for a particular client, and so you need to hit that date. CHLOE: Yeah. We are. We're launching it to...yeah, we've got quite a lot of clients, actually. We've got launches almost every day from next week. So this week is friends and family launch. So we need to get it out and get it tested. And then it goes into the hands of real-life users, which is scary and interesting. CHAD: I wish you all the best with that. I really appreciate you taking the time. CHLOE: Any advice? CHAD: Well, what I was going to say is a question I often like to ask. And I'm curious, before launch, is there something that you wish you could have done differently or realized sooner? I'm sure this question might be different post-launch. The answer to this question might be different post-launch. But from where you sit today, is there something that you wish you would have done differently? CHLOE: Oh my God. I almost want to say everything and nothing. I don't want to go, no, I don't regret anything; everything's been a learning experience, [laughs] so there's nothing I would have done differently because it's all led me to this point. But then, on the other hand, I think we've made the right decisions with the data that we've had. I think we need to...there's stuff that we need to be doing much more rigorously now moving forwards, which is making sure that we are very, very data-driven with what's coming back. Now we're in the hands of real users in a meaningful way with the app. We need to be taking all of that feedback on and not just relying on the gut instinct with a lot of things. It needs to be much more data-driven now that we've got the data coming in. So I don't think that's a regret necessarily because I think you've got to kind of go with your gut to get a product out the door because you could be completely hamstrung by research. And that would have taken us into a whole nother territory. So I think...does that make sense? So whilst I'm not regretting but like -- CHAD: It does make sense. And you asked me for any advice that I have. And this is a very small piece of advice, but it's one thing that I've made the mistake of myself and seen many other teams do. If you want to seek metrics on something and you don't instrument it, you don't set up those metrics; then you don't have them. CHLOE: So true. CHAD: And you realize, oh, we should have been tracking this click, or that click, or this flow. And then you put it in place once you realize that it's not there, and you have to wait 30-60 days in order to get the data. And that time feels terrible while you're waiting for that data to accrue. And so my general advice is to instrument basically everything. Instrument as much as possible, even if you think you're not going to need it. Track as many clicks as possible in the app so that you can really then say, oh, we didn't know we wanted to track this flow. And you already have the data where you can piece it together instead of waiting. CHLOE: Yeah, 100%. So we were challenged by...so we're backed by sustainable ventures on the accelerator program. And we were challenged by them to make sure that we've got all of our KPI metrics in place for the product. Of course, we've just been head down building it. And actually, it was a great moment where it's kind of like, but how many points do you want your users to collect in a day? Maybe there's an upper limit that you want, which we hadn't really thought about. Well, I don't know; we just want them to collect points. Like, you know, we want them to live their best life. And so in setting the KPIs, we've also had to set what we're measuring, but it was like two pages long. [laughs] There are so many things that we're trying to...what our KPIs are. And I think we can also...I think a learning is that maybe we need to be a little bit more focused with also what we're trying to measure and also what we were trying to see because we, again, can't focus on everything. We can't update and upgrade and iterate absolutely everything as a priority. What's going to shift the dial the most? What's going to have the biggest impact? Yes, we can change the color of that, or we can make that button bigger. But actually, if that's not going to lead to the KPI that we're trying to measure, then actually, there's no point. So yeah, so I think that's been a learning as well. I mean, there are so many thousands, billion learnings on this whole journey. [laughs] I could write a book. I don't think anyone will read it, but I could definitely write a book. [laughter] And I don't have time to write it. If I had time to write it and if anyone wants to read it, I'll do it. [laughs] CHAD: Okay. Well, maybe a few years from now, you can write that book. CHLOE: Yeah. CHAD: And, Chloe, thank you so much for joining the show and for telling us all about your journey. I really wish you and Plants and Perks the best over these important next couple of months. CHLOE: Thank you. We're raising, by the way. We're just about to go into our seed round, so yeah. CHAD: Seed round. CHLOE: Yeah. CHAD: Perfect. CHLOE: I know, perfect for Plants and Perks. That's the next inflection point whilst obviously also launching an app. And we don't do things by halves, so that will be the next learning journey. CHAD: If folks want to find out more, to follow along with you, to get in touch with the company, where are all the different places that they can do that? CHLOE: Don't look at the website because we're in the process of updating that. [laughter] And, frankly, now I'm going to change the pricing after this conversation. [laughs] But yeah, no, don't do that. Just email me; it's the easiest way. Or find me on LinkedIn; LinkedIn is probably the number one way. Or email chloe@plantsandperks.com. I love; literally, I love hearing feedback: negative, positive, anything. I love having conversations. I love doing partnerships. I love helping people on their journeys; just reach out. CHAD: Wonderful. And you can subscribe to the show and find notes for this episode along with a complete transcript at giantrobots.fm. If you have questions or comments, email us at hosts@giantrobots.fm. And you can find me on Twitter @cpytel. This podcast is brought to you by thoughtbot and produced and edited by Mandy Moore. Thanks so much for listening, and see you next time. ANNOUNCER: This podcast was brought to you by thoughtbot. thoughtbot is your expert design and development partner. Let's make your product and team a success. Special Guest: Chloe Sweden.

Our expert host, Kate Moody, is joined by some great guests to talk about the most notable fintech, financial services and banking news from the past week. This week's guests include: Tom Pope, Head of Payments and Platforms,Tink Nadya Hijazi, Global Head of Wholesale Digital Channels, HSBC Julia McColl, CPO, Chetwood Financial We cover the following stories from the fintech and financial services space: Mumsbank? Mumsnet teams up with Chetwood to launch family focused financial products in 2023 - 3:20 HSBC teams up with Oracle Netsuite for Embedded Banking Services in the US - 19:03 Adyen deepens its partnership with Tink, by adding open banking payments - 31:01 SoftBank's Vision Fund to layoff 30% of staff - 41:40 Serena William's venture capital firm leads Ugandan fintech Numida's pre-series A funding round round - 52:30 Payhawk launches business credit cards in the UK - 54:50 SEC charges Kim Kardashian for Instagram crypto promotion - 56:35 This episode is sponsored by Tink As the leading open banking platform, Tink enables the largest banks, lenders and payments providers to offer exceptional user experiences. Tink offers the best way to connect to banks across Europe, to build seamless services that can reach more than 250 million consumers. And they're already doing this for the likes of American Express, PayPal and Revolut. To get started with data-driven solutions for customer onboarding, making better risk decisions, or for instant bank payments with the highest conversion rate in the industry - visit tink.com This episode is sponsored by LinkedIn As you gear up for Autumn, you need the right people on your team to help your small business fire on all cylinders. LinkedIn Jobs is here to make it easier. Tap into the world's largest professional network with over 30 million people in the UK. Create a job post in minutes, and spread the word so your network can help you find the right people to hire. Just add the purple #Hiring frame to your LinkedIn profile. Simple tools, like screening questions, make it easy to find candidates with just the right skills and experience. It's why small businesses rate LinkedIn Jobs #1 in delivering quality hires vs leading competitors. LinkedIn Jobs helps you find the candidates you want to talk to, faster. And, you can post a job for free. Just visit Linkedin.com/FINTECH (https://business.linkedin.com/talent-solutions/cx/21/01/jobs-single-cta-11-podcast-uk?src=re-pod&trk=fintech&veh=fintech&mcid=6963291076820369422). Terms and conditions apply. Fintech Insider by 11:FS is a podcast dedicated to all things fintech, banking, technology and financial services. It's hosted by a rotation of 11:FS experts including David M. Brear, Ross Gallagher, Benjamin Ensor, and Kate Moody - as well as a range of brilliant guests. We cover the latest global news, bring you interviews from industry experts or take a deep dive into subject matters such as APIs, AI or digital banking. If you enjoyed this episode, don't forget to subscribe and please leave a review Follow us on Twitter: @fintechinsiders where you can ask the hosts questions, or email podcasts@11fs.com! Special Guests: Julia McColl, Nadya Hijazi, and Tom Pope.

Justine Roberts is the CEO and founder of Mumsnet. A website that makes parents' lives easier by pooling knowledge, advice and support on everything from baby names, and household tips, to who they're voting for in the next election.  On the podcast, Justine talks about being a young girl from Godalming, mad about Liverpool football club and spending her years at Oxford University on the sports field. She worked as an investment banker and journalist before having a light-bulb moment on holiday with her one-year-old, which inspired the inception of Mumsnet.  Produced by Matt Taylor and Natasha Feroze. 

Justine Roberts is the CEO and founder of Mumsnet. A website that makes parents' lives easier by pooling knowledge, advice and support on everything from baby names, and household tips, to who they're voting for in the next election.  On the podcast, Justine talks about being a young girl from Surrey, mad about Liverpool football club and spending her years at Oxford University on the sports field. She worked as an investment banker and journalist before having a light-bulb moment on holiday with her one-year-old, which inspired the inception of Mumsnet.  Produced by Matt Taylor and Natasha Feroze. 

Hello Eavesdroppers! It's a supernatural episode this week about poltergeists and cryptids, but like always Geordie and Michelle kick off the episode with some ramble chat – and some new songs!… Starting with the time they saw a Kate Bush tribute band, an update from Eavesdropper Ray on how Michelle became known as little bitch, Michelle's confusion about why NASA have formed a planetary defence mission and if it's REALLY possible that Nostradamus's 1555 prediction of Harry becoming king ahead of Prince William will REALLY come true… sounds a loosey goosey to me!   Michelle talks about YouTubers and TikTokers from Buckinghamshire in the UK who claim they live with two poltergeists called Andy and Dave. We're not convinced however, the footage of stuff flying around their kitchen looks somewhat convincing – listen to Michelle's laryngitis chat about how Lainey and Ben have learned to co-exist with their ghosts and even asked them to protect their unborn son…   Everyone's gangsta until they see a pair of pants walking by themselves in the night, right? Geordie discusses a creepy bit of footage she saw on The Osbournes Want To Believe of the Fresno night walkers, where illuminated trousers with a head and bendy backwards legs have been caught on film… J What are cryptids? Are they real? What's the Yosemite Night crawler? Why do the trousers on these aliens look like gun holster pants? Is it just a big hoax? Or is there something to it all? We cover the angles but ultimately you decide…   We hope you enjoy this week's episode and remember, wherever you are, whatever you do, just keep Eavesdroppin'!   *Disclaimer: We don't claim to have any factual info about anything ever and our opinions are just opinions not fact, soooooorrrrrryyyyyyyy! Don't sue us!   Get in touch with your stories and listen, like, subscribe, share etc…  Or email us at hello@eavesdroppinpodcast.com      Listen here: www.eavesdroppinpodcast.com Or here:  https://podfollow.com/1539144364   WE ARE NOW ON PATREON :) Support your favourite podcast over on Patreon – you have to use this link to find us apparently, otherwise we get lost in the masses…  https://www.patreon.com/eavesdroppin   EAVESDROPPIN' ON SPOTIFY : https://open.spotify.com/show/3BKt2Oy4zfPCxI7LDOQLN4   APPLE PODCASTS : https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/eavesdroppin/id1539144364   GOOGLE PODCASTS : https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkLnBvZGJlYW4uY29tL2VhdmVzZHJvcHBpbi9mZWVkLnhtbA?hl=en   YOUTUBE: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCqcuzv-EXizUo4emmt9Pgfw   Our Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/eavesdroppinpodcast   Or wherever you normally listen…   #poltergeists #cryptids #nightwalkers #ghosts #nightcrawlers #laineyandben #NASA #hoax #deepfake #psychic #hauntedhouse #thejerseydevil #supernatural #aliens #stickaliens #fresnonightwalker #yosemitenightwalker #reallife #podcast #comedy  #comedypodcast #truestories #truelife #storytellingpodcast #eavesdroppin #eavesdroppinpodcast            SHOW LINKS   Cloudbusting – the Kate Bush tribute band Geordie & Michelle went to see: http://www.katebushtribute.com   Don't Look Up – the trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RbIxYm3mKzI   What is up with NASA creating a planetary defence force? Read about DART here: https://www.thesun.co.uk/tech/19928839/nasa-dart-asteroid-mission-test-science/   Will Harry become kind of England? Nostradamus seems to think so… https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/19915279/bizarre-nostradamus-prediction-harry-becomes-king-after-charles/   The Eavesdroppin' episode where Geordie deep dives into the predictions of Nostradamus… check it out! https://eavesdroppinpodcast.com/podcast/12-nyeavesdroppin-bye-bye-2020/   Are Lainey and Ben fame seekers or do they legit live with poltergeists? You decide… https://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-9749413/Video-shows-proof-haunted-house-Security-camera-records-items-flying-drawer.html   More on Lainey and Ben and the poltergeists they live with… https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/weird-news/two-ghosts-live-house-one-25387953   Lainey & Ben's YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCvLU692Wv1T9Qjz96YVhLtg   More on Lainey & Ben's haunted house: https://www.ladbible.com/community/weird-couple-have-cctv-proof-that-theres-a-ghost-in-their-house-20210702   Listen to the Eavesdroppin' episode on the Enfield haunting… https://eavesdroppinpodcast.com/podcast/15-london-poltergeists-the-enfield-battersea-and-thornton-heath-hauntings/   Osbournes Want To Believe trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8dJ93LRpPr0   Read this to discover whether or not you think night crawlers are real… https://visitcryptoville.com/2015/06/23/remember-the-night-crawler-from-the-fact-or-faked-show/   What did these mums see on MumsNet? https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/_chat/4486761-What-did-we-see-last-night   Learn more about the fake science of cryptozoology: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cryptozoology   What is The Jersey Devil folktale? We wiki'd it here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jersey_Devil   More on the Fresno night crawler: https://paranorms.com/fresno-nightcrawler/   Some footage of the Fresno nightcrawlers with a bizarre backing track: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1sw_Mm1vti8   The Yosemite cryptids got us scared motherfu*ker: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cXEusizrKxg   More on ‘cute cryptids”: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/crime/cute-cryptid-fresno-nightcrawler-is-a-paranormal-darling-with-supernatural-fandom/ar-AAQ1yE8   Listen to our episode on mysterious creatures: https://eavesdroppinpodcast.com/podcast/29-rare-sightings-mysterious-creatures-the-wessex-way-monster-montauk-monsters-yetis-chupacabras-and-more/

A woman posted a thread on Mumsnet about wanting to take time off work while going through a break up with father or her child, the responses she got were mixed. We want to know whether you would ever consider this but also would you be open about taking time off to help deal with a break up? We speak to relationship expert Mel Schilling and blogger Meera Narandan. We talk to Chi-chi Nwanoku from Chineke! Orchestra – Europe's first professional majority Black and ethnically diverse orchestra – and hear music from their new album The Yoga Manifesto – a new book by Nadia Gilani and we'll be joined by one of the winners from last night's International Women's Podcast Awards Presenter: Anita Rani Producer: Lisa Jenkinson Studio Manager: Michael Millham.

Sean and Ashley return for a fifth popular podcast series where comedians discuss posts from Mumsnet and AITA forums.In the eight and final episode of the series, we talk to Bilal Zafar & Alexandra Haddow about pressure washers, borrowing things and not returning them, second-hand dildos, red flags, neck beards, is Sean the arsehole? the Sega mega drive double penetration cartridge, is Toy Story real? Ashley Crisp-packet Hands, Blue Peter, PVA glue, Art Attack, Jamie Oliver and all the chefs Ashley doesn't like, Music Magpie and the death of DVDs, fart tubs, guilt tripping deliver drivers, background checks on your partner, IRA tour guides, friends that cuck together fuck Together.You can find the stories we talked about here:https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/4594349-to-think-if-you-borrow-something-you-should-return-itand https://www.reddit.com/r/AmItheAsshole/comments/qvzs35/aita_for_how_i_reacted_after_i_found_out_my/You can see Ashley in Up For It on BBC iPlayer and hear her on The Ashley Storrie Show on BBC Radio Scotland at 10 pm every Friday or on the BBC Sounds App.You can also find Ashley and  Sean's sketches from BBC Short Stuff and BBC The Social on the iPlayer, and the BBC Scotland Facebook and Twitter pages. You can find Ashley'Ashley's on twitch.tv/ashleystorrie You can find Sean and Ashley on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok @SitDownDad and @AshleyStorrieYou can follow Bilal and Alexandra on twitter. Get along to Bilal's show "Care" at the Fringe and Alexandra's show "Women In Progress".Our theme song is "Snap Happy" by Shane Ivers from www.silvermansound.com.If you want to sponsor the show, contact us at awbupodcast@gmail.co, or donate via buymeacoffee.Thanks for listening, and please take a moment to review our show on Apple Podcasts.   

Sean and Ashley return for a fifth popular podcast series where comedians discuss posts from Mumsnet and AITA forums.In the seventh episode of the series, we talk to Heidi Regan and Nicky Wilkinson about; bad works nights out, vodka luges, Oh-ran more, what is General Studies? Dial-a-drink, Jimmy Brings, the Neighbours finale, Bluey, Australian television, Iranian yogurts, Gu pots, cupping, colonics, collectables, botox, and Karen Allen.You can find the stories we talked about here:https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/2980368-disgraced-myself-on-a-work-night-out%20/and https://twitter.com/redditships/status/1125460311945953280You can see Ashley in Up For It on BBC iPlayer and hear her on The Ashley Storrie Show on BBC Radio Scotland at 10 pm every Friday or on the BBC Sounds App.You can also find Ashley and  Sean's sketches from BBC Short Stuff and BBC The Social on the iPlayer, and the BBC Scotland Facebook and Twitter pages. You can find Ashley'Ashley's on twitch.tv/ashleystorrie You can find Sean and Ashley on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok @SitDownDad and @AshleyStorrieYou can follow Heidi and Nicky on twitter. Our theme song is "Snap Happy" by Shane Ivers from www.silvermansound.com.Our sponsor this week is Tantrum Doughnuts. If you want to sponsor the show, contact us at awbupodcast@gmail.co, or donate via buymeacoffee.Thanks for listening, and please take a moment to review our show on Apple Podcasts.   

Sean and Ashley return for a fifth popular podcast series where comedians discuss posts from Mumsnet and AITA forums.In the sixth episode of the series, we talk to Diona Doherty about; the Fringe, being hepatitis-free, Sean's ugly feet OnlyFans, bad job interviews, the fish that eat your feet, freaky fetishes, Birkenstocks vs. Crocs, Benny Hamish, double-denim, weddings, Michelle McManus, Etam, skunk apes, chocolate milk from brown cows, strange food choicesYou can find the stories we talked about here:https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/4585023-to-wear-sandals-to-an-interviewand https://www.reddit.com/r/AmItheAsshole/comments/vuqj72/aita_for_correcting_a_coworker_aboutsomething/You can see Ashley in Up For It on BBC iPlayer and hear her on The Ashley Storrie Show on BBC Radio Scotland at 10 pm every Friday or on the BBC Sounds App.You can also find Ashley and  Sean's sketches from BBC Short Stuff and BBC The Social on the iPlayer, and the BBC Scotland Facebook and Twitter pages. You can find Ashley'Ashley's on twitch.tv/ashleystorrie You can find Sean and Ashley on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok @SitDownDad and @AshleyStorrieYou can follow Diona Doherty on Instagram here.  And you can listen to her podcast, 'Remember When,'  here. Our theme song is "Snap Happy" by Shane Ivers from www.silvermansound.com.If you want to sponsor the show, contact us at awbupodcast@gmail.co, or donate via buymeacoffee.Thanks for listening, and please take a moment to review our show on Apple Podcasts.   

Sean and Ashley return for a fifth popular podcast series where comedians discuss posts from Mumsnet and AITA forums.In the fifth episode of the series, we talk to Chris Forbes about; Killer Bitch (apparently a  film Ashley was in), horrible hotel and Air BnB experiences, the hotel Cecil, Karens on a Train, Denise Welch, don't be a seat muncher, mystery drinking, the sadness that is Neighbours ending.Promote The Farm on BBC and show with Judy Murray at the fringeYou can find the stories we talked about here:https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/4586349-stuff-airbnb-hostsand https://knowyourmeme.com/photos/2403526-karenYou can see Ashley in Up For It on BBC iPlayer and hear her on The Ashley Storrie Show on BBC Radio Scotland at 10 pm every Friday or on the BBC Sounds App.You can also find Ashley and  Sean's sketches from BBC Short Stuff and BBC The Social on the iPlayer, and the BBC Scotland Facebook and Twitter pages. You can find Ashley'Ashley's on twitch.tv/ashleystorrie You can find Sean and Ashley on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok @SitDownDad and @AshleyStorrieYou can follow Chris Forbes on Instagram here.  And you can buy tickets to his Fringe show here. Our theme song is "Snap Happy" by Shane Ivers from www.silvermansound.com.If you want to sponsor the show, contact us at awbupodcast@gmail.co, or donate via buymeacoffee.Thanks for listening, and please take a moment to review our show on Apple Podcasts.   

Sean and Ashley return for a fifth series of the popular podcast where comedians discuss posts from Mumsnet and AITA forums.In the fourth episode of the series, we talk to Nicola Roy about bad breakups, ugly feet continued, losing toenails, unsolicited feet pics, beards - not the facial kind, wedding dresses again, bridezillas, great white male (what Ashley thinks Darren Connell's podcast is called.)You can find the stories we talked about here:https://www.reddit.com/r/AmItheAsshole/comments/efcc8u/aita_for_jumping_out_of_a_bathroom_window_to/and https://www.reddit.com/r/AmItheAsshole/comments/itw74c/aita_for_telling_my_sister_that_she_should_have/You can see Ashley in Up For It on BBC iPlayer and hear her on The Ashley Storrie Show on BBC Radio Scotland at 10 pm every Friday or on the BBC Sounds App.You can also find Ashley and Sean's comedy sketches from BBC Short Stuff and BBC The Social on the iPlayer, and the BBC Scotland Facebook and Twitter pages. You can find Ashley's twitch at twitch.tv/ashleystorrie You can find Sean and Ashley on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok @SitDownDad and @AshleyStorrieYou can follow Nicola on Instagram here.Our theme song is "Snap Happy" by Shane Ivers from www.silvermansound.com.If you would like to sponsor the show, you can contact us at awbupodcast@gmail.com, or you can donate via buymeacoffee.Thanks for listening, and please take a moment to review our show on Apple Podcasts.   

Sean and Ashley return for a fifth series of the popular podcast where comedians discuss posts from Mumsnet and AITA forums.In the third episode of the series, we talk to Luisa Omielan about how dangerous Dawson's Creek actually was, Pwingys, recalcitrant, the fascistic blight on the peas, things that give you the ick, we don't like feet, roadman culture, reality tv stars, the wedding dress issue again, the Pokédex, and serial killers.You can find the stories we talked about, here:https://www.reddit.com/r/AmItheAsshole/comments/efcc8u/aita_for_jumping_out_of_a_bathroom_window_to/and https://www.reddit.com/r/AmItheAsshole/comments/itw74c/aita_for_telling_my_sister_that_she_should_have/You can see Ashley in Up For It on BBC iPlayer and hear her on The Ashley Storrie Show on BBC Radio Scotland at 10 pm every Friday or on the BBC Sounds App.You can also find Ashley and Sean's comedy sketches from BBC Short Stuff and BBC The Social on the iPlayer, and the BBC Scotland Facebook and Twitter pages. You can find Ashley's twitch at twitch.tv/ashleystorrie You can find Sean and Ashley on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok @SitDownDad and @AshleyStorrieYou can follow Luisa on Instagram here.Our theme song is "Snap Happy" by Shane Ivers from www.silvermansound.com.If you would like to sponsor the show you can contact us at awbupodcast@gmail.com or you can donate via buymeacoffee.Our sponsor for this episode was Ruth Blackie.  Thank you Ruth for so kindly sponsoring our show and helping us to keep it going.Thanks for listening and please take a moment to review our show on Apple Podcasts.