485. Waterstone’s Book Club – Bimbo by Ashley James

Summary

Podcast Summary: The Guilty Feminist – Ep. 485: Waterstone’s Book Club – Bimbo by Ashley James
Recorded live at Waterstones Piccadilly, June 1, 2026
Host: Deborah Frances-White
Guest: Ashley James, author of “Bimbo”

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Episode Overview

This special Waterstone’s Book Club edition of The Guilty Feminist features comedian and host Deborah Frances-White in conversation with broadcaster, campaigner, and author Ashley James, discussing her new book Bimbo. The episode explores themes of feminism’s ongoing struggles, internalised misogyny, slut-shaming, motherhood, identity, and the societal double standards faced by women. With references to classic feminist works—particularly Simone de Beauvoir’s The Second Sex—and Ashley James’ candid personal stories, this episode is an energetic, deeply felt, and often humorous reflection on what it means to navigate modern womanhood and feminist identity.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. The Context of Feminism: Progress and Backlash

(06:10–09:48)

• Deborah opens by reflecting on how the climate for girls and young women today is starkly different from a few years ago, especially with the resurgence of far-right and “manosphere” narratives.
  • “The history of feminism is not like a ladder going up, it’s like a corkscrew going round…each time you go higher, but there’s always a backlash.” – Deborah (07:04)
• Discussion of current threats to women’s rights, such as movements in the U.S. pushing to revoke women’s right to vote and the rise of influential “acceptable” right-wing male voices.
  • “Andrew Tate can only get something to be radical in the Overton window. But it takes more socially acceptable, ‘nicer’ voices to push it up into reasonable or even popular, before it can get to policy.” – Deborah (08:00)

2. Comparing “Bimbo” with Feminist Classics

(09:28–10:47)

• The episode pairs Bimbo with Simone de Beauvoir’s The Second Sex, drawing contemporary and historical parallels.
  • “What would Prince Charming have for occupation if he had not to awaken the sleeping beauty?” – Simone de Beauvoir, quoted by Deborah (18:00)
• Both books explore enduring double standards, societal expectations, and how progress is neither linear nor guaranteed.

3. “I’m a Feminist, But…”: Double Standards and Embodiment

(09:58–12:54)

• Ashley’s “I’m a feminist, but…” confession: “Tonight I did change my outfit last minute because you could see my camel toe.” (09:58)
• Humorous and real conversation about policing of women’s bodies, the male versus female experience of “anatomy on display,” and the inescapable Madonna–whore complex.

4. Why Ashley Wrote “Bimbo”

(13:07–15:53)

• Ashley’s motivation is deeply personal: to write the book she wished existed for her as a confused, angry teenage girl.
  • “It’s the book I wish I had through all the really difficult stages of womanhood…girlhood, maidenhood, womanhood, singlehood.” – Ashley (14:14)
• Candid tales of navigating internalised shame, timelines for relationships and motherhood, and feeling let down by societal narratives about womanhood.

5. On Singlehood, Relationship Myths, and Motherhood

(15:59–24:43)

• Analysis of marriage as a supposed “goal,” questioning who benefits most. The hosts cite statistics showing that marriage often benefits men more than women.
  • “A man being married has a longer life expectancy and guess what happens to a married woman with children? Less life.” – Ashley (16:40)
• Ashley’s conscious decision to embrace singlehood and later reject traditional marriage despite being in a partnership.
  • “I want the thing that works for me that I invent with my partner and family.” – Deborah (24:43)

6. School, Class, and Early Socialisation

(25:39–31:00)

• Ashley recounts her experiences at a posh, previously all-boys school: early “snogging” culture, slut-shaming, and ritualised sexism like “de-kegging.”
  • “I dealt with like a lot of slut shaming, but not just from the boys but also from the teachers.” – Ashley (27:56)
• Stories of overtly sexist and classist teacher-enforced norms and punishments.

7. Internalised Misogyny and “Pick Me” Culture

(31:00–33:10)

• The long-term impact of school and media on Ashley’s attitude: internalised misogyny, rejection of “girly” things for credibility, and surviving by clinging to boyfriends.
  • “If you want to avoid [slut shaming], a) have a boyfriend, a very popular boyfriend, because then the other boys will leave you alone.” – Ashley (32:00)
• How victim-blaming language conditions women to take responsibility for violence against them.

8. Shame, Sexual Assault, and the Importance of Telling the Truth

(33:10–40:29)

• Honest discussion of sexual assault and why Ashley chose to write about her own experience.
  • “The shame has to change sides.” – Ashley, paraphrasing survivor Gisele Pellico (36:05)
• Societal tendency to bury women’s trauma and the catharsis of Ashley voicing her story: “It almost felt like my dirty secret.” (37:29)
• Keeping emotional “rawness” in the audiobook to resist the view that women must be emotionless to be credible. “I’m actually proud that I kept that in the audiobook.” – Ashley (39:26)

9. Motherhood: Reality Versus Expectation

(40:29–44:16)

• Ashley describes her initial struggles with motherhood versus its constructed “fulfillment.” She challenges the idea that difficulty means a mother is “bad.”
  • “I would love to be a dad. I think if I’d have been a dad…” – Ashley (43:06)
• Discussing unequal societal pressures and expectations for mothers and fathers.

10. Navigating Public Scrutiny, Resilience, and Labels

(58:48–65:30)

• Audience Q&A on coping with name-calling, criticism, and public scrutiny:
  • “I’m a palm tree. Like, sometimes things will get thrown at me, but I know that if I ever do ever say the wrong thing or get it wrong, I’ll apologize. Anyone that doesn’t see me, they’re not my people.” – Ashley (61:08)
• The importance of holding boundaries, expressing vulnerability, and refusing the pressure to “toughen up.”

11. Identity, Class, and Accents

(69:11–73:58)

• Ashley and other audience members reflect on changing their accents as coping mechanisms, resulting in apparent “fakeness” or class assumptions.
  • “There is so much judgment and assumption in the way you talk.” – Ashley (71:34)
• The survival mechanisms young people—especially girls—deploy to fit in, and parental misunderstanding of that process.

12. Writing the Book: Self-Forgiveness and Growth

(74:15–76:18)

• Audience member asks if writing Bimbo was itself a formative experience. Ashley affirms it was cathartic, helping her “realize that so many of the things we have been made to feel ashamed of…so much of it isn’t our fault.” (74:32)
• Encouragement to allow for growth and “unlearning” for oneself and others.

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Notable Quotes and Memorable Moments

• On progress and backlash:
  “The history of feminism is not like a ladder going up, it’s like a corkscrew going round.” — Deborah (07:04)

• On the gendered cost of marriage:
  “A man being married has a longer life expectancy and guess what happens to a married woman with children? Less life.” – Ashley (16:40)

• On beauty standards and judgment:
  “No little girl is born a bimbo, nor does she arrive into this world as a prude, a bitch or a slag…So why is it by the time we enter our 20s many of us feel so small?” — Ashley (Reading from the book, 51:58)

• On embracing emotion:
  “I want people to hear how horrific and painful some of these things are that we have to navigate.” – Ashley (39:26)

• On writing the book:
  “It was very cathartic to write it all down and realize that so many of the things that we have been made to feel so ashamed of…so much of it isn’t our fault.” — Ashley (74:32)

• On resilience:
  “I’m a palm tree. Sometimes things will get thrown at me, but I know that if I ever do ever say the wrong thing or get it wrong, I’ll apologize. Anyone that doesn’t see me, they’re not my people.” – Ashley (61:08)

• On “the system” pitting women against each other:
  “Women’s mutual understanding comes from the fact that they identify themselves with each other, but for the same reason each is against the other.” — de Beauvoir, discussed (48:20)

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Important Segments with Timestamps

• Introduction to the live book club and guest: 05:13
• Feminism’s corkscrew history and backlash: 07:04
• Camel toe, the male gaze, and double standards: 09:58
• Why Ashley wrote “Bimbo”: 14:14
• Marriage, life expectancy, and the “manosphere”: 16:40
• Schooldays, “spin the pencil”, and de-kegging: 25:39
• Slut-shaming, internalised misogyny: 31:00
• Sexual assault and shifting the shame: 33:10 and 36:05
• Reading from “Bimbo”: 51:58
• Audience Q&A – Singlehood, public scrutiny, resilience: 54:02, 58:48, 61:08
• On accents, class, and fitting in: 69:11
• On the process of writing: 74:15

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Tone and Atmosphere

The conversation is candid, witty, and emotionally resonant—balancing humor (with comedic asides and self-mockery) and gravity (when unpacking serious or painful topics). Both women share personal stories, reinforcing solidarity, self-acceptance, and the need for communal (and intersectional) feminist progress.

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Final Reflections

The episode closes with mutual praise, an encouragement to buy Bimbo (especially as a gift for young women navigating misogyny in the digital age), solidarity with trans women, and a reminder that feminism is about rewriting stories—individually, collectively, and culturally. The event ends with Ashley and Deborah signing books in the store, echoing the theme of building feminist community.

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For further info, book recommendations, or upcoming events, visit guiltyfeminist.com.

Transcript

[Deborah Frances-White]

Ryan Reynolds here from Mint Mobile with

[Ashley James]

a message for everyone paying big wireless way too much.

[Deborah Frances-White]

Please, for the love of everything good in this world, stop with Mint. You can get premium wireless for just $15 a month. Of course, if you enjoy overpaying, no judgments. But that's weird. Okay, one judgment anyway.

[Ashley James]

Give it a [e-mail] Switch upfront payment of $45 for 3 month plan equivalent

[Deborah Frances-White]

to $15 per month required intro rate

[Ashley James]

first 3 months only, then full price plan options available, taxes and fees extra.

[Deborah Frances-White]

See full [e-mail] hello guilty feminists. Thank you so much for coming along to so many shows. So far all of our Museum of Comedy Road to Gilead shows have sold out and our next show on the south bank with Tracy Emin is also sold out. But you can come to our open space event which is on 20 June. The location has moved. It is now at Town hall at St. Pancras and if you go to guiltyfeminist.com you can find a link to that event on the homepage or the live page. This event is an open space model where anyone can come with any ideas that they've got under the Road to Gilead theme. And the Road to Gilead is really about forming a joyful resistance against the far right and creating a better existence. So you can come. You don't have to have any ideas. You can join other people's spaces, you can move from one to another. You can have an idea you're passionate about. If you it doesn't matter at all. As long as you want to create a kinder, fairer society, you are welcome in that room. It's a full day from 10:30 to 5 and it's £10, which includes lunch. If you cannot afford £10, don't worry, just email us@ guiltyfeministmail.com and you will have a space anyway when you book. If you could afford more than £10, there's an option to pay £20 and that means you will pay for someone else's space who who couldn't afford it or who would really appreciate it. We hope as many people can come along as possible. If you can't make it on the day, you of course can set up a group wherever you are and you can zoom in for the beginning and the end so we all feel like one big exciting project. Or you can zoom in and do the whole thing on zoom, as many people did last time we did it. There's been various projects that have come out of the last one. So we thought we'd do it again and we hope you can make it to town hall on 20 June or zoom in or form your own group if you can't. On the 18th of July we'll be at the Isle of Wight at Ventnor Fringe, 6pm It'll be me and Felicity Ward and some exciting Isle of Wight guests. And on the 7th and 14th July we will be at the Soho Theatre doing Edinburgh preview shows. And what that means is we will have a selection of comedians we think fit in well to the guilty feminist ethos. And if you can't get to the Edinburgh Fringe, this is your opportunity to come out and have a mini fringe night. If you can get to the Edinburgh Fringe, this is your opportunity to see some tasters of shows and you might think, oh, I'm definitely going to go and see that hour long show. So come along to those if you can. They're always sold out so get tickets as soon as you can. We ourselves will be in Edinburgh from the 20th to the 23rd of August doing some road to Gilead shows. 7.30pm at the Gilded Balloon. So come along to those and watch out for more shows. If you would like to hear more about Road to Gilead open Space events, other projects we're doing and know full well when the guilty Feminist shows are coming up so you can get in early and book then sign up to our mailing [e-mail] Also, if you could give our podcast a follow right now, follow or subscribe or whatever it is that you do on your platform. It really helps us build the podcast and the community. So if you can do nothing else, just hit that follow button right now wherever you're listening to this. And if you could pop over and give us a review and rating for any episode, you can do every episode if you want. It really helps other people find us, especially if you give us a lovely five star review. And now on with the podcast. Live from Waterstones Piccadilly, the Spontaneity Shop presents the Guilty Feminist Waterstones Book Club. With me, Deborah Frances White and my very special guest, Ashley James, talking about her book Bimbo. Hello, hello, hello and welcome to the Guilty Feminist Waterstones Book Club. So exciting tonight to have an author we're very, very excited about. Our guest today is the author of the new book Bimbo. She's a feminist campaigner. She's been seen on TV debating the likes of Piers Morgan and Nick Ferrari. She hosts the. I think that was, that was the author Herself who just said, boo. If you haven't done trigonometry, you haven't lived. Don't recommend it. She hosts the parenting podcast Mum's the Word. Please put your hands together and make incredible woohooing noises for Ashley James. Ashley, there's your microphone. Thank you so much for joining us.

[Ashley James]

Thanks for having me. Hi, everyone.

[Deborah Frances-White]

Delight to have you here at Waterstones. We love this book club because it's just like this little attic nest where we come up and we talk about books and it's a real joy. Just give us a cheer if you listen to the Guilty Feminist. Give us a cheer if you don't know what you're at. Give us a cheer if you're here to see Ashley because you love her from the TV or her podcast. Right. So we've got a lovely mix.

[Ashley James]

I wish I'm woos there. That could have been really awkward.

[Deborah Frances-White]

No, it's a nice mix of people who are going to discover you tonight and people who are going to discover the guilty feminist tonight. So that's always a joy when we've got a crossover. Oh, I have been asked to tell you if there's a fire, leave by the door and I would imagine don't try a lift. Just there's lots of stairs. There won't be a fire. There won't be a fire. I've put that into your heads now. There's no fire. Don't worry about it. But I really, really enjoyed your book. I thought it was great.

[Ashley James]

Thank you. That means a lot coming from you.

[Deborah Frances-White]

It feels like a really timely book, especially for maybe girls and young women in your lives who are in a very different climate from the one we were in, in like 2018, 2019, even 2020. Something Ashley has.

[Ashley James]

You mean the years of hope and progress?

[Deborah Frances-White]

Yes. Remember that time when we were all out on marches for, you know, women's marches and the MeToo movement was happening

[Ashley James]

and we all believed that progress was just inevitable.

[Deborah Frances-White]

Exactly. And it felt like of win. We were talking about this out just outside before we came in. And I was saying to Ashley, who has a lot of erudite references in her book and in fact just went on Celebrity Mastermind. And your special subject was Lady Constance

[Ashley James]

Lytton, a lesser known suffragette.

[Deborah Frances-White]

I am absolutely loving that. And I want to hear about Lady Constance Lytton tonight. Do you know the Susan Faludi book Backlash? I've written about it in my book Six Conversations We're Scared to have, just out in paperback. We'll be signing Copies this evening as Ashley is signing copies of Bimbo. But in that she says that the history of feminism is not like a ladder going up, it's like a corkscrew going round. So you go up and then, oh, no, we're going down again, but we're going up higher and then going down again and then. So each time you go higher, but there's always a backlash. And that's what we're experiencing now. In my book. I call it the Empire Strikes. And I feel like right now the Empire is striking back in a way harder than I thought they were going to.

[Ashley James]

I just wish she wasn't called Nigel Farage.

[Deborah Frances-White]

Farage, the Emperor.

[Ashley James]

That's straight back.

[Deborah Frances-White]

Yes, absolutely. It's Nigel Farage. It's the whole Andrew Tate set. All the manosphere boys and the ones that are more palatable scare me more. Andrew Tate can only get something to be radical in the Overton Window. But it takes more socially acceptable, quote unquote, nicer voices to push it up into reasonable or even popular before it can get to policy. And we're seeing a lot of that now. Ashley and I were just talking outside about how there's a big push in America to take the vote away from women. And you think what? To take the vote away from it. But it's genuine and it's real and they have got earmarked for a 10. It's a 10 year project. And we were talking about this backstage, that this is what they're really good at. I reckon this will take 10 years. We've got 10 years, let's go for it. And then of course, 10 years later, they get what they want. And what we always do is, what do we want this, when do we want it? Now. And sometimes you can't get it now. You've got to make that 10 year plan. So I feel like Bimbo is a really important book for a lot of girls, especially girls and young women who are right now getting caught up in them in the womanosphere, which is the kind of complement to the manosphere or, or wanting to attract boys who are saying, well, I want a high value woman wanting to attract boys who are saying, you're a slut if you've had sex with anybody. And that's not what I want. And so you're doing something really, I think, really important and really current because you are a current voice that I think girls will listen to.

[Ashley James]

Hope so.

[Deborah Frances-White]

At the Guilty Feminist Waterstones Book Club, we always compare a new book with a feminist classic. And tonight we have paired it with Simone de Beauvoir's the Second Sex. And I'm a feminist, but I said to Ashley, shall we pair it with Simone de Beauvoir's Second Sex as referenced in Ashley's book? But maybe shall we compare it with the abridged edition? Because it's only 100 pages. Have you got an eye feminist part for us, Ashley?

[Ashley James]

Yeah, I am a feminist, but tonight I did change my outfit last minute because you could see my camel toe.

[Deborah Frances-White]

There you go. Well, that's.

[Ashley James]

It's just anatomy, but it felt wrong. But I do have a vulva and it did look like I did have one.

[Deborah Frances-White]

Listen, it never really fails to surprise me how much men will just sit there with their hand on their penis. Does anyone else see this? They just sit there, like watching TV and their legs apart and they just put their hand. Now that sounds like it's my husband because it's like, why are you watching TV next to this person? And sometimes he does do that. But I just noticed that with men in general, they just sit there with their hand and I'm like. Or they just grab it and I just like, what are you doing? Meanwhile, we're changing out of leggings in case you can see that a vulva exists.

[Ashley James]

Yeah. I looked up, like, why actually is it wrong for it to look like you have the body part that you have? And apparently it's because obviously, like, the male gaze version of sexiness is very, like, leave something to the imagination. And it's like titillating and exciting. And, you know, a little bit of cleavage is okay, but not the nipple. So the camel toe is like, whoa.

[Deborah Frances-White]

Right.

[Ashley James]

It's not a sexy.

[Deborah Frances-White]

Yeah, you've not hidden enough for me. But it's either. You've not. This is something you go into in the book. Whichever way you go, you'll be criticized. You've either not hidden enough or you've not exposed enough.

[Ashley James]

Yeah, Madonna Hall.

[Deborah Frances-White]

Exactly. I used. I'm a feminist, but I used to have some stand up comedy about. Years ago, I did this show called how to get almost anyone to want to sleep with you. And it wasn't about sleeping with people at all. It was about feeling sexy. So it was a kind of empowering show. It was. Lots of women would come because it was about, like walking into the room and thinking.

[Ashley James]

Yeah. As opposed to when you say lots of women will come, like,

[Deborah Frances-White]

well, lots of women.

[Ashley James]

How sexy was the show?

[Deborah Frances-White]

Well, lots of women came to the show, Ashley. And also, I hope a lot of women Came because of it. But I had a bit about sexy clothes in that show. That sexy clothes weren't revealing, but they were unstable. Because, like, you know, have you ever been with someone, like, sometimes very beautiful, and then she's. She's. She's got just a bit of a. Well, I can show you if I unbutton my jumpsuit. It's probably a bit dangerous in Waterstones, isn't it? But it's like if you've got a sleeve that's just sort of falling down and you see somebody, she's just going like that and you just think, oh, I never. Oh, am I going to see more? Am I going to see more? That is actually more compelling than just someone with a really low cleavage, because you can look at it and go, I've seen that now. But it's just this sort of slidy off bit. So, you know, just. Just some women. Angelina Jolie, I think, has a lot of these outfits where you go, how's that fixed on, then? And. And it never comes off. It never quite comes off, but it's just sort of slipping up and down, sliding up and down.

[Ashley James]

I never noticed that about her. I do remember the. The big leg. I think that's quite iconic now, just the leg in the middle of the slit. But, yeah, I'm going to be paying more attention to her outfits going forward.

[Deborah Frances-White]

Exactly. So you want something that's just every now and again reveals, well, we don't want that. We don't want that. Unless we do. And then we do. It's all about choice. I want to go into bimbo now. Can I ask you what made you write this? Because this book is vulnerable and personal and I listen to a lot of it on audiobook, which is often a great way to. I don't know how, buy the hardback publishers in the room, they'll be like, don't tell people to get the audiobook. We've got to get our numbers up here, baby. But I sometimes have two versions and I listen to a bit on the audiobook and then I pick up the book again, or I do both audiobook and Kindle. And listening to you read it on the audiobook was really moving. There were times when you were in tears and it was so beautiful to hear an author allowing that vulnerability out. You write about so many different emotional topics as well as, you know, really just saying this is what I'd had enough of. And being quite analytical. What made you write this book?

[Ashley James]

I feel like it's the book that I wish I had as a teenage girl when like so many of us, you're navigating so many different rules and double standards. And I remember feeling really confused and angry at the time, trying to learn and navigate what it meant to be a good girl and to be taken seriously. And then the real catalyst moment was probably when I had my little girl. She is three now, but she was two at the time of writing. Actually, when I read something out that will explain it much more. But it's just, it's the book I wish I'd had through all the really difficult stages of womanhood. So the book kind of follows girlhood, maidenhood, womanhood, singlehood. I was single between 27 and 33, which I'd say is quite a pinnacle time for a woman. When the noise around, running out of time and are you still single and don't you want to have a baby? Are all quite loud. And that sense of failure that you haven't hit those milestones and timelines by 30. So it's the book that I wish I'd had then when I did feel a huge sense of failure. And the book that I wish I had when I was a new mom and I was like, what? Why? I felt like I've been sold a lie. This is really. Can we swear?

[Deborah Frances-White]

We broadcast on the Internet and I don't think it's ever heard swearing. Go for it.

[Ashley James]

When I was like, this is shit. I feel like I've just been sold this whole lie. And so it's just all of my life experiences. But because I have somebody who read it and said it must be quite exhausting living in your brain. And I was like, yeah, it actually is. Yeah.

[Deborah Frances-White]

That's a really interesting section of the book actually. The time when you were consciously single and you're really trying to divest yourself from the idea of needing a man. And you start to see the idea of a full time relationship and very much marriage as something that it's been sold to you as an advantage, as the goal, as the idea and the goal. But you start to go, hold on a minute, how is this good for me? That's good for him. That when you look at the stats, a man has so many fewer responsibilities being married, it actually prolongs his life.

[Ashley James]

A man being married has a longer life expectancy and guess what happens to a married woman with children?

[Deborah Frances-White]

What?

[Ashley James]

Less life.

[Deborah Frances-White]

That's right. I read that in your book today. I had read the book before, by the way, but I like to refresh. I like to read the book to See if I want to do it. But then, you know, you have to read so many books doing this job. So I was refreshing today by listening to the audiobook while I was doing other things. I don't want you to think I've last minute at this. Just. That's an interesting female internal dialogue there, isn't it? It's just like I'm literally doing my job.

[Ashley James]

If you were a man, you wouldn't have even read the book. You wouldn't have even turned out with audacity.

[Deborah Frances-White]

Absolutely wouldn't have even thought about it. But it. Actually, I did read Simone de Beauvoir later in the day. I read it at university. But, you know, who can remember? Because I also drank at university.

[Ashley James]

I read it at university and I also drank at university.

[Deborah Frances-White]

But you looked up your notes from Simone de Beauvoir. Second Sex, you said. Your notes from uni.

[Ashley James]

I mean, only very briefly. I've had. You know. But yeah, I did have a look, but I also panicked a bit. So I wrote some of the notes down just in case, because I was like, oh, God, what? She asked me something and I don't know.

[Deborah Frances-White]

No.

[Ashley James]

Feel like, you know. And you haven't done your homework.

[Deborah Frances-White]

No, it's not like a GCSE essay question. It was more that. I thought there were some incredible parallels, that actually, she was saying very similar things to you. Obviously, she's saying it in a 1949 French philosopher way, and you're saying it in a very contemporary, lived experience way. But it was shocking how many things she was saying that you were still saying. Some things that I saw. Like one thing that Simone de Beauvoir says in the Second Sex is, what would Prince Charming have for occupation if he had not to awaken the sleeping beauty? And it really resonated with the way that you were talking about how men were being told all the time, oh, well, she'll want to tie you down. The way that you use these kind of monikers and insulting words, ball and chain, that, you know, a woman's trying to catch you and you're trying not to be caught. But actually, like Simone de Beauvoir, you turn that around and say, but hold on, we live less long, we end up doing far more of the domestic duty, far more of the childcare. And how is this a good deal for us? You should be trying to catch us. And also, we're being blamed for the low fertility rates. We're being blamed because, well, women don't want to get married and have babies. And you say it's not really true. It's like we can't find emotionally available men with whom we want to have a baby. And you go back through your catalog and say, well, I didn't find the right partner to have a baby with.

[Ashley James]

But you're also told, well, don't be too picky. Yes, but then if you choose wrong, you'll be blamed.

[Deborah Frances-White]

Yeah. And then you're a single mother and you should have been able to hold on to a man. Or you shouldn't have had these babies, you know, if you can't look after them and so on and so on. It's.

[Ashley James]

But I remember growing up and my mum saying that about people like, she just can't hold on to a man.

[Deborah Frances-White]

It's very easy to look back with nostalgia on a time when things were terrible that you didn't live through, because we see idyllic scenes painted in picture books and old photographs of women in elegant long dresses. But if we didn't live through the horror of being not a full citizen, we will never understand it. And you were saying before, that's being repackaged now.

[Ashley James]

Yeah. I remember saying, probably in the early days of my single days that, oh, I wish I grew up in the 1950s, when men wanted to be in relationships and marriage lasted without really thinking that it was a time before we actually had any rights to leave or even to not be raped within the marriage. So I think. And a lot of people still say it now, don't they? Like, oh, marriages back then just lasted so much longer. Yeah. Because we literally couldn't leave. And we were saying that when I grew up, an insult that was quite commonly used against us was like, oh, just get back in the kitchen and make me a sandwich. So we knew that that wasn't valued, the domestic labor. We were told, like, go out, go to uni, get a career, because you don't want to be like, stay at home, mom. And you don't want to be staying in the kitchen. But now we've kind of reversed that, where it's like, oh, but women now are told they can have it all. And you don't need to have it all. You don't need an education. Your fulfillment is at home. Be at home. How can you do it all? You can't do it all. We actually can't do it all, though, can we?

[Deborah Frances-White]

No.

[Ashley James]

But maybe the answer is someone else may be doing some of it.

[Deborah Frances-White]

What an idea. What if the man did some of it?

[Ashley James]

Yeah, yeah.

[Deborah Frances-White]

Because actually, the people I know that are happiest in relationships in terms of the labor distribution are lesbians, because there isn't so much expectation. But I would say the same about gay men I know who've got children. They've had to reinvent it. They've had to decide because there isn't this role model of, well, this is what it's meant to look like. And you're not doing your job properly unless you look like this picture perfect 1950s household, which we've all. Obviously we've evolved from that, but there are some anchors that are still there. And I think a lot of what your book is about is about the ideas that we've internalized from the TV shows we've watched, from the way that our parents generation, our grandparents generation did things, the assumptions that we've internalized. And the whole book seems to me about a personal journey of you divesting yourself from assumptions.

[Ashley James]

Yeah. And also, you know, even when we go back to Simone de Beauvoir's the Second Sex, like, obviously we have so much more freedom and independence and laws that work in our favor. But I still feel like the expectations haven't really evolved so much. And I realized that when I was studying Lady Constance Lytton and the fight of the suffragettes. A lot of the pushback in the media is very similar to the pushback that we see now in the media. Obviously, back then it was like the weaponization of the word feminist, which we still see now is like, you know, people still don't identify with the term feminist. And now it's like the weaponization of the term woke up. So there are still so many parallels. And the fact that we still ask, like, probably it won't be tonight because this is a great crowd. But most times when I'll go out, somebody will be like, who's looking after the kids? And I'll be like, their dad. And they're like, oh, my God, is he really hands on? And I'm like, yeah, so am I. So great. But that, you know, even the idea of a hands on dad, it's like, of course a hands on dad should be hands on, but that should be the expectation. Not like this exception of like, he changes nappies. Yeah. And I also go to work, like, do you know what I mean? I feel like we. We've evolved so much, but we actually haven't changed as much as we think. Which is also why there's still such a stigma for women about being single. Because it wasn't so long ago that that would have been absolutely outrageous because we had no worth if we weren't chosen. And that's, I mean, I could go on and on, but it's like the passivity of like, she said, yes, the bouquet toss is like, I hope, hopefully I'll be next. And it's like we're, you know, we're waiting to be chosen. If we behave as wife material, then will be picked.

[Deborah Frances-White]

Yes. You really kind of rumble that idea and you're not at all backward about coming forward, about like, what are you hoping to be picked for? And you say you've really got part. You had this vision of being a bride and walking down the aisle and then you've just said, no, I've got a partnership, but I don't want to get married anymore. Because you've found such an internal feminism. You say, I don't judge anyone else for getting married.

[Ashley James]

And also I would actively encourage anyone to get married, especially if they give up, up their career to take time out for children or go down to part time. I think, sadly, laws still only protect you if you're married.

[Deborah Frances-White]

Yes.

[Ashley James]

And keeps telling me that it's a terrible decision from a financial place. And I was like, well, I'd rather fight the system, Martin. And he's like, well, that's going to cost you.

[Deborah Frances-White]

I absolutely love the way that you handle that because you, you look at the logistics, you look at the legals, you look at the financial. But you say, and you say, and I'll be thrilled for you if you get married and I'll be there with bells on. But it's just something that I, it's, it's boiled up into me to such an extent now, inside of me that I don't want the thing that I was sold when I was young. I want the thing that works for me that I invent with my partner and my family, which I thought, gosh, this is a real evolution of you as we go through, because you. When you're young in the book and you're at school, there are some stories that truly shocked me from your schooling. I didn't know that you were like, you were quite Geordie when you first went to school, but you got sent to a posh school and you. Your experiences there were quite something. Can you talk a little bit about experiences that you had at school?

[Ashley James]

Yeah. So for context, my parents are from the northeast of England. No one in my family had been to school beyond GCSEs, never done private school. My dad is from a farming background and was a firefighter on the side. My Mum had a hair salon. She's also from a farming background. They met young farmers, but then she had a hair salon. And then we grew up in a bed and breakfast. So they just worked all the time. And then essentially I got a scholarship to a really posh school, which is now why I have very posh accent. And the secondary school I went to, so the prep school, which was amazing. The first thing that happened culturally was that it was really normal to snog there from like the age of eight. So I, on my first night, basically got locked in a. In the common room, it was called, with an older boy and was told I wasn't allowed out until I snogged him. And then we used to play this game called Spin the Pencil because we didn't have a bottle because we were children. And so snogging was this really normal things. So when I went to my secondary school or the summer before, I went and we had like this posh ball thing and everyone from the school was going to be there. So obviously it's like great time to make a good impression. Sadly, I went to an all boys rugby school, so it was the first year of them allowing girls in school, reluctantly allowing girls in school. That's an important point for the atmosphere that we went into. They weren't privy to the spin the pencil being a very normal thing. So I went and snogged all the boys because that's what we did. And so I basically started school at 14, having only ever snogged as like, basically the school slag. So I dealt with like a lot of slut shaming, but not just from the boys, but also from the teachers. And I remember getting detention once for hugging my brother. He didn't get detention, but the teacher was like, well, what. What are the people in the town gonna think when they see a young girl canoodling with a boy? So it was very much like a boys will be boys. And I don't even think I've put this in the book because I feel like that's a whole book in itself. But they had the. It was just quite a wild culture. So they did this thing called de kegging. And it was usually the first 15 rugby team who were like 18. And I remember being maybe 15 at the time, walking back from sports where I was in a tracksuit, I was on my period and I hadn't shaved my pubes, which, when you're that age, it was a really big deal. And then basically they would target a girl, run after you and try and pull Your pants down.

[Deborah Frances-White]

Oh, my God.

[Ashley James]

So imagine how old were you? Like 15, 16. So obviously you always knew when they were coming because you could see them sort of like walking in, like getting faster and faster and then like charging at you. So I remember running for my life and then I remember being in like the recovery mode, being like, oh, my God, I can't let them pull my pants down because then they might see my tampon string and like, maybe they'll see my pubes and that will just be like the worst thing in the world. And then I don't know if I was like laughing or screaming, but I got told off by the teacher because I was like attracting the attention and being loud. So that was like, in a nutshell. I mean, there's so many stories, but that was kind of the environment that we were in. So it wasn't just like navigating the kind of double standards and slut shaming against the boys. And it was so bad that if a boy was caught talking to us by another boy, they were called a slimer. It was like, we don't talk to the girls. But yeah, it was very much enforced by the teachers.

[Deborah Frances-White]

It quite shocked me some of the stories where the teachers would blame the girl for what happened. There was one story that a boy came and pulled a mooney. Yes. Took his pants down and liked to show the girls his bum. And so a girl, in response, he was outside like the girls common room.

[Ashley James]

And so it was like a bay window. So he like fully trowed down.

[Deborah Frances-White]

And so a girl flashed her boobs as a response.

[Ashley James]

No, it was her tweety pie bra, guys. It was peaklessenza era. Everybody had great bras apart from me because my boobs. Another very sad time for me. But she had a tweety pie bra on. But it just so happened that the house mistress was in the bay window on the other side. So she saw it all unfold and then came in. I'm still actually friends with the girl and that was actually my first time answering back to an adult because I was so angry because she started like slut shaming Jenny. And I was like, he just pulled a moony at us. She didn't even like show actual skin. And she was like, yes, well, the boys can do that and you need to navigate how to be ladies. And I was like, this is ridiculous. So I had a lot of anger. I just didn't really know that that was like me in my early feminist era.

[Deborah Frances-White]

Yeah, it really surprised me. And the thing is, I know that, you know, we've moved on from there. But it is actually reversing now because of the manosphere that boys at school are now 15 year old girls tell me the boys are unspeakable at their schools, like because they've all been drinking all the Andrew Tate Kool Aid. And so when you left school you'd internalized a lot of this into your dating life.

[Ashley James]

Not even in my dating life, but just in my attitudes in general. Because also another theme was like, Ashley, you can be beauty or you can be brains. Do you want to be taken seriously? So it was almost like reject makeup, reject hair dye, reject any of the frivolous girly things if you want to be taken seriously. So of course I did want to be taken seriously. So I like rejected all of that. Then obviously I learned very much that if you're a girl and you sleep around, you're a slut. And it was also like the era of cruel intentions. And I just wanted to be like Reese Witherspoon, you know, like the virginal. I didn't want to be like Sarah Michelle Geller. So I left school with like complete internalized misogyny. And what we'd know now to be like pick me energy. But it was, it was kind of like the rules that I had been prescribed. And I remember my boyfriend at the time had gone on a gap year and he came back and was friends with this girl that he met there. And I was like, I don't get it. Cause he told me that she had some one night stands. And I was like, I don't understand why you'd want to be friends with sluts. And it's so mortifying. But I also get it that that was. And also it was probably like the trauma of being slut shamed. To be honest. That that was almost like a survival mechanism for me me that I was like, if you want to avoid that a have a boyfriend, a very popular boyfriend, because then the other boys will leave you alone because you're protected in some way. But obviously the consequence of having attitudes like that and also being told that it's up to women and girls to keep ourselves safe was that then when I had experiences of sexual assault, I blamed myself because I didn't do the things that are meant to keep us safe. And I think people, well meaning people still like have conversations today with daughters about how like you can't go out like that, don't wear that. But we all know sadly that a bad rapist isn't going to be like oh, she's wearing trousers.

[Deborah Frances-White]

No.

[Ashley James]

Oh, she's got running shoes on. Do you know? But it's like. But we still unknowingly and sometimes well meaning still prescribe that to our girls.

[Deborah Frances-White]

Have you seen the exhibition of clothes that women and girls were wearing when they were raped? It's so moving. You can Google it. But some of it's like, it's like an Elsa Nighty or it's like a ghost Halloween costume or a lot of the time it's just tracksuits and things like that. And it's just, it's so. I just wept when I looked at it. I was like, oh my God, we've been sold such a lie. I mean, if that helped, Victorian women wouldn't have been raped, which they were. If that helped, you know, you wouldn't see rape in countries where women are completely covered up. It's so absurd to suggest that that's what's going on there. You write extremely movingly about assault. When you read it on the audiobook, you're crying and I was crying listening to you because you were saying, I don't really even like, want to talk about it, but I feel like I have to. And I obviously don't want you to have to talk about it now. But what made you say, I am going to talk about it? This is important.

[Ashley James]

So obviously the book is about ultimately it's about shame, right? The shame that we place on women from basically the moment we're born. It starts with like, you know, people. Again, well, meaning being like, oh, what beautiful baby. You're going to have to lock her up when she's older. Where a versus like a little boy who might be called a heartbreaker. There's never any mention of like, he's good looking. You're gonna have to lock him up to keep people safe or you know, it.

[Deborah Frances-White]

Oh, no, I, my, I knew someone who had a little onesie and it said lock up your daughters on it was for a boy. I mean, this was a long time ago, but I remember at the time, I think was 20 years ago. And I didn't at the time kind of clock it in the way that now I'm like, oh my God, imagine buying a boy a onesie that says lock up your daughters. I mean, it's. But again, it's never lock up your sons. That should be lock up your sons, shouldn't it? Shouldn't it be lock up your sons if they're the ones marauding? Why are you locking up your daughters? It's literally Mad.

[Ashley James]

Yeah.

[Deborah Frances-White]

What we go along with, you know,

[Ashley James]

all the labels, whether it's like, bossy, slut, prude, frumpy. They all are kind of like lessons in shame to make us be like, okay, oh, God, we're too frumpy. Slut. Right. Okay, not like that. And so you kind of navigate womanhood learning shame. And so with sexual assault, I was like, obviously, you also, like, think about the kind of, like, landscape of the British press and the sort of sensationalized stories that can come from you sharing something like that. And, you know, I had to think, like, how will I feel if it's like, rape survivor? Or, you know, all the kind of very. And I was like, I wouldn't really feel comfortable with that. And also the fact that I didn't come forward or I didn't do all the right things that somebody should do that I was like, I'm not a perfect rape survivor. Because I didn't. I didn't. I mean, I stayed friends with him after, because for a long time I thought, well, I didn't. I actually cared more that he. Him and his friends didn't think I was. And, you know, it took me, like, a really long time to kind of accept what had happened. And so the reason I put it in that at the time of writing, it was also when, you know, Gisele Pellico's trial was going on. And I think she, like, was so amazing at standing up and saying, like, no, the shame has to change sides. And the fact that she went through, I mean, the most horrific. Not that there should ever be a scale of rape, but, you know, she really did help me be like, why do I feel shame and, like, this dirty secret? Because even though I never really told anyone, I still thought about it every day, and it almost felt like my dirty secret. And so then I put it into the book because I was like, you can't write. I was like, if I had a daughter, and ultimately, like, the goal is write that. I'm writing about all these things that hopefully our daughters and daughters. Daughters don't have to navigate all of these things. And I was like, I can't. What would I. If, God forbid, it ever happened to them, I wouldn't want them to carry it like, their own dirty secret for 25 years. And actually, even if you choose not to go forward for whatever reason, even if it's because, like, your trauma can't allow you to be put on trial, which is sadly, what happens with the judicial system in not just our country, but around the World like there's some horrific cases that I speak about briefly in the book about like you know, a woman that was raped in a, in a toilet in Italy and she didn't lock the door in a nightclub. And so the judge ruled that actually she could have, she gave him like protected herself, like didn't give like a good strong enough signal because the unlocked door could have been seen as like a welcome in. So yeah, that I put it all in the book and I also put the like worry of victim blaming that could come back on me because I almost thought, well if I put it all in then no one can question it of like why was I wearing this or why was I drunk or why was, you know, that or I, I basically did all the things that we tell girls not to do.

[Deborah Frances-White]

Yes. And it, and it's, it's so much of it is again your book but also Simone de Beauvoir's book is about the story we tell. It's not really about the things that happen, it's about the way that we shape them. And I think so many women relate to that and no doubt some men and some non binary people too relate to that. That we reframe our stories about ourselves in order that we do not have to carry greater trauma. And so this is why. So I mean one of the many reasons women don't report it more. The main being nothing's going to happen and then there's no, there will be no justice and then you've been through a second trauma of reporting it or going to a police station and, and going to court. And you know, we all know people that's happened to that story is really, really moving the way you tell it. But also you cry again when you're talking about other people and like you know that some of the readers of this book will have their own stories like this.

[Ashley James]

I mean I do typically cry a lot, especially I was crying today on TV but for justified reason in my thing. And you know, when I did the audiobook, it was really important to me actually that, because I, it's not like obviously I didn't plan to cry, but I cried. And I suppose a lot of it is like probably still the shame or the worry of talking about something like that. And I was asked if I wanted to re record it. But it's actually really important to me actually that people do hear the non sanitized version because I think especially as women often we're told like to be taken seriously, we can't be emotional obviously like anger And Donald Trump and Elon Musk. Having Twitter spouts is perfectly not emotional. But if we show any emotion, then it's like we can't be taken seriously. But actually, I feel like there's so much power in. Actually, I want people to hear how horrific and painful some of these things are that we have to navigate. And, yeah, I'm actually, like, proud that I kept that in the audiobook.

[Deborah Frances-White]

I thought the vulnerability was incredibly powerful. And you also talk about having children and the emotional aftermath of that, which was, I thought, an extremely brave piece of writing that I think a lot of people will connect to. And your whole, like, motherhood journey really took me by surprise, like, how many emotional turns there were in that where I wasn't expecting.

[Ashley James]

It's been a roller coaster.

[Deborah Frances-White]

Yeah. And you're very happy in motherhood now?

[Ashley James]

For the most part, yeah.

[Deborah Frances-White]

Yeah.

[Ashley James]

I mean, no, apart from her running on empty. But, yeah, they are. They are amazing, of course, and they're. It's funny because I really did struggle, not for the first four months, but after. But the interesting thing is that I never. Or not never, but in, you know, in that single chapter, I came to decision that I didn't want children, and. And I didn't see children in. In my future. But when I got pregnant, I was kind of like, well, how bad could it be? Like, everyone's been telling me that I'll regret it, and then I won't know love. Like it. And it kind of, in a way, felt like fate because we were in this lockdown, and it was, like, so much death and despair that then I had this kind of, like, life and thing to focus on. And I was like, maybe. Maybe it's fate. So then, you know, when I was really struggling, I was like, I feel like, like, do other people enjoy this? Like, I don't get it. And I had, like, all these, like, internal thoughts, like, I don't get how this is meant to be fun. I remember at one point doing, like, finger puppets, being like, oh, my God, I used to live such a fun, cool life. And, like, is this meant to fulfill us? Am I a bad woman? And am I. You know, I, I, I didn't like going to. I'm obviously in lockdown. There were no baby clubs, but I went to one once, and I was like, I can't do this. But then, is that so in the night. And it didn't help that my son didn't sleep for a year. He'd wake up every hour, so I was obviously, like, chronically sleep Deprived, very depressed. But I remember like Googling, like, is it normal to regret motherhood? But I loved him. And I felt so guilty because I remember, you know, anyone that has kids, like, you wake up in the night and there's elements where it's like just you and them and they're so like pure and beautiful and gorgeous. And I remember feeling so guilty that I was like. And so when I'd Google, is it normal to regret motherhood? Like, it's obviously such a taboo topic and we'll never really know what the actual, actual study and stats are because it's a very difficult thing for lots of people to admit, especially out loud. But then I thought, I would love to be a dad. I think if I'd have been a

[Deborah Frances-White]

dad, oh, I've said that I'm a feminist, but while I don't want to be a mum, I'd love to have been a dad. Must be amazing because also I'd get

[Ashley James]

praised for being hands on, for coming home after doing work and changing the nappy. And then, you know, I was like,

[Deborah Frances-White]

never mind changing the nap, reading a story, doing the anything.

[Ashley James]

And I'm not saying that like good dad shouldn't be praised, but I was like, I feel like if dads are expected to go through the physical changes and give up careers, even if it's temporary and, you know, just be at home, I think we'd have more compassion for when new mums find it so difficult. We wouldn't be like, but this is your calling. Or like, is this not enough for you? And also to anyone that thinks, well, what are my children going to think when they grow up and one day are able to read that I struggled, it's like, well, hopefully if they ever decide to have children or some their sibling does or a friend does, they might understand what it actually could be like for someone and maybe they'll be able to have more compassion and empathy. And if my son is straight and has a partner, like, he might get it.

[Deborah Frances-White]

Yeah.

[Ashley James]

And so it like, shouldn't we be able to talk about struggles more? Because I feel like they are like, obviously we all have different struggles and some people will love it. Like my, you know, some of my friends, they love that 6 month to 18 month thing. Or they'll say to me like, oh my God, don't, don't you feel ready for another baby? And I'm like, ugh, no, never again. But obviously we're all different and we're going to have different struggles because our circumstances are different and our Likes and dislikes are different, but for some reason, when it comes to motherhood, we kind of apply this universal. Well, this should complete you.

[Deborah Frances-White]

You said your dad wrote you a really nice letter when you were in the Big Brother house.

[Ashley James]

You know when you go on a reality TV show or when you watch reality tv, you're like, why the fuck are they crying? They've been there for, like a week. Have they never been on holiday? Because, like, their family write a letter and they're like. And I had that. I had that attitude. And then the fact that they didn't

[Deborah Frances-White]

want you to go in because they

[Ashley James]

hated the show and they've always hated like. So I was like, I must have been about. I don't know if I was 12 or 13 when Big Brother came out. And I loved it. I watched it 24 hours live on E4. Like, I loved it. And my dad would always be like, do you think they're normal? Do you think that's normal? And even when the celeb one came out, he'd be like, what? And you think that person's normal? And so he just always hated it. So when I said I was doing Maiden Chelsea, my mum was like, would you not have been better doing Geordie Shaw? And I was like, well, I think if you knew the difference, you'd be really pleased. And then my dad was. My dad was. When I said, I'm gonna be on tv, he's like, oh, God, please, not Big Brother. So then when I actually was doing Big Brother, he thought it was a joke at first and I was like, no, I am actually doing Big Brother. But then, yeah, they refused to come to the launch. So when I was in there, obviously you have, like, the slight paranoia of, like, oh, my God, I'm being watched all the time. Are people going to like me? But I was also like, are my parents going to like me? Because my dad was honestly, like, when I said to him, but, dad, I'll be able to buy a house. Like, I'll be able to buy a flat in London. And he was like, and you think that's worth humiliating yourself for life, dear? And I was like, bit, yeah. Like, I'll get on the property ladder in London. Like, how else would I be able to ever do that? And then, so when they wrote the letter, he actually did say, I'm proud of you. I've still got it framed. But he did also say, be careful of the wine. Now, at the time, I do love wine. But I was also, like, slightly flirtatious with A very problematic man called genuine. So I was like, within the house. I was like. In my head, I was like, does he mean the wine or does he mean the Genuine? I still don't know.

[Deborah Frances-White]

You've not asked?

[Ashley James]

No.

[Deborah Frances-White]

You think it might have been code, like a letter in World War II? Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

[Ashley James]

Probably a bit of both, to be honest.

[Deborah Frances-White]

That was not the part of the book that was most like Simone de

[Ashley James]

Beauvoir, but she wrote something very similar from her experience of going on reality tv.

[Deborah Frances-White]

I did enjoy it. I did enjoy it. I'd love to see Simone de Beauvoir in the Big Brother house, though, because it was. That was. Actually, you were asked to do it because it was the anniversary of the women getting the vote. So they put in loads of powerful women.

[Ashley James]

They said powerful women and problematic men.

[Deborah Frances-White]

Why did they put problematic men?

[Ashley James]

It was like candy for me back then. I hadn't quite figured out I was a feminist, but I didn't know how to attract unproblematic men.

[Deborah Frances-White]

Wow. Well, I wasn't asked. In the 2018, maybe 2028, I'll be asked for the hundred year anniversary of all women getting the vote. There were some other things, though, that did remind me of Simone de Beauvoir. She says in the Second Sex. To catch a husband is an art, to hold him as a job. That really reminded me of things you said. In fact, when you mentioned Simone de Beauvoir, you say that she believed that jealousy and competition between girls wasn't innate, but a product of the patriarchal structures that we are raised within. A system that trains us to see each other not as allies, but rivals for male attention and approval. And in the second section, she explores how we internalize these dynamics early on, often turning our frustrations inwards or against each other rather than at the system that restricts. And yes, I spotted the same thing when I reread it. She says women's mutual understanding comes from the fact that they identify themselves with each other, but for the same reason each is against the other. The kind of idea of the system pitting us against each other.

[Ashley James]

But don't you see that so much? It's like, you know, it's like child free. Women versus mothers, I feel like, are pitted against each other. So I talk a lot about my own internalized misogyny against mums that I realized once I became a mum because I was like, ugh, mums are so negative. I'm not going to be negative because I've got a great mindset and I can run Marathons. And then I was like, oh, right, the people are negative because actually the system makes it literally impossible to recover. Parent. Even the fact that school hours haven't evolved since women started working. Working mums versus stay at home mums. Not something that men breastfeeding versus bottle feeding. Like, I mean, the whole thing. I feel like we're constantly pitted against each other for everything. Women who grow old, Grace. I want to grow old disgracefully because that I feel like that is. It's like basically about accepting that you're invisible, isn't it? It's like, oh, I'm not gonna dye my hair or do anything. Like I'm just gonna disappear because I don't want to be like lamb dressed as mutton. And you know all of these phrases that essentially are to shame you because obviously men only find really young girls attractive. So like don't be old and show us anything because we don't like that.

[Deborah Frances-White]

Yes. The constant noise that really comes across, the constant buzzing.

[Ashley James]

A lady on Instagram messaged me the other night and she's 68 and said, I just want to say after seeing your lamb versus mutton or lamb dresses. Mutton post lamb dressed as mutton. Mutton dresses lamb.

[Deborah Frances-White]

Yes. Because that's lamb dressed as mutton. Yeah, that'd be 16 year old.

[Ashley James]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. To be fair, that's just a trad wife.

[Deborah Frances-White]

Yes.

[Ashley James]

Yeah. So she actually said to me, I watched your reel about mutton dresses lamb and I actually went out tonight in a corset for the first time and she sent me, it was actually 4am and I was like, I really want to know what she was doing. But she looked great. She wore a corset and I was like, go on, girl. Like more of that. Like dress for yourself. Obviously, if you don't want to wear a corset, don't wear a corset. Also quite problematic if you think about it, because you're squeezing yourself.

[Deborah Frances-White]

When women walk corsets, they used to faint all the time. That's why they had fainting couches, because they were so constricted. What we've gone through, do you think

[Ashley James]

it was because they were constricted or do you think it was because what they had to put up with from men, they just faint. It was just to get out of it.

[Deborah Frances-White]

It would be quite good if we had fainting couches in nightclubs in that case. And bars just like, oh God, he's talking about crypto.

[Ashley James]

Oh,

[Deborah Frances-White]

just a fanning one. I'm so sorry, I've Fainted from your story. Listen, I would love to throw some questions over to the audience, but first, could you read a little bit of the book just so they get a little flavour of how it's written?

[Ashley James]

Yeah, I'll probably just read a bit of the beginning, but I'm just gonna, like, read it on my phone but pretend that I'm reading it from the book.

[Deborah Frances-White]

Well, I mean, you've really blown the illusion now by telling us just in

[Ashley James]

case anyone saw and they thought I was a bit of a weirdo, but I just find it easier.

[Deborah Frances-White]

No, I would see me with texting.

[Ashley James]

I'm actually live streaming. No, I'm not. My daughter, Ada, is 2 years old. When I look at her, I see a girl who is confident, loud and proud. A girl who looks at herself in the mirror with love, amazement and wonder. She loves her body. She's not scared to speak her mind and tell us no. She's happy. When I look at her, I see myself as a child because that was me too once. Probably you too? No little girl is born a bimbo, nor does she arrive into this world as a prude, a bitch or a slag. So why is it by the time we enter our 20s, many of us feel so small? When we look at our bodies, we no longer feel wonder and awe, but shame and worry. We stop feeling comfortable saying no because we worry that will make us unlikable. We start believing we're not enough on our own and we need to find another half to be complete. We're taught to downsize ourselves, to be slight, quiet and palatable. I realized that my insecurities, lack of self esteem and faltering confidence was so completely wrapped up in the various messages I'd learned about what it means to be a good, attractive or acceptable woman. And perhaps even more. It was tangled up with the double standards everywhere in society, with one benchmark for women and an entirely different one for men. To rediscover my confidence, I had to untie all the knots about womanhood that were eating me up inside. To unlearn anything we've been bred to believe, we first need to understand it. This book will tell the story of how I got there. Spoiler alert. For me, the secret to self acceptance was feminism.

[Deborah Frances-White]

Lovely. Lovely. Does anyone in the audience have a question for Ashley?

[Ashley James]

Love the bimbo colors, by the way. I've somehow, like, dressed myself as the bimbo, but I love it.

[Deborah Frances-White]

I can't help myself.

[Ashley James]

Thank you. But thank you, both of you. And I just want to say, the way that you articulate yourself has helped me be able to articulate myself in friends and family circles when I talk about these things. So thank you. I love that. I really. Honestly, the language that you use is really helpful. So. I'm 32 and I'm single, and I really relate to so much of what you've spoken about and I know you speak about, but I guess in terms of, like, finding peace with that and when it is something that you want and you want to find love and you do, and I so want to be able to be like, it's okay, like, I'm independent and I don't need that. But there is a part of me that still deeply feels like there's something wrong with me, that I've not been chosen and just very unsuccessful in finding that love. And I suppose, yeah, I just wondered what you thought about that. I think it's very normal. And I was the same. And I think for me, like, finding single joy wasn't me saying, I don't want to meet anyone ever, and I don't want all of those things, because also, a lot of it is so deeply rooted. And also it's okay to. To want someone to be able to text you saying good morning, or to make you a coffee in the morning, or to have children, if that's what you want. I think often the idea of enjoying being single is kind of sold as, like, well, you shouldn't want those things. Of course you can want those things. I think it's just knowing that we have time, even if it feels like we don't, and that by spending all the time looking, it doesn't make it happen any faster. So you can learn to do the thing. I always think, like, think of it as a chapter. And I was speaking to my group of friends at the moment who are all, like, late 30s, early 40s. Most of us have kids. I've got a couple of friends who don't have kids. Some because they didn't want kids and they're actually thriving, very jealous, and some who really, really want kids, and some who've spent a fortune on freezing eggs and ivf and they just haven't met someone, and they really want to meet someone, but I think their standards have got higher and they know who they are. And they've also seen us navigating. I say us as, like, the whole group navigating, the difficulties of relationships in the modern day. And when I was speaking to my group of friends, even the ones of us who really, really like our partners, we feel There is an element that we have been sold a lie in the notion of happy ever after, because it's still so. I thought we were really equal, Tommy and I, but there is still such a inequality, even just in how society expects things from us. And, you know, I get told often that I work too hard and that it's not good for the kids, but he would never get told that. So I think we all feel collectively like we wish we didn't waste such a amazing chapter. And I know I'm not saying that you're suddenly going to be like, oh, great. Because I also remember people saying to me, you'll find someone when you're not looking. And I was like, you literally fucking met on a dating app. You were looking. Why does everyone say you'll meet someone when you're not looking? Like you were looking when you least expect it? But it's more that I think, enjoy the chapter. Like, when I found single joy, I think it was realizing that you can have happiness and love. Because another thing I used to say was, like, but I've got so much love and no one to give it to. But I started giving it to, like, my girlfriends and to travel and to. I started scuba diving. Quite niche, but, you know, there'll be like, whatever it is. But then I met really good friends. But also I met really good, like, men from doing the things that I liked. And I always say, like, you could wait. Like, you might be like, I'm gonna save the Maldives for my honeymoon, but then you might be with a guy who's allergic to sand. And so you're like, why didn't I go to the Maldives? Do you know what I mean? So it's like. And actually, maybe you'll meet that person in the Maldives. So I think it's just about knowing that being happy in a relationship isn't always guaranteed. There'll be loads of your friends who have, you know, got the timeline, but they might feel really lonely and they might look at you and be really envious that you have the freedom. And so whilst it doesn't make it better, it's like, try and think of it as a chapter and do all the things you love and your person might be waiting in those spaces. And never, ever know your standards. Doesn't matter how old you are, because,

[Deborah Frances-White]

yes, there are people wanting to applaud it. Never, ever.

[Ashley James]

And I love the solo holidays, by the way. I love it. Love what? The solo holidays. Oh, yeah. That's what I started doing in that chapter. And that's what helped me find single joy? Solo traveling, and I still go.

[Deborah Frances-White]

I think that's a very good advice. There's a question here.

[Ashley James]

Thank you so much. Hi, I'm Abi. Pronouns are she, they. I was just thinking about all these names that you've been called and how much public scrutiny you're under. And I personally am finding it really hard with the name calling and trying to build up my own personal confidence and resilience. And I was just. I feel like, yeah, what do you do to build yourself up and kind of repel the things that are said to you or said about you so that your confidence is unwavering? I am naturally quite a sensitive person, and so I think I'd be lying if I said I never let it ever get to me. And we're always told to have a tougher skin. And I always think, like, I don't want to be. Be tougher. I want people to be kinder. So I think that's a really important thing to say, that I'm not going to pretend that horrible things don't upset me. I think it's realizing that it's a reflection very much of someone else. And you don't need to justify who you are and what your intentions are if people are choosing not to see that. So, you know, I know that I'm a good person who cares really deeply about equality, and that should be a very uncontroversial thing. I also know that because of how I look, the fact that I, you know, I'm a woman, that I will get scrutinized by both men and women based on my intelligence. And, you know, all the things that lots of people won't agree with peers or Lots of people don't agree with peers or Nick. But nobody questions their intelligence. So I have to remind myself that actually it's a reflection of their misogyny, their internalized misogyny. And all I can do is keep knowing that I can make a difference by continuing to do what I do. You could, like, try and please everyone, and I really did. I used to try and please everyone, especially like that Made in Chelsea era. I remember there was this thing that I was too nice, and therefore I was fake. And I remember saying to my friend Steph, like, how can I be less nice? And she was like, you don't have to be less nice. You just need to stop hanging out with twats. And like, now, actually, I'm really, like, proud to be really nice. And I'm really proud that I cry on tv because, like, sometimes I'm like, the world is burning. How are we not all crying? And I want people to. To know that it's okay to feel things and it's okay to be sad. And actually loads of the people who used to say I was too fake actually come to me now when they're going through hard times. It's called trauma bonding because I love it, because I want the bullies to like, like me now and. But it's, I think, just. It's just knowing. What's that phrase? What Sally says about Susie says more about Sally than it does about Susie. So sometimes you just have to think how sad that it's so hard to be happy, especially at the moment. Like, the news is exhausting. I feel like everyone I know, no matter how privileged, is, like, struggling in some way and imagine investing that time being horrible to someone. So whoever it is, you just kind of almost have to have empathy, but don't let it rock you. Another thing I always say about myself, I mean, the things I. My co. Coping mechanisms in my head is that I'm a palm tree. Because a palm tree can, like, weather serious storms. And I don't think they ever fall down. Do they fall down? I always said they never fall down. Maybe they do, but I'm like, I'm a palm tree. Like, sometimes things will get thrown at me, but I know that if I ever do ever say the wrong thing or get it wrong, like, I'll apologize. And anyone that doesn't see me, they're not my people. And that's okay because I don't like everyone. I personally probably wouldn't go and type it and tell them, but I don't know.

[Deborah Frances-White]

That's what I find tricky. Like when people come onto my wall and I'm like, you've bothered to find me. And I'm like, I see things on the Internet I don't like all the time. I can't imagine going, where is that person? I think they need to know. Just like, I can't even imagine it. Even someone as grotesque as Andrew Tate go and find him. Like, I wouldn't bother. Like, I wouldn't engage. And I wouldn't want him to have the same satisfaction of an engagement. But it just wouldn't even occur to me that, I mean, he must need to know what I think. He doesn't care what I think. He's made that abundantly clear. Why would you go and find that person? Do you find it weird when people maybe see you on breakfast television?

[Ashley James]

I just wanted to Come and say you wear way too much makeup. Okay. Like, yeah, like, love it. I guess I'm gonna wear more now, just piss you off.

[Deborah Frances-White]

I had someone. It was just Christmas Eve. I remember that it was Christmas Eve, and I'd just done a bunch of different telly shows. And at the time, I was favoring a smokey eye, dark smokey eye, which I thought looked very dramatic. But a bunch of different makeup artists had done me a dark smokey eye. And a woman came into my DMs and said, Just so you know, that's not how you do a smokey eye. And I've seen you on. I don't know, I'd done, I don't know, QI or Rob Rinder's end of the year show or something like that, that you're doing it wrongly.

[Ashley James]

And I was like, also, this is how I do a smokey eye. Yeah, why don't you do your smokey eye how you want to do a smoky eye? But I was going for the Claudia Winkleman look, actually.

[Deborah Frances-White]

Well, exactly. She's a great example of someone who looks incredible and doesn't give a fuck about how anybody else thinks about her because she's got a look. And anyway, I was doing a dark smokey eye at the time. Maybe it was too dark. But it was Christmas Eve. Why did I need. I'd knocked off work. I wasn't doing a smokey eye. I was having a nice drink with my family. And I just thought, I don't need this confidence knock on Christmas Eve. I don't need this in my life. Go away. Like, why would you need to tell me something derogatory about myself on Christmas,

[Ashley James]

but also Christmas Eve? That says a lot about that person, that on Christmas Eve, rather than being joyful with friends or family or doing anything, they're really sad. So that's why I sometimes think it helps me to be like, I feel really sorry for that person. So even if they're really horrible, I'm like, I feel sorry for them. I feel sorry for them. I feel sorry for them.

[Deborah Frances-White]

I feel sorry.

[Ashley James]

Do you know what I mean? Because it's like, I wouldn't go in because I'm trying too hard to be happy. And also, I'm trying to unlearn what they say. Like, being horrible to someone is like drinking poison and hoping they die. Like, you're actually only really putting the misery in yourself because. So, yeah, it's true.

[Deborah Frances-White]

In the old days, you just say. You just watch TV and you'd say to whoever was There. Well, I'm not sure about her makeup, but now you can go, where is she? She needs to know that it's not right. We're all too parasocial, all of us. Who else has got a question?

[Ashley James]

Hello.

[Deborah Frances-White]

Hi.

[Ashley James]

Thank you. I have a question. You're talking about marriage then? Whether people have got the right people. It's a question about a friend of mine who has recently. Not recently, a few years ago, got married and she's just had a baby. And it has become apparent to us who all of us are school friends. And we went to a school that was all girls and we were all raised to be very independent and I'm very lucky to have been in that environment. And it's become apparent to us that she has perhaps been slightly changed in her opinion since marrying this certain person. And her role has really become quite a trad wife role which is very different to the person that we once knew. So I wonder whether you have ever had situations like that in your life where you have got someone that has changed slightly and become not anti feminist but very different to the sort of feminist views you had and maybe some advice about how you would go about speaking to them and sort of understanding how to get them back. In a way, it's quite a tricky question because I feel like it's very much down to a relationship you have. I can certainly say that I've gone through relationships, especially when I was younger and being a bit of a chameleon and I suppose because back then I wasn't the palm tree, I was very much like the coconut trying to attach myself to a palm tree to know who I was, if that's a good analogy. And I suppose you can't make someone, you can't tell someone they're wrong. You have to almost let them figure it out. And so obviously I don't know your friend. She might also be going through a phase of motherhood because it changes you so much. Like it literally does change your brain. And maybe she's feeling joy in that role. I had internalized misogyny about stay at home domesticated women. And actually I feel really empowered in this. And again, I don't know like the specifics of it all, but it's like you almost have to let people go through it. And if it is because she's in a coercive relationship, you also have to. All you can do is show her that you love her and that you're there for her and you'll always be there for her. And I also think with friendships, it's quite unrealistic, a bit like romantic relationships that we expect and value friendships for lengths of time. And I used to get if my friends weren't aligned with me in specific periods of my life and I noticed it a lot when I was single and a lot of my friends went on to have long term relationships, I felt really ditched by them and I got really angry and I fell out with them all because I was like, I'm lonely, they're not understanding me. But actually now I see it. I saw it again the other way, that actually when I had a child, after spending however many years saying I didn't want children and so loads of my friends were like, we don't want children. And then I felt really isolated and lonely that they didn't care. But it's like now I realize that actually it's okay for friend. Like you can love someone and show you're there, but you can go through different periods and it doesn't have to be a big argument. But I guess like the main thing is you just want her to know that you're always there and if whatever it may be, so you don't have to discuss her changing attitudes, but you can let her know that if ever she needs you, you're always there. I don't know if that's helpful. It's really hard when you don't know specifically. Yeah, sorry, that's probably a bad question, but thanks for.

[Deborah Frances-White]

Who else had a question? Somebody here and somebody there.

[Ashley James]

I'll sit up. Hi, Ashley. Hello. We've met before. We've got a couple of friends in common. I think an offensive group. So I know the accent that you have now in relationship is the accent that you got when you went to private school. And I've just listened to the bit of your audiobook where you're talking about that and you say that you went from Geordie accent to the accent you have now. That resonated with me because I grew up in Brazil. I came to England as a child

[Deborah Frances-White]

with a really heavy Brazilian accent.

[Ashley James]

And I sound like this now. And I remember trying so hard to sound English and to fit in.

[Deborah Frances-White]

And I find depending on which friendship

[Ashley James]

group I'm with, I can sometimes dip into a different accent. And I was saying to my friend on the way up here, I wonder if that happens with you, Ashley, because obviously we see on TV we see the accent you have now. I know a couple of your friends and you kind of sound the same. Do you ever find yourself dipping back

[Deborah Frances-White]

into Geordie, or dipping into another accent when you're with other people because you

[Ashley James]

were fairly young when that started. I feel the opposite. When I go back up north, I feel like the poshest person in the world, that I'll be like, hello, old chum, thanks for some champagne. And I'm like, well, why am I being so posh? Like, I really. I think in my head I don't sound posh. And then when I listen to myself back, I'm like, is that. Is that me? I'm really posh. But it's funny because it's like when I go to America, you suddenly feel like. You're like, oh, tea and crumpets. And you're like, why am I.

[Deborah Frances-White]

My husband's like that. He. I sort of lean into the intonation of wherever I go. And I think, do they think I'm taking the piss when I'm in la? Because suddenly I'm talking like this and I'm like, why am I doing this? And my husband becomes David Niven. He just becomes like, no, coward. I say, do I have a martini? And I'm like, why are you talking about that? He's like, I don't know. And it's because he's gripping onto his identity, whereas I'm like, is this what we're doing here? I had to film something for a job I was doing when I was in Australia, so they sent me this camera crew and then I did it. And then when I got back to Britain, they went, yeah, you're going to have to dub it. You're going to have to do, like, adr. I said, why? And they said, because this isn't how you sound. And in the rest of. You know, when people meet you off the project, they're going to go, that's not you. I said, what do you mean? And they. And honestly, I sounded like I was in Catherine Kim. I had a really Australian accent and I was like, I don't sound like that when I'm there. Like, Tom's. My husband was like, you. You phoned me when you're there or I'm there with you. You don't sound like that. We don't know what happened. To this day, we don't know what happened. I didn't sound that Australian when I lived there, so we'll never know.

[Ashley James]

Do you know what I always say? You know when people are like, what's your biggest insecurity? And they're expecting you to be like, my C section scar or my tummy or my Boobs or whatever it is. I'm always like, my accent. Because I feel like that's the one thing that especially there's something about being in England or Britain as a whole, I guess, that there is so much judgment and assumption in the way you talk. And there's this real idea. And I mean, doing a show like me and Chelsea didn't help, but it's like, oh, sometimes I'll pick up people being like, well, you don't understand because you grew up with a silver spoon. And I'm like, what? The spoon that my dad used to, like, give birth to Cat. Like, it's like, you. But then. And then I feel really like I'm really proud to be from the Northeast. And it doesn't show in, like, the way I sound. And I feel like there's something about accents that we make. There's just so much pressure. And obviously, of course, we feel pressure when we're young if we have a different accent. That's like the worst possible thing as a child, to be different in any way. And the way you speak is such an easy target for being teased. And obviously going to a very posh school. There was, like, an element of classism. So I adapted the accent that it was almost like survival. But then I also get it all the time now of like, she's fake. She faked her accent. And it didn't help that when my dad, when I was in the Big Brother house, somehow my dad started getting like, journalists, call them up. You know how most people know just to, like, not say anything. My dad is like a real chatter. She was like, well, actually, I know she doesn't speak like that, man. She faked her accent. So I came out and all of the things are like, Ashley James faked her accent. As if I'm like, pretending to be posh. And I was like, dad, why did you speak to them? He's like, they just called us up for a chat.

[Deborah Frances-White]

But it's true when you're a kid that you will sound like your peers and kids, they morph in. You know, it's true that any child of immigrants will sound like their peers in about 25 minutes because it's basic survival. So if they're going to send you to a posh school, then they can't expect you to come home any other way. But the way that, like, it's survival, survival. I don't want to stand out, you know, when you're a kid and if everyone's got a certain sort of bag, school bag, and you don't have that same. You just feel it. You feel like, oh, my God, I'm different. Everyone's going to look at me. Everyone's going to point it out. Maybe the school bag was personal. It's a very specific example. There's somebody down here.

[Ashley James]

Thank you so much.

[Deborah Frances-White]

You've made us laugh, you've made us

[Ashley James]

cry a little bit, and it's so nice to kind of ride that wave of emotions, especially when I think we're pushed all the time to sound strong,

[Deborah Frances-White]

whereas I think you're pushing us to sound resilient.

[Ashley James]

And that's just really lovely. So thank you, firstly to both of you.

[Deborah Frances-White]

And I just wanted to ask, so

[Ashley James]

the book is formulated and your story

[Deborah Frances-White]

is formulated of all these formative experiences

[Ashley James]

that you've written about. And I wondered, has writing the book itself been a formative experience?

[Deborah Frances-White]

Like, how has that changed you, and in what ways? And what surprised you or what did

[Ashley James]

you get to put down in the process of writing? Not a bad question, by the way, but I feel like it was very cathartic to write it all down and realize that so many of the things that we have been made to feel so ashamed of, even if it's decisions we made or opinions we had or things we said to people growing up, like, so much of it isn't our fault. You know, like, we are all absorbing different attitudes, and we're trying to survive and we're trying to be good women. And so I think it's just realizing that actually it's okay to have made mistakes, whatever they may be, and it's okay to be learning and unlearning all the time. You know, I'm sure even I called the last chapter Elderhood, which I was actually really pleased with, because I was like, how could I keep it in the hood thing? And then I was like, elderhood.

[Deborah Frances-White]

Great.

[Ashley James]

Is it a word? Yes. But, you know, there'll be things that I'm discovering about how horrifically misogynistic I was about older women when I was. And, you know, we're all just trying to live life for the first time. And I think so often we think that when we're adults, we'll have it figured out. I remember definitely feeling like I can't. Can't wait till I'm in my 20s and boys aren't players anymore. Or, like, you know, you just think things are easier for adults, and we're all doing things for the first time. And I think that was, for me, like, the best thing about my book. And Also to realize, to meet people, people where they are and like, not think just because you've like recently learned something that that makes you better than someone else because they don't know that thing. Like every one of us is just trying to figure it out and be happy.

[Deborah Frances-White]

It's true. As, as Simone de Beauvoir said, representation of the world, like the world itself, is the work of men. They describe it from their own point of view, which they confuse with absolute truth. And I think something that really comes out of bimbo. Ditch the labels. Find your voice, reclaim your confidence. Is there isn't some absolute truth sitting there about you or about womanhood, about femininity, about humanity, about relationships? It's everything to play for. We can rewrite our own stories as women, as feminists, and as individuals and human beings and friendship groups and within our romantic relationships. We can, we can write our own story. And I'm so glad, Ashley, that you wrote your own story in bimbo. It really spoke to me and I know that it will speak to lots of women. And I would recommend that you buy it for lots of young women and girls, especially right now, what they're facing on the Internet. So many Horror stories from 15, 16 year old girls saying the boys at school are just unspeakable. And that's not all boys. There are some, some lovely boys who are absolutely fighting the good fight. But there's a lot now that have been seduced by this story. This would make a great birthday present or a great Christmas present. And you have one opportunity to get Ashley to sign it to somebody. So if you've got any presents coming up, it might be a good idea to buy a couple tonight. I'm also signing my book, Six Conversations We're Scared to have, which is about why the left and the right are so fragmented and why the left has split so much and how we can try and build it back together. And Ashley, have you got anything else to plug? Is there anything else you'd like to tell us about?

[Ashley James]

No, but you just plugged hard. I'm like very impressed with that plugging. I need to up my plugging game. All I was going to say was that, you know, you mentioned trans non binary and I really. Obviously a lot of these stories are my own stories, but I really want to say and have put in the book that trans women are part of our fight. And also there's a chapter in the book about raising a son. And my son is experiencing like bullying at the moment for liking girly things. And so I want this to be educational for people, for everybody, and also, like, basically, we're not equal until all of us are equal. And trans people are very much in that conversation.

[Deborah Frances-White]

Yes, absolutely. Yes. I loved reading that in the book because it's a particularly brutal time for trans people because it's a manufactured culture war that's come out of the Heritage foundation and it's come out of Christian nationalism looking for a way to divide feminists. It's not really. They don't really care about trans people. There's very few trans people. But they care about dividing feminists. They care about dividing the LGBTQ community, and they've done that. So it's really important that we do look out for trans people in our lives, in our communities. And thank you so, so much for coming out tonight and being part of the Guilty Feminist and being part of the Guilty Feminist Waterstones Book Club. Could I have a huge round of applause for Ashley James. Anything else we should watch you on? Read anything else. Just buy a bunch of books and have her sign them tonight. And thank you so much. Bigger round floors, Waterstones and all of them. Oh, stop.

[Ashley James]

Thank you.

[Deborah Frances-White]

I've been Deborah Francis White. We've been the Guilty Feminist. Thank you so much and good night.

[Ashley James]

Thank you.

[Deborah Frances-White]

You have been listening to the Guilty Feminist with me, Deborah Frances White, and my very special guest, Ashley James. The recording engineer was Grundy Lazimbra. The Guilty Feminist theme tune was composed by Mark Hodge. The producer was talking Tom Solinsky for the Spontaneity Shop. Thanks to Gina Dicio Zainab, Mohamed Ned Sedgwick and everyone at Waterstones, as well as all of you for listening. For more information about this and other episodes, visit guiltyfeminist.com.