Emma Barnett Quotes

Nearly 10 years ago, my father went to prison. I had just turned 23 and was heading home after a long day at work when my then boyfriend, now husband, rang me and delivered the news. I had known my dad was in trouble, but he kept his business life so separate, I didn’t even know he was going to court the day he ended up being imprisoned for living off immoral earnings.

Earlier this week, male MPs struggled to say the same words in a debate about the so-called "tampon tax". This is the five per cent VAT rate that stubbornly remains on all period products – ineligible for zero rating because the European Commission deems tampons (oops, I mentioned them again) "non-essential" items. Try to telling that to any woman.
Female MPs and campaigners have been fighting for years to remove this ludicrous levy.
If nappies for children, maternity pads for new mothers and incontinence aids are all exempt, why does Brussels have a peculiar problem with blood?

No one said achieving gender equality would be easy. But if the WEP has got a fighting chance it needs to set out its stall on all the big issues of the day – while keeping a laser-like focus on its main battles. That way it might become a credible party that can steal seats and influence people. To get their attention, the new party must target David Cameron, Jeremy Corbyn and Nicola Sturgeon where it hurts. Only then will the parties that dominate Britain be forced to reckon with it. And only then will the women of the WEP truly be able to say that they have achieved a new gender equality – and retire.

During that first meeting it became clear that this wasn't a party with a long shelf life. In fact the WEP aimed to influence the political debate and then die a dignified and valiant death – gender equality accomplished. Fast forward seven months and the party has officially launched.

[The experience of a 24 year old sister of a friend] Just after finishing her master’s in economics, she started her first job at a City firm, full of ambition. But then she noticed something. There were no female board members – and all the way through the company there were far fewer women overall.
Rosie invited a large cross section of her female colleagues out to lunch at a local deli and pushed them on the matter. The response? Blank faces all round. None of them had “ever noticed” anything. An awkward silence ensued.
Rosie, not wanting to go overboard, dropped the issue. But, right at the end of the meal, the most senior woman present suddenly piped up. "I do sometimes wonder why all of the women who work here are so beautiful," she said.
No one knew how respond to another difficult truth: it seemed that looks had played a part in the men's hiring decisions. Rosie, bruised and bemused by the experience, has just let matters lie. She has rent to pay.

British Jews aren't scared to talk to each other about the situation in Israel. We're becoming scared to talk at all.

[S]ince the start of the latest conflict between Hamas and Israel, protesters marching in anti-Israel demonstrations have regularly held up anti-Semitic slogans, shouting for Jews to be gassed, invoking the Holocaust's chambers of doom. The situation in Britain hasn't been much better [than in France or Germany]. Last week's major pro-Palestine rally, which stopped London's traffic, was littered with placards comparing Israel's – and Jews' – actions to the Nazis ("Well done Israel – Hitler would be proud", read one such sign, accompanied by a swastika). This casual interchange of "Israel" for "Jews" is not just ignorant but often terrifying, especially when linked to references to past atrocities. Indeed, what other group of people get the worst experience in their – or anyone's – history launched at them like a hand grenade?

Not being able to reconcile my secular views with my religious ones is something I too, find hard to explain. Predominantly I struggle to feel comfortable with female rabbis because the Judaism that feels authentic to me is the Orthodox branch, which does everything it can to conserve and not change.
And that's what it comes down to: what part of your religion feels authentic to you – which is very hard to alter when it's been presented to you in a certain way since birth.

In the secular world, common sense must be the order of the day. It isn't reasonable not to have women occupying the same roles as men and vice versa. But in a religious sphere, where faith is the binding force of a group of people, rationale has less sway or place. If you started applying logic to the beliefs held in most faiths, things would start to fall apart pretty quickly at the seams.