[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 o… - Emma Barnett
" "[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.
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About Emma Barnett
Emma Barnett (born 5 February 1985) is a British broadcaster and journalist. In May 2024, she became a presenter of Today on BBC Radio 4. Barnett worked for BBC Radio 5 Live for six years, beginning in 2014, after three years working for LBC. Between 2016 and 2020, she presented 5 Live's mid-morning weekday programme. Before beginning her broadcasting career she worked for The Daily Telegraph, first as its Digital Media editor and latterly its Women editor. Between August 2016 and 2020, she was a columnist for The Sunday Times and, between 2019 and 2022, Barnett was one of the presenters of the BBC's flagship news and current affairs show Newsnight. She was the main presenter of Radio 4's Woman's Hour from January 2021 to April 2024. Her book on menstruation Period. It's About Bloody Time was published in 2019.
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Additional quotes by Emma Barnett
Non-Jewish friends, colleagues and Wikipedia contributors alike, have mistakenly thought of me or described me as an Orthodox Jew. It is true I grew up with that, and it was the form of Judaism showcased to me on infrequent synagogue visits, but it does not, and never has, described my liberal and largely secular life.
I know how to read Hebrew, but I've still got no idea what it means. I recognise certain tunes, but have no clue as to the order of the service. And while it would be easy to blame my seating arrangement, I'd still have very little idea of what was going on if my gender permitted me a ring side pew.
So I have flip-flopped my way to a few Reform services. And while hearing more passages read in English and regular page number announcements are a comfort, I find myself feeling similarly isolated there. Reform Judaism's ways feel foreign because they lack the familiar rhythms of the Orthodox Judaism I grew up with.
However, in Orthodox services I feel increasingly like an illiterate and ill-educated fool, suffering imposter syndrome.
But I didn't want to move on. Not for a long while. I had formed a relationship with our baby, daring to map out a little of our future together. But beyond medical forms, conversations with my stunned and deeply saddened husband, my texts to people about our loss and my memories of such a bond, there was nothing else to show the whole episode happened.
Like millions of women before me, the baby lived within me and died within me. My body and mind were the keeper and witness.
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