Exactly. With Florence Given

Latest Episodes:

BODY IMAGE: Shame, Shaving and Fear of Dating with Natalie Lee May 02, 2022

Show notes

Happy Sweet 16 Exactly fans! Call the limo, buy the big dress and pick up your date because it’s our 16th episode and 4th call in! Floss is joined this week by Natalie Lee aka @Stylemesunday and author of the soon to be published book Feeling Myself: How I shed my shame to find sexual freedom and you can too. Natalie has talked publicly about her post- partum body, had an orgasm on TV and wants you to live proud, present and shame free.

Floss and Natalie answer your questions, listen to your voice notes and take some calls. They answer questions on loving ourselves, dating and the dark places that breed shame. They also explore the way our friends discussing their body image issues invite our own negative comparisons and chat about releasing the pits- fur and all!

Exactly is coming to you live on 26th May. Floss will be joined in conversation by our favourite model, activist, author and icon Munroe Bergdorf.. You can go to www.thepodcastshowlondon.com for more details and to buy your tickets.

Lovehoney would love you to celebrate self-love this Masturbation May with the Womanizer Premium 2. Use my code FLORENCE20 at lovehoney.co/Florence_premium2 and save 20% sitewide on Lovehoney for a limited time!

Click here and use the code EXACTLY to get 14 days’ free access to CHEEX - the new and revolutionary membership offering a safe space for sexual entertainment and education. The promo is valid for new customers when selecting the yearly subscription option. Cancel anytime during the trial period.

Original theme music by Black Honey. Find them on instagram - @blackhoneyuk

Instrumental bed is Black Honey’s song ‘Beaches’.

Find the transcript for this episode here: https://somethin-else.github.io/transcripts/exactly/s1e16.txt

This is a Somethin’ Else production.

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BODY IMAGE: Living Unapologetically with Stephanie Yeboah Apr 25, 2022

Show notes

This week on Exactly we’re joined by the ray of sunshine that is Stephanie Yeboah. She’s smart, funny and fabulous and chats with Floss about how fat-phobia and white supremacy are basically evil twins. In her book Fattily Ever After: a Black Fat Girl's guide to living life Unapologetically, Stephanie shares stories of how misogynoir, the experience of both misogyny and racism, interact with fat-phobia. She discusses the role of black women throughout history, while touching on fetishization, loneliness and how black women have been marginalized in the media, even within the body positivity movement that they started.

Stephanie generously shares personal anecdotes and gives us a history lesson on the colonial origins of our beauty standards, exploring desirability politics and how conversations around weight and size often ignore the significant role mental health has on how we relate to our bodies. We hope you all listen to this episode and go on to write a love letter to your body, thanking it for keeping you alive!

Find Stephanie on Instagram @stephanieyeboah

Find Floss on instagram and Tik Tok @florencegiven

Original theme music by Black Honey. Find them on instagram - @blackhoneyuk

Instrumental bed is Black Honey’s song ‘Beaches’.

Find the transcript for this episode here: https://somethin-else.github.io/transcripts/exactly/s1e15.txt

This is a Somethin’ Else production.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

BODY IMAGE: Fat Liberation with Sofie Hagen Apr 17, 2022

Show notes

A new week, a new Floss pod! It’s episode two of our body image mini series and Floss is joined by the hilarious Sofie Hagen to talk about Fat Liberation. Fat Liberation, as a movement, is concerned less with an individual’s relationship with their body and more with the systemic ways in which fat people are discriminated against. Sofie acknowledges that many people have a difficult relationship with the word fat, and interrogates why this is. Is the word fat an adjective or a pejorative? And how has the capitalist patriarchy influenced this? With wit, fierce intellect and a ton of excellent reading/podcast recommendations, Sofie and Floss examine fatphobia, dating and the role of the scientific community in weight based discrimination.

We can all preach that fat isn’t a bad thing and that all bodies are beautiful, but when society doesn’t affirm that it becomes increasingly easy to feel that body positivity is for everyone else but ourselves. Last year, Sophie published their debut book 'Happy Fat': Taking Up Space In A World That Wants To Shrink You. In their book Sofie dispels myths about health and fatness and they detail some of the horrific discrimination that they've experienced due to their fatness. Sofie's work focuses less on loving what you look like and more on the fact that you deserve the same respect and humanity, whatever you look like. Today’s episode is enlightening, enraging and empowering, so strap in.

Find Sophie on Instagram @sofiehagendk

Find Floss on instagram and Tik Tok @florencegiven

Click here and use the code EXACTLY to get 14 days’ free access to CHEEX - the new and revolutionary membership offering a safe space for sexual entertainment and education. The promo is valid for new customers when selecting the yearly subscription option. Cancel anytime during the trial period.

Original theme music by Black Honey. Find them on instagram - @blackhoneyuk

Instrumental bed is Black Honey’s song ‘Beaches’.

Find the transcript for this episode here: https://somethin-else.github.io/transcripts/exactly/s1e14.txt

This is a Somethin’ Else production.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

BODY IMAGE: Sex, Summer and Self-Objectification Apr 10, 2022

Show notes

Happy Monday Floss Fans! Welcome to the start of a brand new mini series. Today and for the next three weeks, Floss will be chatting to an awesome cadre of guests about Body Image. This week it’s the wonderful Dr. Lindsay Kite and Dr. Lexie Kite, identical twins, co-authors of the book More Than a Body: Your Body Is an Instrument, Not an Ornament and directors of the nonprofit company Beauty Redefined. Their instagram is on fire with body image analysis and they use their doctorates, their platform and their book to espouse essential wisdom on the ways in which we’re all conditioned by capitalist patriarchy to think our perceived desirability is the most important thing about us.

Floss, Lindsay and Lexie chat about the male gaze, body resilience vs body positivity and beauty standards. So many of us feel such pressure to conform to certain ideals that unpacking our own autonomy over those choices becomes increasingly complicated. We’re taught to be so self-critical of the way that we look that we forget to be grateful for all the marvellous things our bodies can do. Later they deep dive into sex, and summer and how truly inhabiting your body can allow you to reclaim your rage.

“Prettiness is not the rent you pay to exist in the world as a woman”- Erin Mckean

“Women Don’t Owe You Pretty” - Florence Given

Original theme music by Black Honey. Find them on instagram - @blackhoneyuk

Instrumental bed is Black Honey’s song ‘Beaches’.

You can find Lindsay and Lexie on instagram @beauty_redefined

Find the transcript for this episode here: https://somethin-else.github.io/transcripts/exactly/s1e13.txt

This is a Somethin’ Else production.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

SOCIAL MEDIA: Cancel Culture, Community and Accountability Apr 03, 2022

Show notes

After three excellent episodes and three excellent guests, we’ve come to the end of our social media mini series. As is our tradition here at Exactly, we’re bringing you a call in episode, with the wise and wonderful Seerut Chawla. Seerut is a Psychotherapist who lives in London. She’s practised in the NHS, and now runs her own private clinic. She has a special interest in personal responsibility, resilience and our relationship with the internet.

Seerut and Floss unpack parasocial relationships, discuss the often mercenary nature of emoting online and examine the significance of self-awareness in owning your own mistakes before judging others for theirs. They also answer questions on using social media to advance your career and authentically being yourself online. Later they take a phone call from a wonderful listener who can’t stop scrolling, despite knowing that social media is really affecting their self esteem (Same here pal).

Remember, it's okay to only share what you want to share, and what you want to show!

Find Seerut on Instagram @seerutkchawla

Find Floss on instagram and Tik Tok @florencegiven

Original theme music by Black Honey. Find them on instagram - @blackhoneyuk

Instrumental bed is Black Honey’s song ‘Beaches’.

This is a Somethin’ Else production.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

SOCIAL MEDIA: Lonely Online with Larissa May Mar 27, 2022

Show notes

For the third part of the mini-series exploring 'Social Media' we’re joined by the incredible, Larissa “Larz’ May to discuss digital wellness; how to navigate the wild west of social media and stay sane in the process.

Larz has an infectious energy and deep insight into this complex subject. She started her project ‘Half The Story’ after experiencing the dark side of social media first hand. Alone and suffering from depression and anxiety with only her Instagram followers for company she realised that what she was experiencing must be happening to many other young people too. Her desire to not only heal herself, but to arm others with the tools to thrive, led to her spending the next 5 years learning all she could about the impact of social media on our mental health and crucially how to take practical steps to protect our minds online.

We’re living in the most connected era humankind has ever experienced, yet so many of us feel lonely and isolated. Larz and Floss discuss the difference between connecting online and true meaningful connection. She explains how focusing on our lives and relationships online can be detrimental to our real-life experiences and friendships. And most importantly how to take back the power and use our platforms with power, purpose and in a way that truly aligns with our values and goals.

It’s time to ask if you’re using social media or if it’s using you… and if so what you can do about it!

Find Larz on Instagram @livinlikelarz

And her incredible projects @halfthestory @globaldayofunplugging

Find Floss on instagram and Tik Tok @florencegiven

Click here and use the code EXACTLY to get 14 days’ free access to CHEEX - the new and revolutionary membership offering a safe space for sexual entertainment and education. The promo is valid for new customers when selecting the yearly subscription option. Cancel anytime during the trial period.

Original theme music by Black Honey. Find them on instagram - @blackhoneyuk

Instrumental bed is Black Honey’s song ‘Beaches’.

Find the transcript for this episode here: https://somethin-else.github.io/transcripts/exactly/s1e11.txt

This is a Somethin’ Else production.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

SOCIAL MEDIA: Being Curious Not Critical with Ayishat Akanbi Mar 21, 2022

Show notes

Happy Monday! Welcome back to another episode of Exactly. It’s episode 2 of our social media mini season and we’re joined by culture writer and stylist Ayishat Akanbi, one of the first people Floss earmarked for interviewing on her podcast. In 2018 Ayishat published a video called “The Problem with Wokeness”. In which she analyses social justice and activism online. With the world becoming a place that rejects nuance for fear of it being interpreted as political incorrectness, Ayishat encourages curiosity not criticism, empathy not anger and responsibility not accountability.

While social media can be a space for connection, communication and change, Ayishat’s incredible razor sharp mind and her analysis of online culture is vital and refreshing. Today she chats to Floss about the experiences in her life that have led her to not only holding these beliefs, but expressing them online.

Don’t berate people for what you see in yourself.

Find Ayishat on Instagram @ayishat_akanbi

Her debut book, The Awokening, is out Summer 2022

Find Floss on instagram and Tik Tok @florencegiven

Original theme music by Black Honey. Find them on instagram - @blackhoneyuk

Instrumental bed is Black Honey’s song ‘Beaches’.

Find the transcript for this episode here: https://somethin-else.github.io/transcripts/exactly/s1e10.txt

This is a Somethin’ Else production.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

SOCIAL MEDIA: Racism, Rockets and Reading with Layla Saad Mar 14, 2022

Show notes

We’re kicking off our Social Media mini series with none other than Layla Saad, the number one bestselling author of Me and White Supremacy, and a globally respected writer, speaker and host of the Good Ancestor Podcast, which we at Team Exactly highly recommend. Layla used social media, instagram challenges and internet trends to shirk assumptions about clout and instead issue an incredible call to action. Me and White Supremacy challenged her followers of all backgrounds to share their experiences of white privilege, encouraging her white audience to engage with the society’s systemic racism in an unprecedented way.

Floss and Layla discuss feeling drained by instagram, the inherent spirituality in Layla’s confrontation with white supremacy and the importance of being uncomfortable. They also explore the vital work being done by writers and educators and their shared belief that while social media may be a springboard for speaker truth to power, literature will be their lasting body of work. Later they answer your questions on performative activism and dealing with relationships that change because of advocacy.

You your anger, lest it use you.

Find Layla on instagram @LaylaFSaad

Check out The Good Ancestor podcast here

Find Floss on instagram and Tik Tok @florencegiven

Original theme music by Black Honey. Find them on instagram - @blackhoneyuk

Instrumental bed is Black Honey’s song ‘Beaches’.

Find the transcript for this episode here: https://somethin-else.github.io/transcripts/exactly/s1e9.txt

This is a Somethin’ Else production.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

FEMINISM: Patriarchy, Periods and Ass Shaking with Amika George Mar 07, 2022

Show notes

In our fourth and final episode of our feminism mini-series Floss is joined by founder of the free period movement, the award winning Amika George, for a call in, where we get to hear from YOU. Amika is an activist, author and icon who is literally dripping in awards. She founded the Free Periods movement in her bedroom when she was just 17 which resulted in her persuading the UK government to provide free menstrual products in all English schools and colleges from January 2020. Last year she published her first book Make It Happen: How To Be An Activist- isn’t she the coolest?!

Amika studied history at Cambridge University and Floss couldn’t be in better company to answer your questions on feminism. Together they pull apart what we mean by ‘patriarchy’, analyse why ‘periods’ are so taboo and take a look at why Doja Cat shaking her arse has men all hot and bothered.

Find Amika on instagram @amikageorge

Find Floss on instagram and Tik Tok @florencegiven

Original theme music by Black Honey. Find them on instagram - @blackhoneyuk

Instrumental bed is Black Honey’s song ‘Beaches’.

Find the transcript for this episode here: https://somethin-else.github.io/transcripts/exactly/s1e8.txt

This is a Somethin’ Else production.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

FEMINISM: Choices, Cults and Guilt with Deborah Frances White Feb 28, 2022

Show notes

For this Episode of Exactly, we welcome feminist podcasting royalty- HRH Deborah Frances White. Deborah is a comedian, podcaster, author and the host of the wildly successful The Guilty Feminist podcast. She is responsible for waving many of us- Floss included- off on our feminist journeys and addresses the shame, anxiety and- well- guilt that dominates womanhood with subtlety and silliness. We. Love. Her.

Floss and Deborah discuss how diets are like Deborah’s time as a Jehovah’s Witness and grapple with what a “feminist choice” is. They also explore how the patriarchy negatively impacts men and how an abundance mindset can create a “new girls club” to rival “the old boys club.” Later, they answer your questions on internalised misogyny and girl to girl toxicity.

Next week is our feminist call in! If you want to get in touch with the Exactly. team with a question, drop us a line at +4 4 7 8 9 0 3 0 2 6 6 5. We’re particularly interested in questions on the internet, body image and relationships!

Find Deborah on instagram @DFDubz and @theguiltyfeminist

Check out The Guilty Feminist podcast and find their live show dates here

Find Floss on instagram and Tik Tok @florencegiven

Original theme music by Black Honey. Find them on instagram - @blackhoneyuk

Instrumental bed is Black Honey’s song ‘Beaches’.

Find the transcript for this episode here: https://somethin-else.github.io/transcripts/exactly/s1e7.txt

This is a Somethin’ Else production.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices