The ‘Grey Areas’ Of Sexual Violence Aren’t Really Grey At All

Posted on 26/08/2021 by Boris Clair

For a decade, Rachel Thompson thought she’d had a fairly positive sex life. If someone had asked her if she’d ever experienced rape or sexual assault, she would have answered with a resounding: “No, I’ve been very lucky”. But in 2017, as the #MeToo movement reached its peak, the journalist started to reflect on past encounters.

One incident, when she was 19, continued to play on her mind. A guy she’d been seeing at university suggested they explore the woods together. He told her to lie down on a mound of moss. Before she knew what was happening, he’d straddled her body, sitting on her chest. The weight of him meant she couldn’t breathe. She panicked but told herself: “It’ll be over soon.” He ejaculated on her without saying a word, and they left.

“When I was 19, I didn’t see my experience as anything out of the ordinary,” she says. “No words sprang to mind in the aftermath of the experience – I simply had no vocabulary to express it.”

Reflecting on that night planted the seed for Thompson’s book, Rough, which explores sexual violence in the bedroom and the systems of oppression that enable it. A common theme is the suppression of one’s own trauma. Before writing the book, Thompson referred to her own experience as “bad sex” or “a grey area”, but she no longer uses those terms.

“That grey area did not stay a grey area for me,” she says. “I realised and came to terms earlier this year, right before my book was due, that actually, this was a sexual assault. It was pretty fucked up and it was really scary.”

Thompson has spoken to 50 women and non-binary people for the book, focusing on experiences of sexual violation that we find hard to talk about, because they don’t fit into the traditional boxes of “rape” or “violence”.

There’s issues like stealthing (the non-consensual removal of a condom during sex), cyberflashing (the sending of unsolicited dick pics) and non-consensual strangulation, which is a far cry from the consensual choking practised by some members of the BDSM community, with saftey precautions and safe words in place. There’s also the encounters we don’t have the words for, the moments that make women – and it is overwhelmingly women – feel a bit weird.

Catherine is among those who shared her experience with Thompson. She and a man were about to have sex for the second time. He said he didn’t have another condom, she said she didn’t have one either. He got up and said actually, he had one in the bathroom.

“In hindsight, he clearly picked our used condom out of the bin, rinsed it and reused it,” she says. “I vaguely noticed something was up at the time, but dismissed the suspicion/was too drunk to care, but thinking back that’s obviously what he did. Thinking back on the night it’s also clear that he was sober while I, although consenting, was very drunk.”

Catherine describes this encounter as something that made her “uncomfortable” during sex.

Abigail, another of the book’s interviewees, shares her experience of non-consensual choking. She met a guy on a dating app and everything was going great, until he unexpectedly put his hands on her throat and hit parts of her body. The experience left her confused.

“I’ve been sexually assaulted before and I was once dragged into a dark driveway by a man trying to rape me, in my head I didn’t feel like the two experiences – stranger in an alleyway and an attractive man on Bumble who texted me the next morning telling me how nice a time he had – were the same,” she says.

Abigail went on a second date with the man and asked him not to choke her again. He didn’t, but soon afterwards they lost touch. She says it took her a few months to recognise what had happened to her as sexual assault.

Thompson wanted to write the book “primarily for people who have experienced things that they just didn’t quite know how to put into words”. But she is clear that she doesn’t want to police the language women use on this topic either, or ban phrases such as “grey area” or “bad sex”.

“These are really personal experiences and our route to coming to terms with them and finding the words is a really personal journey,” she says. “You’re the person in charge of what you get to call your lived experiences and I don’t think we should allow anybody else to impose words or definitions on those experiences.”

Some campaigners remain concerned we don’t have the language to properly describe such encounters, and that women are being conditioned to dismiss incidences of violence.

“If you’ve learned that your sex life must include violence, it’s incredibly hard to unpick why a violent assault felt so wrong,” Fiona MacKenzie, founder of the campaign group We Can’t Consent to This, tells HuffPost UK.

“It’s so normal to blame yourself for something awful that’s been done to you – and monstrously hard when the culture says you should smile and say you enjoyed it.

“Women also see what happens when others speak out against this – we get called prudes, virgins, vanilla, sex-negative… for campaigning on this. There is no shortage of perpetrators who want women to write off being assaulted as ‘just a crap shag’.”

The campaign group has heard from hundreds of women who’ve been violently assaulted in (until then) consensual sex.

“Most of them have been strangled,” says MacKenzie. “Violence against women is widespread, normalised. Society’s only just begun to push back on that in recent decades,” she adds. “We should be very suspicious of anyone telling us that violence is actually liberating. There don’t need to be grey areas – the default should be that men doing violence to women is unacceptable.”

Where is it coming from?

Porn is often blamed for the increase of violence in the bedroom and it certainly plays a part. Acts like choking, spitting and slapping are frequently shown, without any discussion on safe words and boundaries.

Such practices have been appropriated from the BDSM community, but do not reflect it; once in the mainstream, the key pillars of safety and consent are ignored. Such acts require deep trust, which is certainly difficult to establish on a first date and impossible to establish without an explicit conversation.

But porn is only part of the picture, says Thompson.

“It’s part of a landscape that also has a lack of sex education, and a lack of understanding about how consent functions, and how we should be seeking consent and negotiating consent for every individual sex act that takes place within a sexual interaction,” she says.

Brits in particular are alarmingly prudish about discussing what we do and don’t like in the bedroom, Thompson adds – and this is preventing us from establishing consent.

In the book, she hears from the anonymous sex educator @lalalaletmeexplain, who tells of one couple’s miscommunication around choking. Months into their relationship, the man asked the woman why she enjoys choking so much. She replied: “I don’t, to be honest, I do it because I thought you liked it.”

“People are getting these ideas, maybe from watching porn, and they think: ‘Oh, this is just what everyone’s doing now,’” says Thompson. “By not having the communication in those relationships and those sexual encounters, we’re not talking about what we want and what we don’t want.”

MacKenzie points out that images of sexual violence are not consigned to porn, or niche parts of the internet. She directs us to several Instagram hashtags, where images of young women with a hand around their neck are accessible in a few clicks. “Young women tell us that as tweens they learned that being strangled is an expression of passion,” she says. HuffPost UK approached Instagram for comment on this and will update with any response received.

When asking why this is happening, we also can’t forget that sex does not exist in a vacuum. Thompson’s book explores fatphobia, biphobia, white supremacy and transphobia – and how current systems of oppression impact our sexual experiences. It’s complex and endemic – and far too important to try to summarise in one article. But it’s clear that sex can never be an equaliser when it exists in a world of power imbalance.

What needs to happen?

On a macro level, we need systemic change to bring about sexual equality. There’s no quick-fix, but one thing that might help, is elevating all experiences of sexual violence.

“The #MeToo movement was founded by a black woman called Tarana Burke and I think she’s often erased,” says Thompson. “When the#MeToo movement exploded into public consciousness, it focused primarily on privileged white women. And that’s not to say that their stories are not valid or not worth listening to, but I think that we have to be so wary of the stories that we place at the forefront of these movements that we say speak for all survivors, because they don’t necessarily reflect all survivors.”

On a micro level, MacKenzie would like to see greater regulations of sexually violent images on social media. “We’re asking for the Online Safety Bill currently being considered by parliament to ensure that platforms stop normalising the violent assault of women – particularly those that welcome child users,” she says.

We Can’t Consent To This has already campaigned to make the use of non-fatal strangulation punishable by law as part of the 2021 Domestic Abuse Act. MacKenzie wants to see the law working in practice. “Women must be able to report choking and asphyxiation to police, and be taken seriously and not be blamed for these assaults,” she says. “We’d hope to see a significant increase in prosecutions for these assaults.”

Above all, both women want others to recognise the problems with these so-called “grey areas” of sex, and recognise that anything which makes an individual feel uncomfortable or unsafe is not “grey” at all.

The #MeToo movement may have prompted Thompson’s reflection and acknowledgment of assault, but now she thinks action is needed.

“It really raised people’s awareness about the extent of sexual violence and how widespread it is in all levels of society, but I think that we need more than awareness now,” she says, “we need action: tangible, individual change.”

Rough by Rachel Thompson is out now.

Help and support:

Here’s How Your Diet Can Help You Have An Easier Period

Posted on 25/08/2021 by Boris Clair

Our menstrual cycle affects so much of our life. From hormonal acne and serious mood swings to generally feeling quite crappy, I’m sure if some of us had the option to skip our periods we would. And f, like me, you’re someone who has always had bad period pain, it can leave you feel a bit helpless.

There are lifestyle adjustments we can adopt that can help towards making our periods easier to deal with, though – and one of them is the food we eat at different stages of our cycle.

Lifesum, a nutrition app that aims to help users improve their baseline health through what they’re eating, has found that small changes to your diet can improve your symptoms during each phase of your menstrual cycle.

“What you eat plays a huge role in overall health creation, including how you feel throughout your cycle,” says Dr Alona Pulde, star of the Forks Over Knives documentary and member of the Lifesum health advisory board.

“Most people think of periods as just a week-long occurrence, but in reality, it’s a month-long cycle and nutrient-dense foods can help replenish your body and balance your hormones throughout.”

Roxane Bakker who is a registered dietician and head of nutrition at Vitl agrees that it’s important to look after yourself when you’re menstruating, particularly when it comes to your diet. “Choosing foods that can help restore balance to your hormones are always a good option,” she says. “Vitamin B6 specifically is a key player in balancing your hormones. What you eat can sometimes help to relieve some of the uncomfortable symptoms you experience on your period”

There are four different stages to the menstrual cycle: the menstrual phase, the follicular phase, the ovulation phase, and the luteal phase. Each phase of our cycle requires different care and dietary needs, Dr Pulde suggests.

While dietary tweaks can help you ease your period pains, they aren’t solutions to medical conditions such as endometriosis, PCOS, or dysmenorrhoea. If your periods are so painful they’re affecting day-to-day life, speak to your doctor.

“Remember, everyone’s body works differently, and our needs vary,” adds Dr Pulde. “Focusing on a balanced, varied nutrient-dense diet that provides enough energy is key – not only for performance, but for our overall wellbeing.”

The Menstrual Phase

This first phase of the menstrual cycle is the time where our oestrogen and progesterone levels are lowest; you shed your uterine lining, and bleeding occurs. This usually lasts between three and seven days. During this time you can experience cramping, fatigue, low back pain, and mood swings.

This is a time when you’re losing a lot of blood so it’s important to stock up on iron-rich foods. Animal products such as red meat, poultry, and fish (heme iron) or plant-based products, including leafy greens, beetroot, and legumes (non-heme iron) are essential during this time.

“As you can imagine, fruit and vegetables are a staple when it comes to any healthy diet,” Bakker adds, “but they’re essential when it comes to managing period cramps. They’re a vital source of fibre which in some cases can help to relieve the stomach pains associated with menstruating.”

Be sure to avoid foods that are highly processed during this time, such as sweetened breakfast cereals. “They can make period symptoms worse, causing inflammation and bloating,” says Bakker. “Caffeine and alcohol also impact inflammation. And studies show that they can worsen PMS symptoms.”

The Follicular Phase

During this phase, which can last anything from 11 to over 20 days, depending on the length of your cycle, oestrogen levels start to rise again. Your energy should increase and you may notice you have greater motivation.

Eating fibre-rich foods (fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and legumes) and fermented foods (kombucha, kimchi, sauerkraut) will help to metabolise and clear excess oestrogen.

The Ovulation Phase

You may experience some cravings at the time of ovulation, around day 12 to 14 of your cycle, so you should be eating foods that are rich in fibre and high in nutrients and consuming enough of these food types to fill you up.

These include fruits (berries, apples, pears, bananas); vegetables (broccoli, Brussels Sprouts, artichoke, kale, sweet potatoes); legumes (beans, lentils, peas); whole grains (quinoa, oats, whole wheat pasta, barley); and nuts and seeds (almonds, pistachios, and sesame/pumpkin/sunflower seeds).

The Luteal Phase

The luteal stage of our cycle begins after ovulation, when both oestrogen and progesterone levels rise. During this time, pain can feel a bit more intense as large amounts of prostaglandins, a chemical that stimulates contractions, is released.

To help experience less cramping and lesson the physical symptoms of PMS, tuck into anti-inflammatory nutrients such as omega 3 (walnuts, flaxseed, chia seeds), antioxidants like vitamin C (found in fruit – particularly berries – and vegetables) and vitamin E (found in leafy greens, avocado, and whole grains).

“In this phase, it’s common to feel tired,” says Dr Pulde. “Eat complex carbs that provide fibre and vitamins to balance moods and curb cravings.”

Avoid or cut back on caffeine and alcohol if you can, she adds, and if you find your energy levels dropping, reach for the healthy snacks, such as hummus and veg sticks or homemade fruit and nut bars.

Help, My Kid Is A ‘Whiteatarian’ Who Only Eats Beige Food

Posted on 22/08/2021 by Boris Clair

It was parents’ weekend at my daughter’s college, and we were treating her to dinner at an off-campus bistro. The waitress arrived, and she gave her order: “I’ll have the baked salmon with a side of sauteed spinach, please.”

I dropped my menu, my jaw and the mistaken notion that I knew what this kid had been up to since we’d dropped her off a couple of months ago. I had spent most of the past 18 years trying to nudge her – sometimes gently, sometimes with growing desperation º into eating something, anything, other than noodles with butter and salt, half a bagel with plain cream cheese or – her true love –Rold Gold Tiny Twist pretzels.

The idea of fish had always made her shudder. The mere mention of “green things” like spinach could lead to tears. So what was up with her dinner order tonight? She shrugged. “They serve salmon in the dining hall sometimes, and my friends all eat it. Everybody at school likes spinach, too.”

I feigned disinterest and changed the subject, but inside I was doing the parental equivalent of a victory dance. I had relinquished my title as mother of the world’s most adamant whiteatarian, all for the low, low cost of tuition at a liberal arts college that was 1,000 miles away from home.

Your kid is hardwired to act like this

Before I do any more gloating about the sight of my beloved progeny actually putting spinach in her mouth, let’s take a step back to those early years, when I was driven to frustration by a girl who refused anything that wasn’t white. What made her act that way, anyhow?

Well, mums and dads, you already know that children are annoying for lots of reasons, including a tendency toward tantrums, a love of pre-dawn wake-up times and, of course, picky eating. Would it help if I told you that their eating preferences are pretty much hard-wired into their sweet-smelling little noggins?

The National Institutes of Health says infants have an “innate preference for sweet and salty tastes and tend to reject sour and bitter tastes.”

And, guess what, it gets worse. “After the age of one, vegetables begin to taste very bitter to children,” Alisha Grogan, a paediatric occupational therapist who specialises in picky eating and sensory processing, tells HuffPost.

“When humans had to forage in the wild, children’s sensitive taste buds prevented them from eating anything poisonous.”

Some kids remain loyal passengers of the S.S. Sweet And Salty even as they get older, often to the exclusion of any food that might actually provide, you know, some nourishment. A range of different studies have reported that, by the time they reach age 3, between 6% and 50% of kids are described as picky eaters by their parents.

And if you think they’re doing this just to piss you off, you’re right, at least when it comes to the younger set. “Toddlerhood is when many kids start to exert their autonomy and push boundaries with parents,” paediatrician Dina Kulik tells HuffPost. Not only do they get to remind you who’s boss, they also literally make themselves happy with each bland, beige bite. “Simple sugars are easy to eat, they taste good and they provide a quick dopamine hit, much like other stimulating drugs,” she says.

Can your kid live on beige food alone?

Is a diet of pasta and bread sustainable for health? Kulik said there are concerns. “The risk of iron deficiency, especially, is high on a very starchy diet,” she says. Even though many manufactured grain-based products are supplemented, she said, kids following the whiteatarian plan are often low in iron, vitamin D, calcium and B12.

Think this bagel with cream cheese looks plain enough? Think again – those sesame seeds could even be too much for a picky eater.

In the short term, anyway, the nutritional prognosis is not totally dire. One study said that, while picky eaters did tend to have lower levels of zinc and iron, their overall macronutrient intakes were not severely reduced. And many of us know at least one adult who still lives on a mostly white diet and seems to survive, if not thrive.

“Many kids can survive on white carbs alone, as long as they’re eating enough of them,” Grogan says. “Carbs often are fortified with all sorts of vitamins and nutrition. However, depending on how limited a child’s diet is, they could have some nutritional deficiencies.”

The only thing you have to fear

In the comedy special John Mulaney & the Sack Lunch Bunch, a boy named Orson Hong sings an ode in which he declares that “a plain plate of noodles with a little bit of butter is the only thing I’ll eat.” His heartfelt song is more a lament than an homage, and it’s clear that his character is anxious and fearful about ingesting anything but this classic whiteatarian meal.

Fear is a big part of what’s going on, said Amanda Smith, a programme director at Walden Behavioral Care, and it’s important for both kids and parents to acknowledge that. “Some kids might be afraid of different textures, or they might fear that a food will make them choke or vomit,” she tells HuffPost. “It can be overwhelming, scary and hard, so it’s important for parents to try to understand that.”

“Short-order cooking and pressuring a child to eat during meals can lengthen the time a child is selective about what colour foods they’ll eat.”

– Alisha Grogan, paediatric occupational therapist

Keep in mind that once they’ve passed toddlerhood, this eating pattern is about them, not you. “If an older child is still eating only white foods, they aren’t trying to punish their parents or stress them out,” Grogan says. “Eating is hard for them. One way to help is to neutralise the topic, and to avoid labelling foods as good and bad or healthy and not healthy.”

Here’s what you can do

“I suggest not fighting or negotiating,” Kulik says. She suggested an attitude of: “Here’s the plate of food. If you want it, great.” Then, she advises, “If not, don’t start a battle. There is evidence kids need to try a food more than a dozen times to realise they like it. When you simply give in and offer the carbs, they don’t learn to try anything new, and the fear and pickiness persist.”

“Short-order cooking and pressuring a child to eat during meals can lengthen the time a child is selective about what colour foods they’ll eat,” Grogan adds.

In extreme cases, a child might have what’s known as Avoidant/Restrictive Food Intake Disorder or ARFID. The disorder, Kulik explains, is characterised by “very selective eating habits or disturbed feeding patterns.”

She cites estimates that anywhere between 5% and 14% of children in inpatient eating disorder programs, and up to 22% of children in outpatient programs, have the disorder. “It’s important to note that this is a true mental disorder, and the vast majority of kids who are whiteatarians don’t have it,” she says.

Don't forget about tan foods, the close cousin to white foods. — Don’t forget about tan foods, the close cousin to white foods.

“If you have concerns, start with a visit to your child’s medical provider,” Smith suggests. “They’ll be able to assess any medical factors that could be playing a role, and they can check your child’s growth progress, weight and vital signs, and then run some lab work.”

You’ll also want to pay attention to patterns that develop at mealtimes. “If kids are having emotional tantrums or breakdowns over new foods being near them or on their plate, or if they’re gagging or throwing up when new or other-colored foods are near them, then it could be something more serious,” Grogan says.

“If your child is limiting intake to fewer than 20 foods, or you’re noticing physical symptoms relating to their diet, consulting with a health practitioner is advised,” says Sarah Appleford, a registered clinical nutritionist with an interest in children’s health, including fussy eating and gut issues.

“It’s more than just a phase if they’re refusing food at most meals, exhibiting anxiety or stress, have undeveloped eating skills or sensitivities based on texture, colour, appearance, noise or smell at the table and away from the table. Physical symptoms can include slow growth, fatigue, pallor of the skin or complaints of tummy pain or gastrointestinal upset such as constipation.”

Look to the rainbow

Along with every other awful thing, this issue is on the rise, according to the experts. “We’re seeing a growing number of kids with anxiety disorders, and extreme fussy eating behaviour is often a component,” Appleford says. But there is some good news, she adds: “Most children will naturally grow out of fussy eating as they gain more skills and confidence around food.”

“Parents can find it to be very stressful to have a child who only eats white foods, because it’s difficult to go to parties or even pack a lunch,” Grogan says. “But kids — even the pickiest — can learn to eat a variety of different coloured foods.”

In the meantime, listen to the experts and try to cut yourself (and your child) a little bit of slack. You might also want to start saving for that liberal arts college experience that will liberate their taste buds and turn them into rainbowtarians, just a few long years from now.

How To Watch The Tokyo Paralympics – And How Not To, Please

Posted on 22/08/2021 by Boris Clair

“I love the Paralympics but this time round they need to be more than just a feel-good story.” Sophie Christiansen CBE is a British dressage rider who has competed in four successive Paralympic Games. Already an eight-times gold champion, she hopes to up that medal tally at this year’s games in Japan.

Post-Olympics, the Paralympics light up Tokyo again this week, starting with Tuesday’s opening ceremony. But something about this year’s games feels different. After all, the games, which celebrate the sporting achievements of disabled people, and have been held every four years since Rome in 1960, are taking place a year later than planned due to (and during) a global pandemic. One in which disabled and vulnerable people are among those most affected.

Christiansen is leading a campaign with Scope and the British Paralympic Association with a rallying call to turn cheers into change. “I want to use them as a platform to show the reality of living as a disabled person in the UK,” she says.

This is because, like so many others in the disabled community, she’s concerned interest in the Paralympics does not translate into support for disabled people.

Sophie Christiansen: 'The Paralympics need to be more than a feel-good story' — Sophie Christiansen: ‘The Paralympics need to be more than a feel-good story’

Channel 4 certainly anticipates an audience for the games, having launched its most ambitious Paralympics schedule yet with a high-budget promo. At first glance, the ad seems like any other piece of media selling disabled people’s lives as a sob story or the ultimate bravery, until you focus on the narrative.

Instead of framing Paralympians as “super humans”, a message that saw the broadcaster heavily criticised in 2016, this new campaign shows the everyday struggles of disabled people and, in turn, para-athletes – from making hospital appointments to taking medication, and the general inaccessibility of life, whether at sporting facilities or, for one woman, her local greasy spoon.

“So you might as well quit, if you haven’t got it,” rings out the Bugsy Malone backing track, echoed in a pointed clip of Boris Johnson saying the same – before the “super” in the phrase “super humans” is smashed right through.

Evidently, the broadcaster want us to know it has listened – and that there’ll be no more switching off the comments on YouTube as in 2016. This year, Channel 4 and More 4 will carry live subtitles. The opening ceremony will have live signing and enhanced open AD/commentary simulcast on 4Seven, while the majority of content on the Paralympics microsite will also have subtitles.

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Unfortunately, the messaging that accompanies the campaign lets it down: “To be a Paralympian, there’s got to be something wrong with you.” To non-disabled people, that may read as tongue-in-cheek, but for many people with disabilities, it brings back memories of being taunted with “what’s wrong with you?!”

Causing an even bigger uproar online is the accompanying billboard and bus shelter campaign, which uses the slogan: “It’s rude not to stare”.

It’s clear Channel 4 are trying to be subversive here, but when you’ve grown up being told you don’t fit in, that there is something wrong with you, and that if you don’t control your disability, people will stare, these words can still hurt.

There’s also the fact that most people seeing the advert won’t have experienced bias or hate because of their disability, so to them it won’t read as “watch the Paralympics.” It reads as “make disabled people your inspo porn.” Again.

The ads have certainly divided disabled people, and that’s to be expected. Contrary to some reports, we don’t all think the same about things.

Just seen the channel 4 paralympics poster….

“It’s rude not to stare.”

I don’t know about any other disabled people but… I hate it so much I feel slightly ill.

— Harley 🏳️‍🌈♿🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿 (@weegingercpunk) August 14, 2021

I actually quite like Channel 4’s Paralympic tag line. It’s a clever play on a trope. “It’s rude not to stare” is not the same as “It’s not rude to stare.” Kind of sick of the idea we can’t do witty or smart disability campaigns just because some non-disabled people don’t get it.

— Frances Ryan (@DrFrancesRyan) August 16, 2021

Lol at the people saying the Channel 4 ‘it’s rude not to stare’ Paralympics billboard is ‘clever’ and ‘original.’ I’m sure some executive thought it was clever when they thought of the idea. It isn’t.

— Karl Knights (@Inadarkwood) August 15, 2021

Comedian and presenter Rosie Jones is part of The Last Leg team, presenting live from Tokyo. “I really think since the Paralympics have been on Channel 4, it’s a completely different thing,” she says, while acknowledging her possible bias. “Maybe I’m being naive but I don’t think there’s been an ‘inspiration porn’ aspect. It’s all about balance and it’s like, ‘yeah, great, we know how we got disabled, now can we watch then just smash the rowing or the cycling.’”

Inspiration porn, a term widely used by the disability community, was first coined by activist Stella Young to describe a situation where a disabled person is seen as inspirational purely because of their disability – for example, an Instagram post showing a disabled athlete running a race on prosthetic legs with the text: “If they can do it, what’s your excuse.”

These sort of clichés ignore the hard work disabled people put in to get to the top of their game, despite the ableism thrown at them – whether the game in question is sport, as for Paralympians, or in Jones’s case, stand-up comedy.

For her part, Jones attributes a reduction in inspirational imagery to a rise in disabled talent – for the first time, more than 70% of Channel 4′s presenters for the Paralympics have disabilities themselves. “The storytelling comes with a sense of authenticity you wouldn’t get if the entire team were abled bodied.”

Although what Jones says has some truth in it, much Paralympics coverage still leans on sob stories and in-depth personal details from disabled people’s lives in order to get an emotive response from non-disabled viewers. But former Paralympian wheelchair racer Baroness Tanni Grey-Thompson, who will be commentating the games for Channel 4, believes there’s a clear solution.

“They need to show sport, and they need to commentate on it as just sport.”

– Dame Tanni Grey-Thompson

“If we’re in the studio having a discussion about the politics of disability, then that’s the time to educate and talk about someone’s disability, not when they’re getting ready to compete,” she says. “They need to show sport, and they need to commentate on it as just sport.”

In something of a Catch-22, the very fact that disabled people are ignored or overlooked so much of the time is what leads people to pay closer attention when they are doing something out of the ordinary, like competing in the Paralympics, and to hold them to impossible standards.

Something that could be solved, perhaps, if the world was built more for disabled people

Liz Johnson: 'It’s assumed that Paralympians represent all disabled people' — Liz Johnson: ‘It’s assumed that Paralympians represent all disabled people’

“If we invested more attention in creating a world in which everyone was enabled and empowered to get on with their lives, being disabled wouldn’t be seen as something to be ‘pitied’ or dramatised,” says Liz Johnson, former Paralympian swimmer, commentator and co-founder of The Ability People and Podium, a platform for people who are unable to work conventionally, due to disability or impairment, to share and promote their skills and expertise.

“It’s assumed that Paralympians represent all disabled people. But just as not every person wants to be an athlete, nor does everyone with a disability want to be a Paralympian,” says Johnson. “The better representation we give to disabled people from all walks of life, doing all kinds of jobs, the more we’ll level the playing field and stop ‘othering’ people who happen to have a disability.”

Now more than ever, the Paralympics wants to champion sporting excellence while using its legacy to draw attention to the lives of disabled people – but how big a burden is this on an event that happens only once every four years?

Tokyo hope Kadeena Cox at the IPC World Para Athletics Championships.

“We can’t expect the Paralympics to do everything. If we wait for the Paralympic movement to raise the bar, it’s never going to raise,” says Grey-Thompson. “We need government and other people to raise the bar. If you just let the Paralympic movement do it, it means government don’t have to take any responsibility.”

London 2012 was widely seen as a high water mark for disabled visibility, with the Paralympic events as packed as their Olympic equivalents. But by no means was it ‘job done’ for equality.

“Yes, 2012 changed the world for disabled people, but, it didn’t stop, “do not attempt resuscitation” orders being put on 1000s of disabled people last year. It hasn’t changed hate crime doubling against disabled children since 2012. It didn’t change my ability to get on the Northern line,” Grey-Thompson adds.

Mike Sharrock, chief executive of ParalympicsGB, sees the urgency of this moment. “Following the disproportionate impact of Covid-19 on so many disabled people, we now believe more than ever that the success of ParalympicsGB must be a catalyst for meaningful, long-term action,” he says.

“Athletes are powerful advocates to turn the nation’s cheers into change and those medals into a UK-wide movement. The Paralympics might only be four weeks every four years but the message from disabled campaigners and Paralympians alike is clear – we won’t be forgotten when the Paralympics end.”

Ultimately, the International Paralympic Committee, the British Paralympic Association and Channel 4 aren’t the ones in power. We can hold them to account for the ways they portray disabled people, but we can’t expect them to enact meaningful change in our lives. For that, we need to lobby government and, disabled or able-bodied, we can all play our part.

“My concern is the after-care and how quickly people go back to their normal lives and they forget about disabled people,” says Rosie Jones, summing it up. “We’re at a point now as a country where we’re just as excited for the Paralympics as the Olympics, but we shouldn’t be grateful that for four weeks, we’re equal to abled-bodied people. That should be happening all the time.”

How To Deal With A Boss Who Sucks At Listening To You

Posted on 20/08/2021 by Boris Clair

Bad bosses come in all kinds of flavours –- from incompetent to just plain jerk -– but one of the most frustrating kinds of managers is the one who never seems to listen to you. Your ideas, requests and complaints are ignored or rejected. Everything you say seems to go in one ear and out the other.

At a certain point, not feeling heard can take a toll on your psyche. In a survey by the Society for Human Resource Management, 84% of U.S. workers say poorly trained people managers create a lot of unnecessary stress. The workers’ biggest recommendation on what their bosses could improve? Their communication skills.

Ideally, good bosses take the time to proactively ask what’s working and what’s not in your one-on-one meetings with them.

But when your boss is not listening to you, you have two options: either do nothing and hope your boss realises you are unhappy, or you can take actions to make yourself heard.

Jennifer Tardy, a career coach and diversity and inclusion consultant, said too often she sees employees who avoid dealing with their boss and are not comfortable talking in a direct way or in a timely manner to them.

“Employees wait too long to have the courageous conversation and now the situation has compounded,” Tardy said. “At this point, rather than have a rational, logical conversation with their manager, they explode ― often with emotion leaving the core message to get lost in.”

There are helpful steps you can take about feeling unheard long before it gets to that point.

Here’s what you can do to salvage a relationship with a boss who is not listening to you –- and when to decide enough is enough.

1. Diagnose whether they don’t listen to anyone, or just you.

Gorick Ng, a career adviser at Harvard University and the author of “The Unspoken Rules: Secrets to Starting Your Career Off Right,” said that when employees deal with bosses who are not understanding them, they may want to jump straight to quitting as the “path of fastest relief.” But one way to figure out if you can save the relationship is to take the time to understand where your boss is coming from.

“Whatever you’re dealing with, someone else has dealt with before.”

– Gorick Ng

To do that, first try talking to people who work with or used to work with your boss. “Whatever you’re dealing with, someone else has dealt with before,” Ng said.

He suggested asking questions about how your boss prefers to communicate, such as “What’s worked with this person before? Are they someone who needs to see it on paper? Are they someone who needs a nice long pro/con list? Are they someone who needs a mockup or draft? Are they someone who needs to hear it from a certain person?”

“What you’re really trying to figure out is if this is a problem that you can solve,” Ng said.

After you do this bit of research, you should have an idea what will get your boss’ attention, be it project deadlines or influential colleagues. If your manager listens to what a certain colleague says, for example, you could focus on asking that colleague to be the whisper in your boss’ ear about your ideas, Ng said.

2. When you bring it up to your boss, make sure that you have a solution in mind.

Once you diagnose your boss’ deal, you can have a conversation. But don’t simply complain. Get specific about what actions made you feel unheard, and bring solutions that could address the problem.

Tardy said you should ask yourself what specific actions your boss took that led to this. What specific actions would my boss need to take for us to remedy the challenge? That way, when you bring it up with your boss, you can be clear on their role in the problem and in the solution.

And then after you acknowledge how you felt unheard, have a solution on what could make your joint communication style better.

“Many times when we have courageous conversations, we leave it to the other party to figure out what action to take to reach the solution,” Tardy said. “The more specific you are on the action you want from your boss, the more clearly you can articulate it to them so they can take the action.”

You can bring up solutions with language such as, “Hey I know we’re trying to achieve this. I was thinking of this option or this option or this option. These are the pros and cons. My suggestion is that we might want to consider option B. What is your reaction?” Ng said.

Or, the solution can be brought up as simply as something like, ”‘Would it be helpful if I did ‘blank’?’” Ng added.

3. If talking and suggesting solutions fails, it’s time for change ― either your boss or your job.

If you’ve exhausted these options, and nothing has changed, then it’s time to consider switching it up ― perhaps out of the job altogether.

First, you can try leaving your particular manager if you still want the role.

“Change doesn’t mean leaving the company. Maybe it means leaving the manager, but staying in the department or company,” Tardy said. “Escalation means talking to your manager’s manager. Oftentimes, messages that go unheard from an employee become clearly understood by a leader.”

But if leaving your inattentive manager is not a possibility, then it really may be time to start looking for a new job where you and your ideas will be heard. And then, at this new job, you can hash out communication styles with your boss up front.

“If you make it very clear that you need to feel like your ideas are heard, and define what that looks like when it doesn’t happen, it will be easier for you to bring up three, six or 12 months into the role with the manager,” said career coach Kaitlyn Buckheit, who specializes in career transitions. “You won’t be bringing up the topic for the first time.”

What Is Single-Origin Coffee, And How Is It Different From A Blend?

Posted on 19/08/2021 by Boris Clair

As more people have been working from home over the past year, coffee drinkers have had a chance to explore coffees apart from their usual Starbucks or Costa. Home baristas are digging into specialty coffee, grinding their own beans and making cold brew, Japanese iced coffee, espresso and pour-overs in their own kitchens. As a result, they’re realising there’s a whole unfamiliar world of coffee beans out there – one of which is single-origin coffee.

Most third-wave specialty coffee companies offer both single-origins and blends, but what’s the difference between them and what should you be buying and drinking?

What is single-origin coffee, anyway?

Essentially, single-origin coffee comes from a single producer, crop or region in one country.

“Single-origins are small lots and typically, depending on how granular you get, single-origin can be from a single country or region, and you can go all the way down to as granular as a specific lot size, which would be a small section of a [coffee] farm where they’re growing one specific type of coffee,” explains Jeremy Brooks, Verve Coffee Roasters’ head of sourcing and green coffee buying.

“Single-origins really do highlight the terroir of a specific place – so how the coffee tastes in that place,” Brooks adds. “Single-origins are typically very expressive of the country where they’re purchased from. Ethiopian single-origin coffee is like eating a peach. Whereas with blends, we can play around and position them in a way that actually gives you a little bit more of a dynamic range: Instead of having a peach, you have a peach cobbler.”

Most blends contain single-origins, but the difference comes from how a coffee roaster will build a flavour profile. “We’re taking coffees that maybe have one attribute of chocolate or plum and then you’re building something in order to bring a coffee to a customer that would allow them to experience it in a certain way,” Brooks explains.

Which tastes better: single-origins or blends?

“I think there is a time and place for everything,” Brooks says. “Early on in my coffee career, I was a die-hard single-origin maker. I would only drink single-origins. As I developed my coffee career and I’ve also become closer to the sourcing and roasting side, I now understand the value in both. They both play an important role in sourcing and the supply-chain side of how we support farmers and kind of what you want to taste. Like anything in your life, it depends on your mood.”

“Blends are a way that roasters communicate a vibe or something about themselves, something signature,” Talitha Clemons, owner of the Oklahoma City-based mobile coffee company Bright Vibe Coffee and a coffee taster competitor, tells HuffPost. “Maybe they want to create something that will remind folks of time around a fire or of holidays. When you taste a blend called Fireside, Sweater Weather or Tropical Weather, you are in a frame of mind to let that coffee take you to a place or a moment or memory, rather than focusing so much on given tasting notes. What is difficult for me is that a blend can contain multiple coffees and you may get some information about the regions the coffee comes from, but the level of transparency changes.”

Single-origin coffee can come from a single producer, crop or region in one country.

Veronica P. Grimm is the founder of Glitter Cat Barista, an inclusive organisation focused on helping minority groups become baristas and providing them resources to compete in coffee competitions. Grimm prefers to work with blends in these competitions because it balances the coffee with more depth. “Basically, [it’s] like having a soprano and a bass in a choir,” she says.

“When they are in harmony it is beautiful.” Despite preferring blends over single-origins in the field, Grimm likes to drink single-origins. “Blends bring together something magical in a cup of coffee,” she says. “But blending coffee takes work and on a daily basis I like to just enjoy what I’m drinking without too much thought.”

While both single-origins and blends will appeal to different types of coffee drinkers, Brooks said some people complain about how acidic or sour single-origins can taste. “It is a little bit more of a unique flavour profile that you have to grow to love,” he says. “Sometimes people can take that as a negative. On the reverse, some people can say that blended coffees are boring, they don’t have any flavour at all, that you have to put milk and sugar in them just to make them taste good.”

Clemons points out that just because a blend might not taste like a single-origin, the blend’s quality isn’t necessarily inferior. “Blends can be really tasty,” she says. “I am all for adding sugar and milk if and when you want it, but feeling the need to add something to coffees like milk or sugar because something it is lacking can have more to do with that coffee not hitting the notes you hoped it would.”

Brooks recommends that single-origins are best made with paper filter pour-overs, or a Chemex. As for blends, “If you’re looking for something with more body and you’re wanting the coffee to showcase a little bit more of that blend traditional flavor profile, using a drip pot or doing a French press is really good with blends,” he advises.

Single-origin costs a bit more than blends

During the pandemic, Verve saw an increase in online sales, with single-origins outpacing blends – Brooks thinks more at-home brewers are curious about specialty coffees. Single-origins tend to cost more than blends, but customers are willing to pay the higher price points.

“I think that people should drink the coffee that they can afford. Things are rough and there are folks who love to drink several cups of coffee throughout the day. I say just buy the best coffee that you can buy,” says Clemons.

For novice single-origin drinkers, Brooks recommends they start with mild Latin America coffees from Costa Rica and Colombia. “They tend to be inherently sweet and really approachable,” he says. “As you progress, you can get into some of the more exotic profiles, getting into Africa, especially East Africa.”

Whether you buy single-origin or a blend, here’s why you should always look into where your coffee is sourced

As both Brooks and Clemons stated, the most important part of buying any coffee is the ethical practices of the company. “I would love it if people drank more coffee that is sourced ethically from roasters who practice direct trade, safe and equitable work environments for employees, and who bring us tasty coffees,” Clemons said. “There is a need for wage transparency, racial equity, access and so much more in the industry as a whole.”

Brooks echoes similar thoughts. “Whenever you’re really looking to buy coffee, you’re really looking at the underlying missions and values of the people who are buying the coffee and the coffee that you’re drinking,” he says.

“If there’s a coffee company that’s buying really amazing blends and they’re paying their farmers really well, and they’re making a blend and that’s your approach, I think as long as you’re buying the coffee you know is supporting the long-term sustainability of the coffee industry as a whole, then you’re doing your part. If some coffee companies are really doing that just through their single-origins, then I think you should buy single-origins. But if they’re doing it through their entire buying philosophy, with their blends through their single-origins, I think it’s perfectly fine to buy from either side.”

The bottom line: Give new coffees a chance

Changing one’s coffee palate takes time, and a big part of that is education. “I think a lot of people are like, ‘This is weird. I’m out. I’ll just go back to whatever I was doing before,’” Brooks says. “I think once you start understanding it, you start to appreciate it because you realise this is intentional. This doesn’t just taste this way by accident – they’ve actually done something to make it taste this way, and that’s really cool. I think that once people start taking the time to learn about the coffee – the processes and the growing – and they learn about how complex it can be, they start to appreciate it.”

We Tried 8 TikTok Beauty Trends To See If They Really Work

Posted on 19/08/2021 by Boris Clair

TikTok is littered with hair and makeup tutorials, ranging from the wacky to the “oh, this might actually be doable.” While some of them aim to solve common everyday problems (like a flat ponytail, for example), others are a little more out there (for instance, it’s a mystery why anyone would feel the need to draw fake freckles on their face, but that’s a viral tutorial nonetheless).

While no one should feel pressured to sport faux freckles or contour their face to look like a Kardashian, I wanted to see if these TikTok beauty hacks at least deliver on their claims. In that spirit, I tried eight viral TokTok beauty trends to see how they actually work.

1. DIY skin tint (or BB cream)

The concept behind this trend is mixing creams you already own to create a custom shade of skin tint. See an original TikTok video highlighting the trend here:

BB, which stands for “beauty balm,” is meant to be a lightweight base, so mixing your foundation with other products (primers, SPF and more) makes sense. You’ll note that in the original video above, the creator added sunscreen – but be warned that mixing sunscreen with other products diminishes the SPF factor and offers less protection. For this DIY product to work, you have to ensure your foundation and primer have the same base ingredients – for example, if one has a silicone base, the other should too; otherwise the product will roll right off your face.

Did it work?

It did! It feels like the perfect base for summer. I found it was a little tricky applying with a brush, but it was smooth and easy when using fingers. It’s like “your skin but better.” Plus, it’s great that you can customise how much glow or moisturizer you want to add.

Here’s a video of my experiment:

2. High ponytail for long hair

This popular tutorial creates a ponytail that sits up super high and is extra voluminous. It’s done by twisting the hair tie around the bottom part of the ponytail twice. It sounds like it won’t make much difference to the height of a ponytail, but as someone with long and heavy hair, I’m willing to try anything. See an original TikTok tutorial here:

Did it work?

Not only did it work, but it was also extremely easy! And it doesn’t feel like a ponytail that’ll give you a headache. Here’s a video of my experience:

3. A makeup routine that claims to be sweat-proof

If you prep your skin and apply your base makeup products the way this tutorial suggests, it claims to be absolutely sweat-proof. This was inspired by the way drag queens do their makeup, as are many great discoveries in the beauty world. It goes like this: moisturiser, translucent powder, setting spray, makeup primer and foundation. Here’s an original TikTok tutorial:

I originally tried this trick in March 2020 and found it to be a little cake-y for my dry skin, but I was willing to give it another go.

Did it work?

Initially, yes. The base looked very good upon application. But after a while it started pilling (balling up) around my neck. I think it’s one too many layers for me, but I’d still try it again being more careful around my neck area.

Here’s a video of my experiment:

4. The scrunched-up tissue eye look

When I first saw this look, I thought there’d be no way it could actually look good. You take a tissue, wad it up, dip it in random colours of eyeshadow, and dab it on your eyelids to create an artistic, almost tie-dyed look. Here’s an original tutorial from TikTok:

Did it work?

I loved this! Who says you need expensive brushes to create something fun? All you need is a colourful makeup palette and some tissue. Sure, it looks a little messy, but it’s a fun and colourful look I’d gladly wear again. I think brighter colours work best for this beauty trend.

What I used: The NikkieTutorials x Beauty Bay palette. Here’s my take:

5. A quick way to fuller lips

Overlining lips isn’t new, though it grew in popularity thanks to Kylie Jenner. Not everyone loves the overlined look – it can look like too much (it can also look like you have a thin moustache), but this tutorial promises it’s not only easy but very quick, too. Huda Kattan of Huda Beauty recreated it, and she’s also a fan.

Essentially, you purse your lips together very tightly and apply the lipliner around and inside the lips. In essence, because the lips are stretched out, you get a more even overline more quickly. Check it out:

All you need is your lip pencil and a liquid lipstick or lipstick of choice. I tried it with red, as I was feeling adventurous.

Did it work?

I suppose so, but it’s a lot more overlined than I’m used to so it looked weird at first! It was quick and easy, though. I prefer not drawing over my cupid’s bow, and once I cleaned up that part, I liked it a lot more. I used the MAC lip pencil in Cherry and Colourpop Ultra Matte Lip in Creeper. Here’s my video:

6. 10-second contour

All you need is a stick bronzer, your foundation and 10 seconds to the perfect contour. Sound too easy? That’s what I thought, too. You simply contour over the lips, under the cheekbones and chin, and on the forehead, add your foundation on the rest of the face and blend in, like this:

Did it work?

Surprisingly, yes. It was easy and quick and blended in really nicely ― I will certainly use that hack again.

Here’s my take:

7. Using a burnt almond as eyeliner

I couldn’t believe that burning an almond could actually be used as a smoky eye liner/shadow, but apparently it works. I obviously had to try it out, as it seems like an easy and affordable way to do your eye makeup. You just take an almond, burn the tip a little bit, wait for it to cool down (this step is important!) and apply it like you would your shadow when doing a cat-eye. Watch this:

Did it work?

Somewhat so! It was a lot harder to get color out of the almond. Also, let me advise you again to wait until the almond isn’t burning hot! It’s more of a soft smoked outline and though it was a fun challenge, I think I’ll stick to my black eyeshadow and liner for future looks. Here’s my take:

8. Easy and natural-looking freckles

TikTok is full of faux freckle videos, most including fake tanning mousse, which are intimidating and can easily go wrong. However, this tutorial uses Maybelline Brow Tattoo, which is meant for your face ― so I was hoping the colour whould be more natural-looking. Here’s what it claims to do:

To be on the safe side, I picked a color lighter than my hair —colour Medium Brown — and applied it across my nose and cheeks.

Did it work?

It worked so well! It created a very natural-looking result ― I went over my natural nose freckles and did some more over my cheeks. I think leaving it on for two hours wasn’t necessary, but the product’s instructions recommend that for the colour to last three days. I will try it again, for sure. Here’s my attempt:

The Most Meaningless, Unhelpful Feedback People Get At Work

Posted on 18/08/2021 by Boris Clair

Getting good feedback is necessary for anyone to grow their career. But too many of us end up receiving unhelpful advice that doesn’t mean anything useful.

Phoebe Gavin, a career coach who specialises in supporting early and mid-career professionals, said she often sees bad feedback fall into two categories: empty praise and vague criticism.

These types of feedback are unhelpful, she said, because what people really want is “to be able identify something specific that they can do that they should either keep doing because it’s working, or something they should adjust because it’s not working.”

Unfortunately, bad feedback is common, and it can even start to infect your own language at work. Here are types of feedback you should rethink.

1. “Great job.”

Popular but vague words of encouragement like this are not actually helpful, because they aren’t tied to a specific outcome related to the role or the organisation. The person hearing it doesn’t “know why they did a great job, what exactly they did a great job at. They don’t know how their great job has an impact. It’s just not very useful,” Gavin said.

It doesn’t encourage anyone to keep up the good work, either.

“The problem with this type of feedback ― although it feels great to receive it ― is that it is not reinforcing any behaviours. In order to turn meaningless feedback into something that will encourage employees to continue to perform, the feedback must be very specific,” said Angela Karachristos, a career coach who has worked in human resources.

“Instead of saying, ‘good job,’ the manager should say give a specific example of what the person did well so that those positive behaviours can be repeated,” she said.

Often, giving too much unhelpful praise is a people-pleasing mistake that first-time managers make as a way to make up for negative experiences they personally had on a team. “A lot of managers over-correct and really lay on the praise, and not give the kind of support through constructive criticism that actually helps people grow,” Gavin said.

2. “I don’t like that.”

Bad criticism stops with what someone did wrong, while good criticism gives them a clear path of what needs to happen differently and how they can do it better next time.

“If you just tell someone, ‘Hey, you missed that deadline, that caused problems,’ sure, that might be valid, but it doesn’t give space to improve with whatever context that person is working in,” Gavin said. “It doesn’t create a conversation where the problem can be solved.”

Gavin said subjective, vague feedback such as, “I don’t like that,” “That doesn’t work for me,” or “I’ve never heard that before” stems from someone reaching into “their own subjective experience and not bringing any other external factors in.”

A better method is to be specific about what’s going wrong, or to have the humility to note that the feedback is just an opinion. It’s the difference between “‘Those colours seem very jarring to me, that’s just how they look to my eye,’ versus ‘I don’t like that, I don’t like that design,’” Gavin said.

3. “You need to work on your attitude.”

In her book Radical Candor: Be a Kick-Ass Boss Without Losing Your Humanity, management expert Kim Scott writes that a lot of bad work criticism falls into the trap of highlighting personal traits rather than having external causes of a problem acknowledged.

“It’s easier to say, ‘You’re sloppy’ than to say ‘You’ve been working nights and weekends, and it’s starting to take a toll on your ability to catch mistakes in your logic.’ But it’s also far less helpful,” Scott writes, noting that better criticism makes it clear that a work problem is not “due to some unfixable personality flaw,” and can be used as a tool for improvement.

Karachristos said that a common example of this kind of personal criticism is “You need to work on your attitude.” “Any type of feedback that is focused on the person or that person’s personality, and not the work, can be very problematic,” she said.

At worst, when job performance feedback is tied to a person’s identity, it can be used to hold their career back. Women of colour, in particular, are given subjective labels like “difficult,” “angry” or “challenging” in performance reviews – words that signal they are not a “fit” in a workplace or don’t “fit” a manager’s homogenous idea of success.

Nadia De Ala, founder of Real You Leadership, a group coaching program for women of color, said her clients deal with feedback – often unsolicited – about their natural tone of voice and how they dress, rather than about actual points of improvement on their work.

One client asked a co-worker for help with compiling marketing research for a promotion and was told, “You’re not going to get promoted if your voice goes up at the end of sentences. You don’t sound confident.”

“This type of feedback was unhelpful because it was unsolicited advice and had nothing to do with market research,” De Ala said.

It speaks to how feedback is not just words: It can make or break an employee’s experience and even push them to leave. Gallup research found that when a boss’ feedback makes employees feel demotivated, disappointed or depressed, four out of five of those employees start to job-hunt.

Sometimes, the feedback can be right, but still be wrong because of how the message is delivered.

If you’re in a position to give feedback, recognise that not everyone likes to hear it the same way.

“You have to be sensitive to where you do it. You might feel like it’s great to publicly recognise the person, but some people hate that. It makes them feel embarrassed,” Karachristos said.

Karachristos said it’s also a mistake for peers and managers to publicly criticise a group when they really intend that message for one person.

“That person will never get the message, and then my whole team is going to get annoyed that I’m down on the whole group, or not necessarily respect me as a team leader or colleague because I’m not brave enough to address the problem,” Karachristos said.

What Is The J-Lo Effect And How Can You Channel It?

Posted on 17/08/2021 by Boris Clair

You’re defying age and almost every other human standard? Congrats, you’ve unlocked the J-Lo effect. You’ve set the bar higher for everyone else? J-Lo effect once again. You’re dating a man whose hotness has now multiplied because of you? Ding-ding-ding, J-Lo effect.

Jennifer Lopez has done it all. Whether it’s frolicking under the Capri sun with her former flame Ben Affleck, showing off what the new 52 looks like, or just being a total badass at work, J-Lo is killing it.

The New York Times recently published an article marvelling at J-Lo’s professional and personal achievements, dubbing it the J-Lo Effect. The multi-hyphenate’s accomplishments include managing to secure $12 million (£8.6 million) to replace Simon Cowell on American Idol, plus booking a Las Vegas residency and the Super Bowl halftime show at 50.

Though she’s had her fair share of flops too, J-Lo has been able to do something other celebrities with a 30-year career have not: stayed relevant.

And her allure has been long recognised. The term J-Lo effect was first popularised in 2012 after Lopez’s American Idol success, setting off a string of other talent show judges asking for more pay.

A new context has also been added to the phrase – the desirability of Ben Affleck as a result of their pairing. By virtue of being with with her, Affleck is considered more desirable, or so the theory goes.

On Urban Dictionary, the J-Lo effect has a different meaning altogether – describing it as wearing tight trousers to make one’s butt look bigger.

To get more of an idea of this diverse concept, we spoke to Dr Hannah Hamad, a media and communication lecturer at Cardiff University, to ask what she understands the phrase to mean.

“The J-Lo effect is a phrase that has entered pop culture parlance and the celebrity gossip lexicon to refer to a phenomenon whereby the perceived sexual desirability of a man increases when he successfully couples with a woman who commentators and observers understand to exist in celebrity culture with higher levels of social, cultural and industry capital than him,” Dr Hamad explains. “In other words, she is ‘hotter’ than him, and she is ‘out of his league’.

“However, his levels of capital increase as a result of his association with her via their romantic or sexual relationship.”

Another connotation of the phrase is how Lopez bucks the trend for female celebrities being lambasted for ageing.

“In experiencing the levels of cultural cachet and industry power that she is at this time of her life (her 50s), she is bucking cultural and industry trends that have seen female stars criticised in the media for ageing appropriately – see for example the scorn that was heaped upon Renee Zellweger and the scrutiny to which she was subjected as a result of a noticeable change to her facial appearance in 2014,” Dr Hamad says. “Equally, we saw this in the ‘tragic spinster’ discourse that has attached itself to celebrity gossip media’s coverage of Jennifer Aniston in the post-Friends decades.”

She adds: “Lopez is not only escaping what previously appeared to be the inevitability of these cultural scripts of ‘bad ageing’ that attach themselves to female stars as they enter the mid-life decades, but is rather successfully channelling renewed confidence, energy and vitality into her celebrity career both on screen [her central figure in Hustlers is a glorious example of this] and beyond, as we see in the noteworthy levels of positive interest being taken in her reunion with Affleck.”

The rest of us might not have her fame and fortune, but we can certainly channel J-Lo’s big, baddie energy.

Life coach Kiran Singh says it’s more a state of mind. “Confidence is a daily practice. You need to connect with yourself and call out the limiting thoughts every single day,” she tells HuffPost UK. “You need to get yourself to a point where you become your own best friend, your own coach and your own cheerleader. Where you know how to talk yourself through moments of doubt and pump yourself up to take action.”

Singh believes confidence is a “by-product of action”, so you need to develop your own hype routine to pump yourself up to take action.

“Learn to love and validate yourself so that the opinions of others are irrelevant,” she says. “You do this by getting to know yourself and what you like about yourself and living in alignment with that and by overcoming the limiting stories that you are not enough through reprogramming your mindset.”

And lastly, remember “confidence is an ever-evolving journey, and the development of it is one that you will be on forever”. So if you’re not Jenny from the yacht just yet, there’s still time.

How To Survive Your First Holiday Together As A Couple

Posted on 17/08/2021 by Boris Clair

You are reading Anywhere But Here, our summer-long series on travel at home and abroad, serving up the information and inspiration you need.

After the 18 months we’ve had, many of us are aching for a holiday, but you might be a little hesitant about enjoying a staycation or jetting abroad with a new partner.

There are so many things to consider when you’re going on holiday with a partner for the first time. Will you argue? Will you want to do the same activities? Will their snoring be unbearable? It’s perhaps no wonder that almost a quarter (23%) of couples feel more nervous than excited about their first trip together.

A third (33%) of Brits are most nervous about using the toilet in close confines with their partner, not having any time to themselves (27%) and having their partner see how they look first thing in the morning (28%).

In the new survey by Hotels.com, 62% of Brits also said going on holiday with their significant other is a “make or break” situation. Talk about pressure.

Many see holidays as a time for indulgence, which is why 34% of Brits said the most annoying thing their partner can do on holiday is being tight with their money. Meanwhile 31% of Brits said making the hotel messy would be their biggest pet peeve and 25% said they wouldn’t want their partner to wake up late and miss the hotel buffet.

So, how do you have a successful first break? Keeping the room tidy and being open to new activities and ideas will help, as will pushing your toilet worries to one side (remember: everyone poops!) Dating coach and relationship expert Hayley Quinn also shares these tips:

Great Expectations

“Big expectations can often lead to disappointment. After a year of being cooped up, for a lot of couples, summer 2021 represents their first opportunity to go on holiday: this can create a lot of pressure for everything to go perfectly. Remember things invariably never go exactly to plan, so don’t sweat if you don’t bag the best hotel sun loungers on the first morning! Enjoy being in the moment instead.”

There’s no time like the present

“Get off the grid! And yes, that means the Instagram grid too. A holiday is a great excuse to switch off, and you may find you connect better with your partner if you factor in a few phone-free days. Get off the gram, switch on your out of the office and get yourself to the hotel bar. Doing novel activities will also help you to be more present with your partner.”

Try a mini break first

“Before committing to that two-week summer vacation, road test how your relationship works abroad by going on a mini-break. A low-pressure shorter hotel staycation will help you to iron out any potential differences before you commit to a longer haul destination.”

Money, money, money

“It may not sound sexy, but budgeting is an important part of any long-term relationship. As your lives and finances become more intertwined, it’s important that you’re on the same page with your attitude to money. As a general rule of thumb, the budget for your holiday should be affordable to the lower-income partner.”

Communication is key

“A first holiday together signals a gear shift in your relationship where perhaps things are becoming a little more serious. It may also throw up some points of incompatibility. If you’re seeing this person as a long-term partner these are actually all good conversations to have. Remember it’s not about having everything in common, to begin with; it’s about your ability to communicate and resolve any conflicts that really make the difference.”

Travel is the story of our summer. The rules (and traffic lights) are always changing, but one thing’s clear, we dream of being Anywhere But Here. This seasonal series offers you clear-headed travel advice, ideas-packed staycation guides, clever swaps and hacks, and a healthy dose of wanderlust.