The Spill: Live at PodClub for a very special evening with Louise McSharry and Emilie Pine

Have you ever had one of those days that screamed for a wine and chats sesh with your girlfriends? Enter Image.ie’s podcast, The Spill. 

The Spill is hosted by our very own self-proclaimed agony aunts Sophie White and Rhona McAuliffe. With a mix of discussion on current affairs, arts and culture and some healthy advice to our listeners, it’s the best place to unwind and deliberate the issues affecting Irish women today.

Lovers of The Spill had a real treat this week when they got the chance to see the podcast live and in person. Sophie and Rhona were front and centre in Luna restaurant in Dublin, as they chatted to bestselling author and professor Emilie Pine and broadcaster and author Louise McSharry about the trials and tribulations of being a modern woman.

The live recording, which was fittingly called ‘Earthly Bodies’, saw an hour-long discussion between our hosts and their guests; giving a sometimes emotional, often funny and completely honest portrayal of, as Sophie calls it, the “bullshit” it is to be a woman sometimes. All of the women on the panel have dealt with body issues, from Emilie Pine’s anorexia to Louise McSharry’s struggles with fat-shaming. As women we tend to have real problems with self-policing and putting intense pressure on ourselves (and, unfortunately, other women) to fit into society’s perceptions of beauty, and all of our panel voiced their various experiences of this in recent years.

As well as body issues, there are plenty of other difficult situations that women find themselves in simply because of their gender; namely, safety and bodily autonomy. Each and every woman on the panel had been sexually assaulted on public transport. They each spoke movingly about their experiences and, judging from the sounds of agreement from our audience of women, it seems to be a worryingly common occurrence. But what is really worrying, as our panel says, is the complete non action of the general public around them as this took place. When will we start appreciating a woman’s right to be safe and secure, regardless of how she looks?

Candid, eye-opening and unapologetically feminist – this week’s special edition of The Spill is live now.