Beyoncé the billionaire, Adults regressing at Christmas, Girls' political confidence

Woman's Hour

BBC

Society & Culture

4.2 • 2.9K Ratings

🗓️ 30 December 2025

⏱️ 57 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Beyoncé has been declared a billionaire by Forbes, making her the fifth musician to join its list of the world's wealthiest people with 10 figure fortunes, including Taylor Swift, Rihanna, Bruce Springsteen and Beyoncé's husband Jay Z. Clare McDonnell speaks to Jacqueline Springer, music journalist and Curator of Africa & Diaspora: Performance at the Victoria & Albert museum, about what makes Beyoncé such a successful businesswoman, and the challenges along the way.

Why can adults seem to regress to childhood or teenage behaviours at Christmas? We discuss family dynamics and the kinds of behaviour that can re-surface with everyone under the same roof again. Guardian columnist Elle Hunt shares her own experience alongside Woman's Hour listeners, and Psychotherapist Julia Samuel offers advice.

Madelaine Thomas works as a professional dominatrix. When her own images were shared online without her consent, she decide to develop a tool that could allow images to be tracked, and abusers identified. Image Angel was the result, offering forensic image protection for platforms, and she's now trying to get businesses in the adult entertainment industry on board.

Do we need to re-think our attitudes to ageing, as we age? As we approach 2026, we consider how to shed a negative attitude towards ageing, and embrace growing older and wiser, by revisiting an episode of the Woman’s Hour Guide to Life: How to make ageing your superpower. Therapist Emma Kirkby-Geddes shares how she’s been struggling to accept the passage of time. Gerontologist Dr Kerry Burnight, and Jacqueline Hooton, a personal trainer and ‘ageing well’ coach, offer advice.

Research tells us that girls tend to disengage from politics before the age of 16, just as boys seem to grow in confidence. Academics at Roehampton University have looked into this and have created a programme aimed at Year 9 students, in an attempt to re-engage teenage girls in issues that matter to them and boost their confidence to speak politically. Professor Bryony Hoskins has created G-EPIC (Gender Empowerment through Politics in the Classroom) and Rachel Burlton is a teacher at Mulberry School for Girls in London who has been teaching the programme.

Presenter: Clare McDonnell Producer: Helen Fitzhenry

Transcript

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0:00.0	BBC Sounds, music, radio, podcasts.
0:07.5	It's like going into an ice path with your hands as the ice.
0:10.8	In 2025, we were here for the entertainment.
0:13.8	Ellis and John.
0:14.9	Have you not considered just coffee, which is what I do?
0:17.6	Sightracked with Annie and Nick.
0:19.4	Stevie Wonder, welcome. I'm pleasure. Loyal Carnar is with us. We want to hearract with Annie and Nick. Stevie Wonder, welcome.
0:21.4	My pleasure. Loyal Carnery is with us. Want to hear all about Glastonbury. And Celebrity Traitors Uncloaked. Welcome to Uncloaked, Ireland. Oh, thanks for having me, Ed. The winner. I know, still hasn't sunk in. Get the best of 2025 with podcasts on BBC Sounds.
0:42.1	Hello, this is Claire Macdonnell and you're listening to The Woman's Hour podcast.
0:53.8	Hello and welcome to Woman's Hour. Great to have your company this morning. Today, we'll hear from one woman who decided to protect herself after intimate images were shared online.
0:56.0	She's Madeline Thomas. She works as a professional dominatrix, but when her own images were shared without her consent, she developed a tool
1:01.7	that can track anyone who misuses or shares them online. Madeline will join me in the studio.
1:09.1	Now that we're out the other side of Christmas, how were things if you went
1:13.0	home as an adult or if you welcomed your adult children home? Was it happy families? Or did you or
1:19.8	they return to those family dynamics of childhood and teenage years? If you did, don't worry,
1:26.8	you're not alone. Regression is a very common thing,
1:29.9	and we have experts on hand this morning to help you spot the signs and avoid falling into the
1:35.3	same old behaviour traps in the future. So tell me this morning about your Christmas family dynamics
1:42.3	that you caught yourself or your adult children doing.
1:46.9	Did you pile that washing up up in the sink knowing that someone else would eventually do it?
1:53.0	Or could you just not stop yourself from interfering slash directing the dinner prep at your adult child's home?
2:01.2	You can text the program.
	...

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