Malala Yousafzai: Should I get married? How to fall in love as a feminist
Happy Place
Fearne Cotton
4.6 • 15.2K Ratings
🗓️ 10 November 2025
⏱️ 61 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Malala Yousafzai was shot by Taliban gunmen when she was 15. She then became the youngest ever recipient of the Novel Peace Prize, but since then she’s been desperate to discover who she really is underneath the weight of the world’s expectations.
In this chat with Fearne, Malala explains why skipping classes, smoking weed, and chasing bad boys have all played a part in finding herself, and why her own self-discovery has made her more passionate than ever about women having choices around education, work, and marriage.
Malala talks through how she dealt with her own PTSD, and reframes what it means to be brave. She also explains the current situation for women and girls in Afghanistan, something that’s being called a ‘gender apartheid’, as well how we can all direct our anger in a positive way to help girls across the world.
Malala’s memoir, Finding My Way, is out now.
Support women and girls through Malala Fund.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hello, I'm Fern Cotton and this is Happy Place, the show that encourages a sense of rebellion that helps you find yourself. |
| 0:08.6 | Today I'm chatting to Malala Yusuf Sai. |
| 0:11.3 | Somebody took this photo of me and that photo went viral and there was a whole backlash and controversy saying shame on Malala for wearing jeans. |
| 0:20.2 | And I just could not understand what was |
| 0:22.5 | happening. At college, I just wanted to have the choice to be able to wear the clothes that I |
| 0:27.2 | preferred. And I also saw that there were some people who were criticizing me for wearing a headscarf |
| 0:31.8 | because they thought that I was not fully free if I was still following my culture and my tradition. |
| 0:37.1 | And I disagreed with all of those |
| 0:38.7 | opinions because everybody was trying to control the way I dressed. But the message that we are |
| 0:44.2 | promoting, those of us who are talking about women's freedom and liberty, is that women should |
| 0:48.8 | be able to make these choices for themselves. Anyone else feel like that full moon that we've |
| 0:54.0 | been experiencing has just totally |
| 0:55.6 | rock their world? I know that might sound to some of you, maybe not all of you, wacky, but this |
| 1:02.2 | week I have felt so exhausted and so discombobulated. And like, you know, when you just have a |
| 1:07.5 | clumsy week, I mean, it could also be hormones, couldn't it, guys? Or just that I'm bloody knackered. I managed to smash two glasses in one morning. I trapped my |
| 1:16.6 | finger in the fridge and I've got a massive sort of blood blister on my finger because of it. |
| 1:20.5 | And generally just sort of like forgetting everything. I'm just having one of those weeks, |
| 1:24.4 | like just off, off-kilter weeks. weeks are you with me and I did a little |
| 1:30.3 | Instagram post about this but when I feel like this like just totally spun out my natural |
| 1:35.1 | inclination is to stay really busy because I'll just sort of distract myself from feeling like a |
| 1:41.4 | massive hot mess but what I've tried to do this week is go against the grain and slow down and at |
| 1:47.3 | time stop for a minute just to sit in it. |
... |
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