Why Are We Scared Of Single Women?
Betwixt The Sheets: The History of Sex, Scandal & Society
History Hit
4.8 • 2.1K Ratings
🗓️ 23 September 2025
⏱️ 46 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Where did the idea of the bunny boiler come from?
In this episode we're exploring how single women got such a bad rap in popular culture. From Miss Havisham to Bridget Jones, Caroline Young joins Kate once again.
Caroline is the author of 'Single and Psycho: How Pop Culture Created the Unstable Single Woman'.
This episode was edited by Tom Delargy and produced by Sophie Gee. The senior producer was Charlotte Long.
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All music from Epidemic Sounds.
Betwixt the Sheets: History of Sex, Scandal & Society is a History Hit podcast.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Thanks for listening to Betwixt the Sheets. |
| 0:02.1 | To get all History Hit podcasts, |
| 0:04.1 | ad-free, early access and bonus episodes, |
| 0:07.6 | head over to historyhit.com forward slash subscribe. |
| 0:11.3 | Or you can sign up on Apple Podcasts with just one click. |
| 0:18.1 | Hello you. |
| 0:19.5 | It's Glow Time on Magic Radio. |
| 0:23.6 | Join me, Gokwan, at breakfast. |
| 0:26.4 | With me, Harriet Scott. |
| 0:28.2 | We're on Magic Radio with Nikki Chapman, Gabby Roslyn and me, Mel Gedroach. |
| 0:33.3 | And what a team we are. |
| 0:37.0 | We're all on Magic Radio, playing the best variety from the 80s to now. |
| 0:43.0 | It's Glow Time on Magic Radio. |
| 0:49.2 | Hello, my lovely betwixters. It's me, Kade Lister. You are listening to Bertwester sheets, and we do like to get a bit mucky around here. So if you're a newbie, this one's for you. This is an adult podcast, spoken by adults, to other adults about adulty things and an adulty way covering a range adult subjects and you should be an adult too. Right, fair do, do you've warned you on with the show. |
| 1:11.8 | As a single woman, I have to say I do thoroughly enjoy myself. |
| 1:17.1 | Honestly, it's great. |
| 1:19.4 | But growing up, I didn't have any role models around me to tell me that. |
| 1:24.8 | When you think about the TV shows and the films of the 80s and 90s and even |
| 1:29.5 | into the 2000s, you'd be forgiven for thinking single women were all, what was it, Bridget |
| 1:34.3 | Jones said, covered in scales. Whether we were watching friends or sex in the city or single |
| 1:41.0 | white female or even Miss Havisham running around her house going completely back crap crazy. |
| 1:46.4 | The message was everywhere. |
... |
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