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Seriously...

Wokewash - Episode 1

Seriously...

BBC

Society & Culture, Documentary

4.1885 Ratings

🗓️ 29 March 2024

⏱️ 30 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Following on from the success of Green Inc and with the same bold, provocative and entirely un-switchoffable energy, writer, comedian and satirist Heydon Prowse turns his tongue-in-cheek attention corporate Wokewashing.

From a razor company talking about #MeToo to an LGBT sandwich and a burger chain tackling depression, writer and satirist Heydon Prowse unpacks how some of the world's biggest corporations are falling over themselves to appear socially conscious, progressive. And he lifts the lid on the advertising and PR companies who've woken up to just how much money they can make helping them.

In this first episode, Pride Before a Fall?, Heydon investigates corporations’ approach to LGBTQ+ inclusivity. He’ll trace the history from brands’ first engagements with gay customers to the situation today, where Pride month sees the high street and social media festooned with corporate rainbow flags. Heydon will ask how many companies live up to this inclusive message in actions. This episode will also take a look at the backlash to brand engagement with LGBTQ+ issues that has been seen in the UK and the USA as the corporate world is drawn into the culture wars. It’s led to boycotts and hasty backpedalling, but what’s really going on, and why?

To listen to the rest of the series, just search for Wokewash on BBC Sounds.

Contributors: Peter Tatchell, Activist and Director of the Peter Tatchell Foundation Prof Alison Taylor of New York University's Stern Business School and author of 'Higher Ground: How Businesses Can Do the Right Thing in a Turbulent World.' Rain Dove, Model and Actvist Andrew Doyle, Comedian, GB News Presenter and author of The New Puritans: How the Religion of Social Justice Captured the Western World.

Producer: Sam Peach

Archive Credited To:

John Sloman (Youtube) Dove US (Youtube) raindovemodel (instagram) dylanmulvaney (instagram) Make Yourself At Home Podcast by Nines Ben Shapiro (Youtube) CNN WKMG News Kid Rock (X)

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

This was an impregnable fortress. The only way you get out was in a wooden box.

0:05.0

The controversial maximum security prison impossible to escape from.

0:09.0

And one of the duties of a political prisoner is the escape.

0:12.0

The IRA inmates who found a way. of a political prisoner is the escape.

0:12.5

The IRA inmates who found a way.

0:14.5

I'm Carlo Gableer and I'll be navigating a path

0:19.5

through the disturbing inside story of the biggest jailbreak in British and Irish history.

0:25.0

The narrative that they want is that this is a big achievement by them.

0:28.5

Escape from the maze, listen first on BBC Sounds.

0:35.0

BBC Sounds.

0:36.0

BBC Sounds, Music Radio Podcasts.

0:39.0

Hello and welcome to Seriously from BBC Radio 4. I'm Hayden Prowels a comedian and journalist

0:45.3

and you're about to hear the first episode of my Radio 4 series Woke Wash where I ask

0:49.9

why have big corporations suddenly become so progressive and do they really care?

0:55.2

In the episode you're about to hear, I look into LGBTQ plus equality and the Rainbow Flag

0:59.8

Fest that is corporate pride. To hear the rest of the series just search for Woke Wash on BBC

1:04.9

Sounds.

1:08.1

The World Economic Forum in Davos has just concluded. I went once to try and troll politicians for a TV show. It's a surreal

1:14.7

event. Billionaires fly in on their private jets to discuss equality. Huge billboards

1:19.7

advertise the humanitarian deeds of Saudi Arabian crown prince Mohammed bin Salman.

1:24.4

You can enjoy a complimentary glass of Verve Klico in the Equality lounge with an executive

1:29.0

from a tax-avoiding multinational, a retired war criminal and Lord Voldemort.

...

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