Under the Influence with Jo PiazzaAs women’s rights are eroding in the United States, our Women’s Day Off (the Internet) is becoming increasingly necessary. While we plan it, we take one more look at Iceland as a model for how to build a better society for everyone and particularly for women. Luckily we don’t have to go too far back this time. We can look at the women who are there right now–specifically Iceland’s first lady, Eliza Reid. In her book, Secrets of the Sprakkar, she tells the stories of extraordinary Icelandic women to illustrate how the country became a leader in gender equality. Jo and Eliza sat down together to talk about the book and how being a mom in Iceland is just different than in the US. With paid paternity leave, less guilt, less judgment, and a strong sense of sisterhood, there’s so much we can learn from Eliza and her country.
Hi, miss you all. I wish that I could say the world has gotten better for women since we did our last episode of last season, that we no longer need to bust our asses, to have freedom over our own bodies, or to feed our children. But unfortunately, my friends, that is not the case. Bombshell, the Supreme Court poised to strike down Row Versus way after I saw the news week. By the time this episode airs, we may see a complete erosion of women's autonomy over their own bodies by the Supreme Court of the United States of America. But we do begin with New York City declaring a state of emergency over the nationwide baby formula short and of course, just when the government is forcing women to quite possibly have children they cannot afford, we are also seeing a massive shortage of formula that is mainly caused by the draconian laws governing how formula is manufactured and distributed in this country, laws that were mainly created by men. I want to give a couple of shout outs to influencers who are seriously fighting the good fight. Yeah, I'm talking about formula influencers right now. It is a whole subset of mom influencer that promotes formula feeding and feeding your baby. However, you need to feed your baby, and it is something that I did not think about until the formula shortage happened, But formula influencers are a real thing you're gonna want to follow at the formula mom um. What would be your advice for that mom so that, hey, what do I do if I'm expecting a baby and with the shortage kind of looming in the future. Yeah, So, first and foremost, I don't recommend if you're expecting that you try to create a stockpile number one, because we don't want to further pressure on the market for babies that are already here and need it. In number two, you don't want to end up with a big stock of formula and then maybe your baby doesn't take to it well or they have a reaction, and then you have a bunch that you can't use. So I recommend having at least a week's worth. And right now they've been speaking out and up during this formula shortage crisis about the need to feed our babies, however we can do that, and how the government needs to support mothers women all over the country and all over the world are taking to the streets and social media to protest everything that continues to be wrong with how we treat women. It is inspiring because seeing action being taken makes me feel just a little bit better about the state of the world, which is why we're still planning to take our own form of action. So big news here, We're still going to have our Women's Day off the Internet to try to realize and show all of the power that women have on the Internet and in the real world. And that is the reason that we're actually bringing you this bonus episode today. This episode actually isn't about the issues from the last few weeks, but it is going to give us some context for how we might build a better world. If you remember, way back in the beginning of the last season, we introduced you all to the women of Iceland, Yes, and how in n four they had a Women's Day off that completely totally fucking inspired that entire country to see women in a different light, to actually value women. Crazy fucking idea, right. I recently got to meet and interview the first Lady of Iceland, Eliza gene Read. She is the author of the brand new book Secrets of the Spracker Iceland's extraordinary women and how they are changing the world, which I picked up recently on a visit to Fargo, North Dakota. True story. I was in Fargo, North Dakota, and I loved it. Eliza and I got to chat about what makes Iceland the greatest country in the world for women and what America needs to do to catch up, and of course, of course, because this show is under the influence, we also got to talking about what social media and the world of influencing has to do with all of that. I'm gonna finish this lozenge. Tell me, are we recording now like for the thing? Oh we are? We are? Yeah, laws and jowey. Eliza read first Lady of Iceland is the kind of woman who will just tell you she's chomping away on a cough drop, which made me love her from the very start of this conversation. I just scarfed down a whole bowl of macaroni and cheese in three minutes, So yes, right, It's possible on this book tour that I had Cheetos for breakfast one day. I'm just no judgment, I swear to God. We eventually did talk about gender and power and women's history and agency and very important things. So I picked up your book Secrets of This brack Are on a whim because we've been talking about Iceland this season so much and Iceland's wonderful gender equity, and this is a book literally entitled Iceland's Extraordinary Women and how they are Changing the World. And you are are the first Lady of Iceland, so you have a you have a great perspective on this, but also not a native Icelander. You're originally from Canada, right, That's right, yeah, yeah, And in a sense that gives me, I think an even better perspective for it, because I see things that are remarkable to my immigrants eyes that maybe if you were born and raised in the country, you wouldn't particularly take notice of, right exactly. So one of the things that Iceland does to support women that you think makes it possible for women to thrive in this country. I think one of the biggest things actually is that really as a society, we've kind of passed the tipping point of debating whether trying to achieve gender quality is something important and move to how we're going to achieve it. So we've kind of realized that working to achieve greater equitability like that isn't a zero sum game that is benefiting one group at the expense of another group. It's something that is elevating everyone. It's something that is giving us a higher quality of life for people of all genders. And so that's really helpful to us that we can kind of focus most of our energies on how to improve what we're already doing. So some of the things that the Icelandic government is doing, for example, are these systems of state provided parental leave. So it's a user or lose it system, which means that each parent is allocated a number of months of parental leave that's paid for by the state. So if you're self employed, you know, you still get the benefits, which obviously encourages fathers to be very involved with their children's upbreaking. And then there's heavily subsidized childcare and of an excellent quality, with even further subsidies if you have many children in the system of your single parent or something like that. And really that kind of infrastructure for families has been created that is is really really beneficial. But with the book, I'm also trying to just inspire people in their everyday live so that even if you happen to live somewhere that doesn't have some of these this more structured support, hopefully there are some ideas or inspiration there for how we can really live more equitable lives and and use our voices and elevate other people's voices too. Yeah, and that's one of the things that I wanted to talk to you about. One of the things we keep talking about this season is how much power I think women have on the Internet and content creation on the Internet and in technology in general, and how we don't always realize that we have that power. We don't see it. I think that that's a great point that you make about this power of of all types that we have, and I think a lot of it is about using our voices and not being afraid to use our voices. I think so often women have been socialized as we've grown to to minimize ourselves, to make ourselves smaller, not to disturb other people, not to bother other people, not to take up space. And I think what we need to do is take up space. We aren't using the space that we deserve in all kinds of areas of society, whether that is in public life, whether that is in corporate life or in the media. And I hope that this book kind of serves to inspire people a little bit to kind of see life with the gender equality glasses. But also speaking up for each other and making sure that we have a diversity of voices represented in various situations I think is really important and just following our own dreams. I mean, I I profile some women in the book, these spracker eyes, I call them, which is this old word for outstanding women who are for instance, a woman who is a shipping captain. She was the only woman who graduated in her school to captain a boat because that's what you wanted to do. Or a woman who runs this volunteer search and rescue organization, and and these are things that people do um even though they're in the minority, but just because that's something that they want to pursue. And I think that as women, we have to really do what we want to do and not let others tell us is it the right time? Are you sure you want to do this? What about your kids? What are your kids going to say when you choose to do this? And I think we really kind of I guess it to put it rather crudely in a sense, need to be a little bit more selfish, you know, need to also think of ourselves. I really couldn't agree more. I am about to have a surprise third baby, which is very exciting, which also happened in Fargo. I found your book in Fargo and I made a baby there, so really good things come out of Fargo, North Dakota. There, you have to say. And the first thing even my husband, my very feminist, wonderful husband, asked, is you know I want to start start teaching at university next year. And he said, well, you won't be able to do it. You're going to have a have a baby in December. And I'm like, no, We're going to figure out how to do it. This is what I want to do. And I don't think that I'm going to continue to write to two books that I'm writing and making these podcasts and teach at a goddamn university because I think that mothers have the power to do these things. We just need the support. And I just looked him, I looked at him very very squarely, and like I need the support, and that is you, That is you supporting me. Accomplishing these goals. I wonder how many people are asking your husband that question now that he's having another child. Nobody, absolutely nobody. He goes out and and announces his virility, and people are slapping a guy. What a dude what You're almost fifty slapping him on the back and still got it, you see, exactly, exactly, no question, no question about whether or not. And you've got to say, like this baby making now he's kind of done the crucial part for him. Yeah, and there's a whole lot more work involved for you still exactly, that's so much more work. So much so. You had four kids in about six years, right, um, which is making me feel amazing. Reading your story is making me feel amazing. But your house then took the paternity leave that was offered in your country. I would tell me a little bit about that. Yes, when our children were born, he was working at the university. I was working freelance. I took five months off when our son was born, and then he took four months off when I went back to work, and uh, and then we kind of puzzled it together somehow in between and then our son started in full time childcare when he was a year old, and and so that meant that, of course, my husband also knew his schedules and his naptimes and his favorite food and you know, the washing all the cloth diapers and and all of this sort of thing. He was he was really involved with that. And it also means because you know, I went back to work, as do most mothers in Iceland, there wasn't this feeling like are you ready to go back to work? Do you feel guilty about going back to work when your son is this age. There's a lot less of the sense of it's an either or sort of binary that you either have to, you know, focus on your career and be successful in your career, or you can be a really focused and and and mother. And I'm not saying that the you know it works all the time. You know, there's many weekends when I don't win Mom of the Year and you stretched the imagination, or there's certainly lots of projects and trips and events that I've said no to because I want to spend more time with my kids. But at least I feel like I get to choose that balance myself without feeling judgment from society. Do you feel like there's less judgment of mothers in Iceland. Well, I've never lived in the US, so I don't maybe have a real bad here sense of it. That's what people tell me I should say, so from what I'm told, Yes, but that's really also up to us. I mean, do we need to then look at ourselves. Are we making these unconscious judgments or decisions or offhand remarks without thinking about the impact that it can have, you know, even if even if it's well intentioned. So when people are saying to you, now, how are you going to do it all? How do you manage it all? I'm sure that that adds extra stress for you. But but I think you know, we all have a duty to sort of help each other out in a sense. But maybe then you have an opportunity if you wish to to be a role model for other people, so that you know, probably you're in the privileged position that some of these projects you can bring the new baby with you, or you can you can choose your own working hours, which a lot of women, of course don't have the opportunity to do. And therefore, if you were able to do that in the job, that might inspire some other women to say, look, in my job where I have less flexibility, maybe I should start asking for that because it should be something that we're entitled to do, because we need these women's voices in the workplace. I was just at a mom influencing conference and I was in a room with women who collectively probably had half a billion followers. They know their entrepreneurs, they know they're the next wave of content creators, they have a huge audience, but I think they were still often discounting the power of their voices. And one of the things we talked about is I said, you can show your audience that you left to come to this conference in Los Angeles. You left your children and it's okay. Yeah, and they're on devices and they're eating pizza or my kids would be for sure, and that's okay, and that mine are right now while I am talking to you, the first Lady of Iceland, my kid is watching Encanto for the fifty seventh time. Awesome totally, And I think that's okay. Good for you because mom has to work too and has things to do. And I think that's you know, there's the key word influencer. And I would not call myself an influencer, but It's absolutely something I think of in the sense that I'm a public figure in Iceland and I have this immense privilege and joy of serving his first Lady, which of course has the sort of expectations, and of course I need to serve and I want to serve with the dignity that the office deserves. But I also have to be me, and I'm a very grounded, laid back, pretty informal person, and so I really try, you know, just even beyond gender equality, thinking, Okay, I'm in this public role, I think it's okay for example, that you know, I'm seen wearing the same outfit multiple times on different occasions, because guess what, that's what people do. And I think, especially while women are still judged so much on what they're wearing or or what they look like, well, I think we work to change that. We work to focusing on what women are saying and what they have to say. We can also still send particular messages with that by saying that it's fine to re wear your clothes and do all of this. And that's why we talk a lot about authenticity. And you know how I think that women who have influence, who have an audience It's really time to show the messy parts of our lives, and not the messy parts, just the real parts of our lives, the part we are rewearing an outfit that half the time I'm still wearing my i'm a pants. When I do my interviews on television on CNN, I'm like, I'm office on the top and party on the bottom. I'm in the mullet of clothing. I have done that too, and I'm a first lady. It's okay, right, yes, exactly. Or that we let our kids eat all the crap frozen pizza and watch the screens and leave them to go do our jobs and maybe we don't even maybe we don't even feel guilty about it. Maybe I don't guilty about it. No, I don't feel guilty about it. But sometimes every time I leave my kids because and this is such an American thing. I don't know how many Americans you follow on the social media's, but I, oh, I just see so much about mom guilt and I know that it is a real thing, but I feel like we feel like we have to say it. And when I leave them, I don't feel guilty there with their other parents. Who is a fault is a parent who was fully responsible for making them. No, absolutely, I completely agree with you. And I think there's two things there I want to say. One is exactly this idea about that, you know, the emotional energy that we spend feeling guilty or that we're not enough, or that we haven't managed to do this or that or the other thing. But we can't. We can't all do it all, you know. I feel I'm so incredibly privileged and I can't do it all by any stretch of the imagination. And the second thing that I want to point out, which again links to your idea there of influencer and social media and and how we curate lives for ourselves, because when we're looking at Instagram photos and all these videos, those are curated images of course, you know, and we're presenting a view. And I know for me, I'm active, say on Instagram, And I try to showcase a lot the sort of non traditional first lady things that I do. First of all, I show my work, which is writing books and running a writer's festival in addition to my first lady work. And when I talk about the first lady work, I try to, you know, quote from my speeches and show me talking and you know, actually using my voice. But I also know that people really engage with acute selfie in the morning, and so you really have to show a balance with that. But one of the one rules that I have with say, if I post a selfie i'm doing this is I take one photo pretty much and that's it, and I certainly never you know, put a filter on it or change it or something like that, like if this is the photo of this is how I look, and I'm a forty six year old woman and I have gray hairs and blotchy skin and that's just life. Yes, I have many chins now, and that is okay. It is okay to show my neck on the instagrams. It's it's healthy because it's very normal. And you know, it may be on this book tour that I had cheetahs for breakfast one morning, but that's what happens, and if I was going to do it, I really enjoyed having those cheetahs for breakfast because it isn't something you do all the time. Yes, no guilt. I want to go back a little bit too, because I I love teaching our listeners something where the concept of the sprack are came from because it's pretty ancient. It's pretty old, right, yeah, it's it's not only old, but it's also obscure. And I think that listeners everywhere want to hear a bit about Icelandic grammar all the time, am I right? Ah my? Um yes, Wait wait before you tell me what you're gonna say, I have to tell you my favorite word that I learned in the book. At my favorite Icelandic word. You're gonna have to say it for me, but it's the word for stomach, stomach sisters, the women that the women that have slept with the same man. It's just this, it's you know, it's sort of a female adaptation of a like a more common word about two people who slept with the same people. But yeah, there's there's great words in the Icelandic language. And spraker is a plural word. The singular is spracky. It's really old. It means outstanding woman or extraordinary woman. And I love the word because, you know, if you think in English of all the words that we have to describe women in an exclusively positive way, you wouldn't have a very long podcast if you can you think of any words a single word no, So I love that for that reason. And also this is an old it's really obscure. As it said, even Icelanders didn't know this word, because here's your grammar lesson. It kind of evolved into a word um for spraki, which means leader, but can be applied to men or women, So it wasn't I was so nervous about using it because we know we're women and we get nervous about with let's be okay or am I allowed to do this? I called this institute in Iceland that is almost a caretaker of the Ionic language, and the woman who runs that institute hadn't heard of the word, and I was like, can I use it? Is it a legitimate word? And she said yes, and people I spoke to, so I'm really trying to bring the word back into even to modern circulation in Iceland. Well, let's bring it into circulation in the US. Let's let's spracker, let's let's have let's make sure that people are hashtag spracker please that I would love that and I would share that, and I think it happened. Actually did a couple of interviews national interviews when the book came out, and then as an insecure first time writer would do. I would like google my name or google spracker. And then I saw a few people I just posted about this word spracker, which I thought was really exciting, and I think we should just you know, elevate and talk about out the sprack are in our lives and the friends of the sprack in our lives. I think working towards gender quality isn't a women's issue. It's a societal issue and human rights issue, and it's not something that's just for women to benefit from. So shout out to all of the men who get that too, which there are a lot, you know, I really am an optimist. There are fantastic men. There's a lot of a lot of good men. And I think that we should show the men doing the work more often on social media, in in media, media, in television shows, in movies, and when we we still in American movies and culture, when we see a father caretaking, it's the punchline. It's he doesn't know, he's fumbling, he doesn't know how to do anything. He's never ever the competent caretaker of his children. No, you're right, and we set the bar so low for men, and I think that does them a disservice. I think we set this bar so low that just that they given them one meal. It's amazing. Um. There was like a Canadian story on Mother's Day and a sort of a satirical website like the Onion kind of thing, and the headline was something like dad celebrates Mother's Day by preheating the oven for his wife. And it is kind of true that we have this low standard and that does mena disservice. And so if we women also don't expect that they can do it, if we think, well, I have to manage this because they can never remember birthday or they have no idea how to cook a healthy meal, then we're not going to achieve it either, and it just does everyone a disservice. Yeah. Absolutely, We're calling for a women's day off the Internet, modeled off of your Wonderful Countries Women's Day Off, where content creators and tech workers average citizens just don't do things on the Internet for space of a working day eight hours. That's it to show just how much women are creating both content but also fueling all of the commerce on the Internet. But what I think is allowable on that day is you can have your husband post pictures of him doing the work of caretake rate and care giving to your audience, because that's that's exactly what we need to see more of. We also need to see women more in these traditional male spaces on the internet, you know, in the business section and the finance section, all those areas where it tends to be guys who are doing something and we're just not noticing the women. I think, what else do you want people to know about this book before they pick it up and read it? And I'm telling everyone to read it by the most, Well, thank you so much, that's fantastic. Um, what do I want to know people know about the book? Well, I guess I hope that people know or realize that it is kind of it's a sort of it's a love story to Iceland, you know, and it's a portrait of that country with gender equality as the theme. So I want people to know that the tone of the book. If you've liked listening to this podcast and you think, oh that Eliza, she can be funny sometimes, or she's someone that I would want to have a drink with, that's the tone of the book. I hope it's very sort of anecdotal and friendly, but still full of interesting information, hopefully inspiring, an optimistic but realistic. It's not a sort of dry treatise on feminism. It's not an academic work, although there's further reading and footnotes for people who want it. It's not a complaining, angry book. It's like you went out for a glass of wine with me. So I hope that people who want kind of a smart and interesting read but it's not super heavy, and want to learn about a new country and kind of feel hopeful and inspired, that's book it is. It's true that was a great description because that's exactly how I felt about it well. And I also have to say, I really, I really did love your chapter on the strength in sisterhood and women supporting other women and just how important that is to have strong networks of support. I think too often women have been pitted against each other, particularly in American society, and we think that we're constantly competing, and that's not true. The tides rise all boats, and you really get into that in that chapter. I think that's important to talk about be because you're right. Sometimes I think if I'm being say it's just a construct of the patriarchy to like pull people to use wedge issues and say that women are fighting against each other when they shouldn't. Obviously it happens sometimes, you know, we're a place like everywhere else. But the two groups of people that I speak to in that in that chapter I liked because one of these older women who volunteered, you know, for decades with these women's associations, which are kind of I guess you'd see like church groups in the States or something, although these are not you know, religiously affiliated, and just the amount of work that they devote the community, but also the benefits that they get for themselves, you know, in these kind of remote areas of friendship. But the second group are these women around the age of fifty who decided to swim across the English Channel to raise money for charity. And they went, you know, every week, and they were training, and they were swimming in the sea in the North Atlantic, and it takes a lot of effort and you really have to kind of carve out time for yourselves. And they said as well, when they spoke to people, they would say, like, what does your husband think of this? Or what do your children think? Even though they said, of course, the guys they go off for a golf weekend and it's just the guys. They've got to get together and have their time alone. But for somehow, for women, it was this sense of are you allowed to do this? Um, But they said, absolutely, we're allowed to do this, and it's really important and it's important for our children to see that we are taking the time to do this. Absolutely. I think it's so important for our children to see us taking time to do things that we love, that we're passionate about. And my favorite thing about these women is that they were called the jellyfish. Yes, they're called the jellyfish in Iceland. It's very you often have these names for organizations, like I think I mentioned the beginning. Two of them knew each other because they were in a walking group, and the walking group was called shut Up Magnus. I have no idea why, but I love it. It's one of those yeah, strange things. And that same group and many of that same group of women UM walked up Iceland's highest peak last year as well. So they're still doing all these really amazing physical challenges. Wonderful. We'll go enjoy your cheetos and everything. I love her, love her. I love anyone that I can talk to about Cheetos and wine and women first thing in the morning, right when I opened my eyes. And I also love you, guys. I'm very excited for us to keep talking about the many ways that women are influencing the world on and off social media. And don't forget the Women's Day off is coming. It's going to be on my birthday because I like to make things all about me and maybe, just maybe I'll be going to Iceland for it. Do you guys? Also like that very soft, very quiet third baby pregnancy announcement that I made in this podcast. Still haven't put it on Instagram, even though I probably get like a million followers if I did, because Instagram loves pregnant bellies. Until next time, my friends, I'm Joe Piazza and your Under the Influence. Under the Influence is hosted by me, Joe Piazza, Emily Marinoff is our senior producer, and Aaron Peters and produced this episode. As always, our theme and additional music was composed by Jackie Huntington's and Jessica Crinchurch. We're executive produced by me and Nikki tor and please, please, please go out and buy Eliza Reid's wonderful new book, Secrets of the Sprack Are
