The Vagina Museum with Florence Schechter | Transcript
Find the episode shownotes here!
Florence Schechter
I knew there was a reason I liked wine so much.
Hannah Witton
Wait, so what you're telling me is that it is safe to put wine up my vagina.
Florence Schechter
Probably don't
Hannah Witton
Can you get drunk that way?
Florence Schechter
Oh my god. Can you imagine douching with wine? Oh my god!
Hannah Witton
Please don't do this people, I don't know how safe that is! Welcome to Doing It with me, Hannah Witton, where we talk all things sex, relationships, dating, and our bodies. Hello, welcome back to Doing It. So if you didn't know, The Vagina Museum is opening this Saturday. Saturday, the 16th of November. It is the world's first ever, and only, vagina museum. And in this episode, I sat down and chatted with the founder, Florence Schechter, all about it. Apologies first of all for the bit of background noise in this episode, we were recording on The Vagina Museum premises, in Camden Market, but we recorded it in the empty space before the collection was installed. The collection and the first exhibition there will be at The Vagina Museum, which you can go see from Saturday, is called Muff Busters and it's all about the myths and legends around vulva's and vaginas and you know, the actual facts. What's actually true. I'm really honoured that I got the chance to steal Florence away from her very busy schedule of organising and opening a museum. We talked all about the story of The Vagina Museum, from the idea, to their premise now in Camden Market, what obstacles they face, the politics and the language around getting things approved, being able to run ads on social media with the word vagina in it, hint - they can't. It's just flagged, and they're not allowed to in a lot of cases. What you can expect from The Vagina Museum if you go and visit, and then a very interesting and appropriate tangent all about animal sex facts. You are welcome. Thank you so much for listening. If you enjoyed this episode, please go give the podcast a rating and a review over on iTunes. It really does help us out. And if you want to hear more from us, you can follow us on Twitter and Instagram @DoingItPodcast. I hope you enjoy this episode. Well, Florence, thank you for taking time out of your probably incredibly busy schedule to chat with me about The Vagina Museum.
Hannah Witton
It's amazing. I mean, thank you for having me! I'm honoured
Hannah Witton
How is it all going? Because you're launching, very, very, soon, when this podcast comes out, it will be like this weekend and right now, what you're like a few weeks off?
Florence Schechter
Yeah, oh my god
Hannah Witton
Are you feeling the pressure?
Florence Schechter
So much, so much. I mean, thankfully, so the only thing we have left to do is get the exhibition up. And I have a curator, and that's her job so she can be stressed.
Hannah Witton
We're currently sat in the exhibition space which is lovely and empty. It's kind of fun to be recording in an empty museum.
Florence Schechter
Yeah, yeah, it's gonna, pretty soon, there's going to be all kinds of things in here, and it's going to look very different.
Hannah Witton
Yeah, so tell us about your first exhibition.
Florence Schechter
So the first exhibition is called Muff Busters.
Hannah Witton
Love it. Who came up with that?
Florence Schechter
I don't know. It was one of these things where it just like popped up somewhere, and you like forget who came up with it. But we just liked it so much we stuck with it. Vagina myths and how to fight them is the is the tagline.
Hannah Witton
Yeah.
Florence Schechter
And it's all about the different myths. Like if you have too much sex, your vagina will get really loose.
Hannah Witton
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Florence Schechter
And if you have an abortion, you'll get breast cancer, and like you can't get pregnant if you douche with Coke.
Hannah Witton
Oh.
Florence Schechter
That's an actual myth
Hannah Witton
Wait, Coke as in the drink?
Florence Schechter
Yeah.
Hannah Witton
I mean, don't do that either. I wouldn't recommend doing the other kind of coke in your vagina.
Florence Schechter
Sounds painful. Yeah, so so we're going to have you know, like, virginity soaps on display, which like claim to make your vagina tighter and, and that sort of thing, yeah.
Hannah Witton
Because there is a lot of like products out there, as well, that just like make your vagina smell clean and flowery.
Florence Schechter
Oh, God, and they're so, they're so stupid and they just like they prey on our vulnerabilities, and just trying to make money off of scared people, you know? Yeah, that's what it is.
Hannah Witton
So let's rewind. How did The Vagina Museum come about? And how did you get from the idea to like, you now have a physical museum space? It's amazing cuz I feel like I've just been on this journey like watching you've been like, like from the beginning and like, it's happening!
Florence Schechter
Because you knew me way before any of this happened?
Hannah Witton
Yeah, we went to uni together.
Florence Schechter
Yes, and I liked vaginas, then. And I like vaginas now.
Hannah Witton
Nothing's changed.
Florence Schechter
Nothing's changed in that respect. So it all started because in 2017, I discovered there's a penis museum in Iceland, which is great.
Hannah Witton
There is, have you been?
Florence Schechter
No, I haven't
Hannah Witton
Research trip.
Florence Schechter
But yeah, definitely, I'm gonna apply to like, you know, the Arts Council to get some money for that.
Hannah Witton
Yeah.
Florence Schechter
I haven't been, but I've seen many photos from it. So I feel like I've been, virtually. So I found out there's this penis museum, but there's no vagina equivalent anywhere in the world. And I thought that was really unfair. So I just decided to make one.
Hannah Witton
Equality.
Florence Schechter
Yeah, equality. It's like, it's like sexism, nail on the head, like you couldn't get more obvious.
Hannah Witton
Because there's lots of like sex museums and erotic museums around the world.
Florence Schechter
Loads. They're very phallic, though, a lot of them.
Hannah Witton
Yeah.
Florence Schechter
Yeah. There's a lot of dildos, or erections on statues and things. There's not a huge amount of vulvas.
Hannah Witton
And now that is changing. So, but what exactly happened, right? Because you had this realisation, like there's no vagina museum in the world. I'm going to make that. And then the next thing that I saw was like, you were getting amazing press. Like you like in news outlets, and it was like a first ever vagina museum, because you effectively founded the museum, without there being a museum, but it was like, Florence, founder of The Vagina Museum.
Florence Schechter
Yeah.
Hannah Witton
Like, so how did that happen? You were just like, I don't do anything half arsed.
Florence Schechter
Yeah, no, absolutely. It's like, it's I describe it as the most millennial museum that's ever happened. It that, I decided to do it. And it's very funny, because the museum sector, they're all like, really old and slow and everything and like, how did you, that makes no sense? Like, if they tried to do it would take them like 20 years minimum.
Hannah Witton
Wow.
Florence Schechter
So what I did was, I came up with the idea, and I was like, okay, how would that actually happen? What would I actually do? Because I've never obviously made a museum before. So I like researched how museums are made, how have other museums in Britain be made. And most of them were made by bored, rich, white men in the 1800s.
Hannah Witton
And they just throw some money, at some people, were like, make me a museum.
Florence Schechter
Yeah, exactly. They're just like, go steal some stuff from Africa, go put it in a building, and pretend like it was a really good thing. And I was like, well, I can't do that. And there is a whole crop of like, new museums that are happening at the moment, like Queer Britain, and the Museum of British Colonialism, and the Eastern Women's Museum. And that's kind of the model I'm following, where it's a group of people have an idea where they really want to share a particular story, rather than like most museums where they've been given a collection.
Hannah Witton
Like we've got this stuff.
Florence Schechter
Yeah.
Hannah Witton
Wheras you've started with no stuff.
Florence Schechter
Yeah, exactly. So I did it like the opposite way of most museums. So because I'm not a person of independent wealth, I couldn't just go and like okay, I'm just gonna buy a building now. And I couldn't go to funders because they were like you're just a random person that has never done anything, so like, why would I risk giving you money because you can be anyone. So like, I just had to figure it out. So I just like made a little website, I made a Twitter page, I made you know, a place where you could donate and I was like, this is the thing I want to do, help me make that happen. And we did pop ups, we did like pop up events, and then we started doing pop up exhibitions, we've done three pop up exhibitions so far. And so then we'd been going for like, I think a year and a half or something by then when I was like, this is really exhausting and we're not getting enough like return on our time. So like the thing about pop ups right is they pop down.
Hannah Witton
Oh, no one talks about the pop down.
Florence Schechter
Yeah, yeah. So I was like, what I really need is a building, and then I can like have a source of income. We can always have exhibitions, and I can prove to everyone like, yes, we are a real museum. Now please give me 50 million pounds.
Hannah Witton
Was that a real struggle to get people to see you as a legitimate museum. Because I feel like with the types of people that I follow online, the way that people would talk about The Vagina Museum, was that like, it already was a museum, I think. But that's just, I guess, the circles that I run in online, but did you have trouble from people outside of that friendly circle being like, what is this?
Florence Schechter
Yeah, no, there was definitely like confusion. But museum is not like a protected word. Like anyone can technically call themselves a museum.
Hannah Witton
Oh.
Florence Schechter
So yeah, I could just do it. And I didn't, you know, I didn't want to call it something else, and then have to rebrand when we actually opened the museum, because then it would be confusing because people would be like, I don't understand if you're called like the vagina project, and you want to build a museum, but you don't know anything about museums. Where as if I'm like, oh, we're The Vagina Museum, and we're building a museum -
Hannah Witton
From the beginning.
Florence Schechter
Yeah, people are like, oh, I get what you're trying to do.
Hannah Witton
Because that was like, your mission statement from day one.
Florence Schechter
Yeah.
Hannah Witton
Yeah. That's amazing. And so like, what have been some of the obstacles that you've faced along the way? Because like, I know about the getting your charity status and just lots of other things. Do you want to, care to explain? Oh, and like advertising on Twitter.
Florence Schechter
Oh, God. Yes, so many obstacles. Yeah, I mean, charity status is really interesting. Because the obstacle that we met was the name, so like you apply to be a charity online and you fill out this big online form and you type in what you want to call it, and then it will automatically check for like copyright and trademarks. It will check if it's got the word like royal in, because you can't call yourself a royal charity without consent from the Queen.
Hannah Witton
Ah.
Florence Schechter
That sort of thing. And then also you can't have rude words.
Hannah Witton
Rude words! What is a rude word here?
Florence Schechter
I know! And so it's, so we put in Vagina Museum and they're like, this is a word that you're gonna have to get special permission to use it.
Hannah Witton
Did you try and put your penis museum and see what happened?
Florence Schechter
Yes. I tried a whole different, because I had to, like make the argument, in writing. And I was like, well it allows for like penile, but it didn't have a penis, but I think that's just because they didn't realise that they could put adjectives in, instead of nouns. But I also said like, you've already got like the vulval, what was it, the Vulva Cancer Society or whatever. So like, clearly, you're fine with it.
Hannah Witton
Yeah.
Florence Schechter
And then all that happened was that the person who the Charity Commission was like, some people might find your name offensive. How can you like assure me that you've thought about this, you know, and -
Hannah Witton
Like, it has to be this name.
Florence Schechter
Yeah, yeah, she was, you know, can't you call it like the lady parts museum, or something, or the private parts museum.
Hannah Witton
Oh, no.
Florence Schechter
And I think she didn't actually think that. I don't think she thought it was offensive, I think she was just doing her due diligence, so that if someone complained, they could be like, look, she gave me a satisfactory answer, because I wrote her like this four page essay about stigma, and about how the stigma hurts people, and if we can't even use the name, vagina, which is a scientific word, it isn't like we want to call it the cunt museum, you know?
Hannah Witton
I mean, did you think about that?
Florence Schechter
That would have been would have been great. Maybe in a couple hundred years, I don't know. But you know, like, it's just the fact that people will think it's offensive is exactly why we need it. And we can't be claiming to be fighting stigma, if we can't even use the word in our own name.
Hannah Witton
Where is this four page essay? Like stick it up on a public Google drive link and just be like, here it is everyone, if anyone, if anyone needs to, like defend the word vagina at any point in their lives, like -
Florence Schechter
Here's a tonne of stats for you.
Hannah Witton
Oh, yeah. Very useful.
Florence Schechter
Yeah, it's in our personal archive, about like a story of the museum.
Hannah Witton
Aw, is that gonna be an exhibition?
Florence Schechter
I don't know. Maybe, maybe in the permanent museum will be like, how was The Vagina Museum made?
Hannah Witton
Yeah, that'd be so cute. I love that, the little like museum, museum story archive.
Florence Schechter
Yeah.
Hannah Witton
I mean, it's, it's an interesting story. I don't, I've never heard like what, you mentioned, was it Queer Britain? So is that a museum? I'm not -
Florence Schechter
So they're currently trying to make it. So this guy called Joseph Galliano, and he wants to make a National Museum of Queer British History.
Hannah Witton
Amazing.
Florence Schechter
And they are currently trying to make it happen. So they've been doing pop up exhibitions, following quite a similar model to us.
Hannah Witton
Yeah. Oh, that's really cool. Well, there you go folks, another another cool museum to go support.
Florence Schechter
They're great, please support them. Yeah.
Hannah Witton
You crowdfunded.
Florence Schechter
Yes.
Hannah Witton
How was that process?
Florence Schechter
Interesting. Hard.
Hannah Witton
Yeah.
Florence Schechter
Not only because it's like, please give me money for a thing that you've never even seen before. So it's kind of like a weird sell, you know? Like, you know, you just have to trust us, it will be great. And also, advertising, like you mentioned, is really hard. Because like, you know, every kind of ad we would try to get, it was banned. It's like, oh, you're using a naughty word. Anything we try and put on Facebook is immediately rejected. It's really, really hard. So we were kind of like struggling. And we also had a bit of like terf, like trans exclusionary backlash as well, of people who are like, please don't give them your money because they're trans inclusive, and isn't that horrible and awful, and they're going to lead to the decline of society.
Hannah Witton
No!
Florence Schechter
Yeah.
Hannah Witton
I mean, you don't want their money.
Florence Schechter
Yeah, it's true. Yeah.
Hannah Witton
But money would be nice.
Florence Schechter
Yeah, money would be nice. And we have had, like, just a handful of people who, after the crowdfunding campaign, realised that we were trans inclusionary, didn't like that fact, and then were like, please take me off your mailing list. I never want to hear from you again. I can't believe I gave you my money. I'm so upset.
Hannah Witton
Wow.
Florence Schechter
And I'm like, you should have done your research. It's like, right there on our website. It's not, we're not trying to hide.
Hannah Witton
Yeah, but that's really interesting. How, I guess like, for crowdfunding campaigns, I don't know, is there small print to be like, you can't get a refund if it actually is successful?
Florence Schechter
No, if you donate money, it's gone. You can't get a refund on donations.
Hannah Witton
That's a good thing for you.
Florence Schechter
Yeah.
Hannah Witton
I guess. And that, that crowdfunder basically has meant that you have this space in Camden Market.
Florence Schechter
Yeah.
Hannah Witton
Which we're sat in right now. So tell us a bit about the space. You've got this room that's going to be the exhibition. And then, is this is this the room where events have been happening?
Florence Schechter
Yes. Yeah, because we have to start small.
Hannah Witton
Yeah.
Florence Schechter
Obviously, and kind of road test the idea. So we've got two rooms, one is kind of, as my curator likes to call it very fancily, the Welcome Centre. It's just like a reception desk and a little shop.
Hannah Witton
Oh, you've got to have a gift shop in a museum.
Florence Schechter
Oh my god, definitely.
Hannah Witton
How, have you like, so what have you got like, the items in the gift shop?
Florence Schechter
Oh, what's it there's a whole bunch of stuff. We've got some menstrual cups.
Hannah Witton
Yeah, I can see those.
Florence Schechter
We've got some things that people have like sold us, for us to sell, like so we've got these vulva necklaces by this Dutch artist called Denise Rosenboom. We've ordered a few of our own things, so like specially printed, we've got like mugs with vulvas on, and postcards.
Hannah Witton
You've got a little book shop as well, I see
Florence Schechter
Yeah, we've got books, which is loads of fun. Yeah, and then in this room is going to be the exhibition gallery. And where we have events.
Hannah Witton
What I've like sensed from, like, online and everything is just like how willing everyone is to help. Like, how big is your team right now, and you also have like a lot of volunteers. But then like you were saying about not being able to create ads on social media, what I've seen is loads of people just tweeting being like The Vagina Museum can't create ads, so like, go like, go support them, And like everyone's creat, like coming together to like, help promote the launch.
Florence Schechter
Yeah, 100%. I think, because people are really incensed that something so like, clearly educational, and feminist, and good, is being banned because we're being lumped in with like sex workers trying to advertise, and things like that. I have absolutely nothing wrong with ethical sex work, at all, but Facebook does. And they're kind of lumping us all in the same pot. And so people are like, kind of incensed by that. And so they're helping us out. So like we discovered we were shadow banned on Twitter because somebody tweeted us being like, I tried to search for you and you wouldn't come up. And I was like, oh my God. And then so I checked it like this shadow, shadow, checker band checker website, whatever it is, and we were. So then I tweeted, being like, oh my God, please help us out because we clearly like being silenced.
Hannah Witton
Does that mean, if you're shadow banned, does that mean you're like unsearchable? So people who follow you will, your tweets will still come up for them, but no one can like, if someone is like, I wonder if there's a Vagina Museum, and they search that in Twitter, you wouldn't come up?
Florence Schechter
Yeah. So there's like, it's there's different types of shadow banning that they do. And the one that we had was that if you searched it, and no one in your circle followed us, we wouldn't come up. So like, if loads of your friends also followed us, it would be fine and we would come up. But if you had a completely new Twitter account, for example, with zero followers, zero -
Hannah Witton
Or if you weren't logged in, and you were searching. Ah, I'm so sceptical of shadow banning because like, because I know that a lot of people have problems with Instagram doing it as well. And then every time I've spoken to anyone at Instagram, they're like, shadow banning isn't a thing. That's not what we do. And I'm just like, I don't know who to believe, like, what's going on?
Florence Schechter
So much to do.
Hannah Witton
So yeah.
Florence Schechter
Oh, my God.
Hannah Witton
What is there to do then? How do you open a museum? How do you, how does that happen?
Florence Schechter
Everything, so much, and there's so many things that I didn't know I would have to learn about. You know, like, like fire safety regulation. Just this morning of the recording, we had our premises licence hearing, where we tried to get a licence to have alcohol. And -
Hannah Witton
Which you got
Florence Schechter
Which we got, which is great.
Hannah Witton
Yay! Because that will help with funding?
Florence Schechter
Yes, absolutely. Like, you know, because it's been really difficult getting funding. People don't want to, one, take a chance on a new venture, because it's like risky and in the charity worlds, when the funding has been cut, they become extremely risk averse. Also something that's controversial, and they're like, ah, you know, something's gonna happen or whatever. So people hate - people really, really wanna don't fund us. It's like, they're very nervous about us. Yeah. So we have to get all the money we can get from somewhere else.
Hannah Witton
Have you managed to get any, like big bits of funding? Or has it all been like, through just crowdfunding from like the people.
Florence Schechter
The vast majority has been through crowdfunding, but we raised about 50k from crowdfunding. The biggest grants we've ever got was £1000. And ironically -
Hannah Witton
And that feels like nothing, in the scheme of things.
Florence Schechter
Oh yeah, oh my God, like 1000 pounds feels a lot, like to an individual person.
Hannah Witton
Yeah.
Florence Schechter
But when you like start thinking about, how much money would it take to run a museum? Like you need three members of staff and you're already at £100,000 a year?
Hannah Witton
Yeah.
Florence Schechter
So -
Hannah Witton
Do you have three members of staff then?
Florence Schechter
We do, yeah. Me, Sarah, the curator, and Zoey, the development and marketing manager.
Hannah Witton
Great.
Florence Schechter
Yeah. And then we also got all our volunteers. So it's mostly volunteers. We've got like, I think about 40 volunteers.
Hannah Witton
Amazing.
Florence Schechter
Who all staff our front of house, and then we've got like, 10 bartenders, and like five technicians. And they're paid though.
Hannah Witton
Yeah, yeah. Wow. Yeah. Cuz also, yeah, you have to like, make sure the place is all like, what's the word, plugged in. There's like electricity, and power, and heating.
Florence Schechter
The heating is really hard because this is a Grade Two listed building.
Hannah Witton
What does that mean?
Florence Schechter
So we can't do very much to it.
Hannah Witton
So it's gonna be cold.
Florence Schechter
It is cold. We've got the heaters going at the moment, but it'll be better when it's like lots of people in and the body heat will do it for us.
Hannah Witton
Yeah. What are you going to do to celebrate once it launches? Personally, what is Florence going to do?
Florence Schechter
Sleep for 72 hours. Probably cry a lot. I mean, we've got some launch parties coming up. We have like a sort of VIP launch party, which you're coming to. That's the one when we are going to be like my best behaviour, and there's gonna be like press taking photos, whatever -
Hannah Witton
Yeah.
Florence Schechter
But then the next day I have, there's gonna be a party just for like the people we like, and the people we want to thank for helping us out with the project, and that's what I'm gonna get wasted at.
Hannah Witton
Yeah, just like your safe group of people, like we did it.
Florence Schechter
Exactly. The exhibition will be open and so for a couple of weeks, I will need to like be on call to make sure everything like works alright.
Hannah Witton
Is the exhibition free? Is The Vagina Museum free?
Florence Schechter
Yeah. Admission completely free.
Hannah Witton
And then events are ticketed?
Florence Schechter
Yeah, but like super cheap to be honest. They vary between like £3 and £16.
Hannah Witton
Oh nice!
Florence Schechter
So for London, and you can get concessions as well.
Hannah Witton
So you guys get on it. And how long do you hope to be here in Camden?
Florence Schechter
So the initial sort of term we're working on is two years. So that's like how long our planning permission has gone. I had to get planning permission -
Hannah Witton
Is it weird though that like, am I like at the adult stage where I'm like, this is fascinating. Like all of the boring bits I'm like, oh, interesting.
Florence Schechter
I had exactly the same thing. I was like, how can I be so interested by like council framework policies. But it's cool like because you because it's given me an insight into like when I walk around London, I'm like, oh, you know, that pub isn't just like a pub like it's also got to do all these things. I kind of understand the work that goes behind doing businesses and charities and things, it's quite fascinating. I'm like learning more about how the world works -
Hannah Witton
Yeah.
Florence Schechter
- by doing it, but was it, oh yeah, two years. So the idea is, so this museum is not the end all. Like this is kind of a proof of concept for us. We want to show the world that like we can do this, this is a thing that people will come to, a thing people will enjoy and get something from, and then it also means we can get some experience and some practice. It also means we can get some data about like who wants to come.
Hannah Witton
Oh, the data.
Florence Schechter
Oh, so so much data collection. And so that we can end up going to some big funder, and be like, please give us all the money so we can build like this lovely permanent museum, that has like you know, five permanent galleries, can have like an artist residency, and can do all these great things.
Hannah Witton
Sploosh, sploosh, sploosh. What are some of your favourite vagina facts? Come on.
Florence Schechter
So many. I like this one, during your reproductive years your vagina will be around a pH four, it's a bit acidic, and it's about the same pH as wine.
Hannah Witton
Oh.
Florence Schechter
I knew there was a reason I liked wine so much.
Hannah Witton
Wait, so what you're telling me is that it is safe to put wine up my vagina.
Florence Schechter
Probably not.
Hannah Witton
Can you get drunk that way?
Florence Schechter
Oh my god.
Hannah Witton
Please don't do this, people. I don't know how safe that is.
Florence Schechter
No, please don't do that.
Hannah Witton
Don't do that.
Florence Schechter
Oh my god. Can you imagine douching with wine? All the bacteria up there will get drunk.
Hannah Witton
Okay, someone has tried it.
Florence Schechter
Definitely. I know there is beer that's been made from vagina flora. So.
Hannah Witton
What?
Florence Schechter
So like beer is made using like bacteria that cements it and so -
Hannah Witton
They've used like vagina yeast to make beer.
Florence Schechter
Yeah, it was a company that did that.
Hannah Witton
Did it taste good?
Florence Schechter
I don't know, I didn't try it. It was a bit of a shame because it was done by like some company that it, the whole marketing campaign was actually really misogynistic and was all these like sexy women and like, and it was like very objectifying. It was like drink this woman's vagina, it was super gross. If we did it would be very different.
Hannah Witton
Maybe that's something you should sell.
Florence Schechter
Oh my God.
Hannah Witton
Is it legal?
Florence Schechter
I don't think it would be because, I - I don't know.
Hannah Witton
Is it cannibal - no,
Florence Schechter
Is it cannibalism? I was thinking about this the other day.
Hannah Witton
But people eat sperm.
Florence Schechter
Yes, true. That is true. But I was thinking like, is breastfeeding cannibalism? I just had a weird, you know when weird thoughts pop into your head.
Hannah Witton
Yeah, then, maybe cannibalism is specifically about flesh. Why are we talking about this?
Florence Schechter
I have no clue!
Hannah Witton
Any other great vagina facts?
Florence Schechter
Vagina facts, yes. I really like hyenas. They have the best vaginas in the animal kingdom. I think they should be our mascot. Because, so their vaginas are blocked by a humungous clitoris, and that clitoris is so long, oeople have called it a pseudo penis. I think that's a really bad name, by the way.
Hannah Witton
Yeah, it shouldn't be in relation to a penis
Florence Schechter
Exactly. It's just a big clitoris, that's just what it is. But like Aristotle used to think that hyenas were all hermaphroditic, because he only ever saw hyenas with penises. So he was like, oh, well, I guess they must, I don't know.
Hannah Witton
But actually, he was seeing some big clits
Florence Schechter
Actually was seeing clits. And the reason this is so great is because, to have sex with the hyena, the hyena has to specifically retract her clitoris so that you can get access to her vagina. So what I'm trying to say is that you can't like force a female hyena to have sex. She has to let you. And so what that has led to is this hugely matriarchal society, where the females are -
Hannah Witton
Is that why the hyenas in the Lion King are female. Are they female? I've always thought of them as female.
Florence Schechter
No, I think the stupid one is male, but that also would be in keeping.
Hannah Witton
That makes sense within a matriarchal -
Florence Schechter
Exactly, because the females they're like the hunters, they bring back the food and they eat all the food. And then it's the males who are like, please can I have some scraps.
Hannah Witton
Because they control the means of production or reproduction. Oh my god, oh my god. Oh my god.
Florence Schechter
Marx predicted it all along. Yeah, no, but this is a general rule of thumb, that you see in the animal kingdom, that the greater sort of control over their body the females have, the more matriarchal society there is. So like bonobos, for example, they have loads of sex, and that reduces paternity certainty. So none of the males know who their babies, whose babies are theirs.
Hannah Witton
But that means that they then tend to kind of look after everyone's.
Florence Schechter
Exactly. And they're, like, slightly matriarchal, in comparison to their very close relatives, chimpanzees, where the females do not have a great time at all. And part of that is because they have very little control over their bodies, because like the males are like forcing themselves on them and stuff.
Hannah Witton
Wow, I remember when when we were at uni we did, you gave me like a sex quiz, true or false thing, and a lot of that was animal related sex facts.
Florence Schechter
I just love animal sex.
Hannah Witton
Yeah. I remember, did you ever go to the Institute of Sexology exhibition that was at the Wellcome collection, a few years ago?
Florence Schechter
No, I don't think I did
Hannah Witton
It was, I remember it opening like, just as I moved to London, so it was like 2014/2015 it was open. And there was like this one video that played that was different animals like doing stuff. I'd like cannot now get an image of an elephant's penis out of my head.
Florence Schechter
They are huge.
Hannah Witton
Oh my god.
Florence Schechter
They are terrifying. But an elephant vagina is super interesting.
Hannah Witton
I don't know anything about elephant vaginas
Florence Schechter
They're like a metre long and before you get to the vagina -
Hannah Witton
Wait, hold on, a metre long, like internally.
Florence Schechter
Yeah.
Hannah Witton
Okay.
Florence Schechter
Yeah, not like wide! Oh God.
Hannah Witton
Their vulva might -
Florence Schechter
Oh.
Hannah Witton
Lke, how big is the vulva, but vagina, internal vagina.
Florence Schechter
You have to first, before we get to the vagina, you have to go through the vestibule. So our vestibule is you know that like skin that goes around your vagina, on the like inside the labia minora? That's called the vestibule. So it's basically just an extended version of like the entryway to the vagina. And I think that's super cute because it makes me imagine like there's a butler standing at like the elephant's vagina.
Hannah Witton
Name, please.
Florence Schechter
Just come on in. Are you on the guest list? And then what's also really cool is elephant insemination is like a whole thing. And there's only like three groups in the world that can do it, because it's so difficult. And one of them is in a Disney park.
Hannah Witton
Oh my god, like in Animal Kingdom.
Florence Schechter
Yeah, that's it. One of one of the very few elephant insemination groups in the world is based in Disney's Animal Kingdom.
Hannah Witton
Oh, I bet Disney don't advertise that.
Florence Schechter
Didn't put that in the most recent Dumbo.
Hannah Witton
I remember reading about pig insemination, and how pigs clitoris is actually like, in the entranceway to the vagina. So it means, and it was just about like farmers wanking off their pigs.
Florence Schechter
It's a whole thing, especially with pigs. You know how you can tell if a pig is in heat, is the farmers they will like, like, I want to say the word ride. But read it in the literal like if you were to ride a horse like you put your legs on either side of them. And then if they start bucking, that's how they're in heat. So you have to like kind of pretend, because it's the idea of putting weight on their back, and then the female pig is like oh my god, there's weight on my back. That must be a male pig, it's time for me.
Hannah Witton
And if they basically go for it.
Florence Schechter
Then you know it's it's sexy time
Hannah Witton
Wow, how come you know so much about like animal sex facts?
Florence Schechter
Because I am a depraved person.
Hannah Witton
Is that going to be a future Vagina Museum exhibition about animal vaginas?
Florence Schechter
Yeah, 100%, I really want it to happen. And I'm going to call it like the Vaginal Kingdom, or the Vaginal Queendom, or I don't know the Animal Queen, or something like that. And yeah.
Hannah Witton
Does it always have to be pun based?
Florence Schechter
Every exhibition has to be pun based. I just like it because I have a scientific background. So I've always found it fascinating. And also like it's also socially important to humans, because facts about animals are used, often, to as a weapon against human women, and human people with vaginas. For example, there was that senator who said, oh, I'm about to say something really horrible, trigger warnings. But he genuinely made the argument, as a senator, that if you were raped, then the only way you would conceive is if you enjoyed it, because ducks can control, they have like these labyrinthine vaginas, they control they can control who is inseminate their eggs. And so that way, if somebody does force themselves on a duck, like if a male duck forces themselves on a female duck, she can actually choose not to be inseminated. And for some reason, ducks are the same as humans there. But this was an argument he genuinely used against abortions in the cases of rape.
Hannah Witton
People use that argument a lot in terms of like, trying to argue what is, like, natural masculinity, or femininity and, and behaviours. And like men and women are different, because look at these chimps, they're our closest ancestor, and this is how they behave.
Florence Schechter
Completely BS, all of it.
Florence Schechter
Yeah
Hannah Witton
Yeah. And it's really, because it's, it's very, that whole logic is, it's very easy to follow. Like, I think if you don't like question it, you're like, yeah, that makes sense. They're our closest ancestor and they’re in nature, so that's a really good example to know how we would behave in nature. And it's just like, no, no, no, no, no, like, literally, humans evolve. And, and, and like society changes, and and what may have been true for us when we were like living in caves -
Hannah Witton
Like is not true for us now.
Florence Schechter
And also, that's not even true when we were living in caves. Because no one 100% knows.
Hannah Witton
No one knows.
Florence Schechter
People and people who make those theories have often been men. And living in very patriarchal times, in like the Victorian times, where people are like, well of course, women would be subservient, because they couldn't imagine another world in which that wouldn't be. So these theories are inherently flawed. They may be science, but science is not perfect. I say that as a scientist.
Hannah Witton
You're like, question everything I say
Florence Schechter
Yeah
Hannah Witton
Yeah. What can we expect from some of the events you've got coming up?
Florence Schechter
Oh, we've got a whole load of fun events. Comedy, plays. Tonight, we've got like an interactive play with, that's being done in conjunction with Doctors for Choice, which is all about reproduction, and like, take, like, you know, family planning and that sort of thing, called Babies/No babies. And then tomorrow, we've got a comedy show about this guy's foray into the BDSM scene in Bristol, and it's really funny. I've already seen bits of it. And about like him kind of learning all about this kind of stuff. And then we've got pub quizzes, and bingo nights.
Hannah Witton
Oh my God. Are all of the pub quizzes is going to be like vagina/vulva based questions.
Florence Schechter
Yeah. Or like sex, or gender, or LGBT issues, or something like related, yeah.
Hannah Witton
Oh, well, thank you so much for chatting with me, taking time out of your very busy schedule. The Vagina Museum opens on the 16th of November. Yeah. So come along, Camden Market, and check out the website for all the different events and also like how to support and stuff. Thank you.
Florence Schechter
Thank you.
Hannah Witton
Thank you so much for listening to Doing It. If you enjoyed it, I would really appreciate it if you left a rating and a review. You can find show notes at DoingItPodcast.co.uk and do go follow us on social media and I'll catch you in the next episode. Bye.
Hannah Witton
This was a Global original podcast