Ideas at the House

Author. Entrepreneur. Visionary. Arianna Huffington is one of the world’s leading businesswomen and most influential women in media.Born in Greece, Huffington moved to the US by way of Cambridge University in England, becoming a renowned broadcaster and nationally-syndicated columnist. In May of 2005, she launched the Huffington Post, which quickly became one of the most widely-read and -cited online media brands. Huffington was soon named one of Time Magazine’s 100 Most Influential People, and is currently the chair, president, and editor-in-chief the Huffington Post Media Group. Her latest book, Thrive, reflects on her stunning success as well as her passionate and personal mission to redefine its meaning. Join Arianna Huffington in conversation with Annabel Crabb as they discuss Thrive and explore her rise to being one of the most prominent and important women in the world. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Throughout history, the cultural forces that have repressed female sexuality have also created a picture of women as sexually passive and requiring protection from the rapacious desires they inspire in men. Women's sexuality has been denied in its totality, let alone their capacity to become paedophiles or predators. And where stories of women as sexual predators do emerge, attractive women are excused, painted as victims in the media, and become celebrity sex objects themselves rather than being recognised as perpetrators of criminal harm. This apparently benevolent hangover of sexist attitudes does women no favours. If women are to own their own sexuality, they must also own their potential to be sexual predators with all that this implies.Alissa Nutting is an American author of the short story collection Unclean Jobs for Women and Girls. Her latest book, the novel Tampa, explores the sociopathic and predatory potential of female sexuality. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Women, and their bodies, are for sale. You don’t have to go to Nigeria, where Boko Haram wants to sell kidnapped schoolgirls, to find women on the market. Throughout the world, women and children are trafficked and traded as workers in the multi-billion-dollar sex industry, and their bodies are bought by ‘consumers’ everywhere. In the West, ads for everything from clothing to cars feature scantily clad women to help turn a profit. Pornography, IVF, surrogacy and prostitution are very different things, but all put women and their bodies on the market. Women are bought, sold and exploited everywhere. In much of the world, equality for women is still a dream, but wherever women’s bodies are for sale, real equality is still a long way off.Lydia Cacho is an award-winning investigative journalist, writer and activist, and is the author of Slavery Inc.: The untold story of international sex trafficking.Kajsa Ekis Ekman is a Swedish journalist, writer and activist. She is the founder of Feminists Against Surrogacy and the author of Being and Being Bought: Prostitution, surrogacy and the split self.Alissa Nutting is an American author of the short story collection Unclean Jobs for Women and Girls and the novel Tampa.Elizabeth Pisani is a London-based journalist and epidemiologist and the author of Indonesia etc.Jules Kim is acting CEO of Scarlet Alliance, the Australian Sex Workers Association. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

For the past forty years there’s been a concerted effort to deny the growing evidence that marriage matters. Families with married parents are more likely to provide stable homes for children. Children in single parent families are less likely to thrive than those with two parents, particularly married parents. Family structure is one of the key factors in predicting the future lives of our children, yet most are still determined to ignore what they see as a most unpalatable truth. For all the talk about gay marriage, these are the marriage patterns that have most impact on our society, and if we take the future of children seriously, it’s time to put this back on the agenda. Bettina Arndt was formerly a clinical psychologist and one of Australia’s first sex therapist. She now works as an online dating coach and writes on social issues for many Australian publications.Kay Hymowitz is an American writer, researcher, and is the William E. Simon Fellow at the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research. She is the author of four books, including Manning Up: How the rise of women has turned men into boys.Kay Hymowitz appears with the support of The Centre for Independent Studies. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

There’s been great unease about the future of 'serious' investigative journalism since the eruption of the internet shook up the traditional newspaper model. What if it’s not just the money to support this journalism that’s gone? What if it’s the readers as well, too busy sharing cat videos and shark memes to think about real news? While new philanthropic models for journalism are emerging, and traditional journalism is working out how to survive, the cat video publishers might be the ones to save the day. Maybe they were just using the cats to attract our attention, so that they could then give us the serious journalism we need. In the new world, there may be fewer newspapers, but good journalism might just find new homes (next to the cat’s basket?), and not entirely disappear.Simon Crerar is a Sydney-based British journalist and BuzzFeed’s Australia Editor.Tim Duggan is the Content Director and co-owner of Sound Alliance, which publishes In The Mix, Faster Louder, Same Same and Junkee.Peter Fray is deputy editor of The Australian and former editor-in-chief and publisher of the Sydney Morning Herald.Mark Scott is the Managing Director of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In the West, slavery is often seen as a dark part of the colonial past. Although it’s illegal in all countries, it remains alive and well—and is growing dramatically. Impervious to recession, it forms a thriving part of the globalised sex industry run by organised crime. International trafficking of women and children for sex is a multi-billion dollar business that won’t be anywhere near ‘abolition’ until those who make money from its operations and buy its services think again about what being complicit in slavery means. Lydia Cacho is an award-winning investigative journalist, writer and activist. Her reporting focuses on violence against women in her home country of Mexico. Her latest book is Slavery Inc.: The untold story of international sex trafficking. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

John Pilger addresses the 'great Australian silence', applying it not only to the treatment of Indigenous people but to class, great power and the limits of public debate.What are the 'unofficial truths' that are often unmentionable in Australian 'mainstream' debate? The treatment of First Nations people is often presented in stereotypes while the majority deny the rapacious past, and present. In matters of class, Australia's cultivated image of a 'land of fair go for all' increasingly falls victim to a corporatised world of widening inequality. The mythology of a proud, independent nation is challenged by the often secretive role of Australia as an appendage of the United States and the rise of militarism. In the wake of the release of his latest film, Utopia, John Pilger will be in conversation to discuss these 'unofficial truths'.John Pilger is an internationally renowned Australian journalist and documentary filmmaker. Liz Ann Macgregor is the director of the Museum of Contemporary Art. She is a celebrated member of Australian cultural and public life, and in 2011 received an OBE in the Queen’s birthday honour list and the Australia Council Visual Arts Medal.John Pilger appears with the support of the Edward Said Memorial Lecture. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Looking into the future, we can see the possibility of severe occurrences that threaten human extinction. Until recently, we haven’t taken this seriously and are therefore putting the future of humanity at risk. When looking at existential risk, there is a difference between natural disasters such as asteroids and the human-created risks inherent in the rapid advancements of areas like artificial intelligence and nanotechnology. No one wants to stop science, but if we want to create a sustainable future, we need to understand these risks as fully as we can so that we can balance the benefits of scientific discovery and innovation and protect ourselves from existential risk.Huw Price is the Bertrand Russell Professor of Philosophy Cambridge and a co-founder of the Centre for Study of Existential Risk at the University of Cambridge.Jaan Tallinn is a founding engineer of Skype and Kazaa as well as co-founder of MetaMed, a personalized medical research company. He is a co-founder of the Centre for Study of Existential Risk at the University of Cambridge. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

We like to think of Australia as an egalitarian country where social mobility is real and the concept of equality is unchallenged. But the reality is that, along with our English speaking peers, we are in the top third of OECD countries in terms of economic inequality. This inequality is getting worse, and continues to influence education, health and housing. Accusations of ‘class warfare’ are thrown around to stop discussion whenever these topics are raised, but it’s time to ask if the class system is back, and if it is getting stronger.Mark Carnegie is the Managing Director of M. H. Carnegie & Co, and has over thirty years of experience as an entrepreneur, investor and corporate advisor.Mark Latham is an Australian writer, essayist and former politician. He is the author of Not Dead Yet: Labor's post-left future and, soon to be published, The Political Bubble: Why Australians don’t trust politics.Judith Sloan is contributing economics editor to The Australian. She has held numerous commercial directorships, and has served as a commissioner on the Productivity Commission and Commissioner of the Australian Fair Pay Commission. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Since it emerged from its disreputable romantic beginnings, the novel replaced history and poetry to become the most significant vehicle for storytelling and the transmission of cultural values. Readers were sent to the novel to cultivate their empathy, develop moral principles and explore ideas, and it survived the rise of film with its influence intact. But a new generation of television creators have taken our most popular medium and broken the shackles of format to create huge, rambling narratives that, by reaching millions of viewers, have become new cultural icons. Will this make novels a pastime for the intellectual one percent, or will it liberate their writers to find a new audience?Emily Nussbaum is the New Yorker's television critic. She has previously contributed essays and criticism to Slate, New York Magazine and the New York Times among others.Sir Salman Rushdie is one of the most celebrated novelists of our time and the author of the Booker Prize-winning Midnight's Children, The Satanic Verses and most recently the memoir Joseph Anton. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.