Okay, so we all know that STEM – Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths – is a big deal. We also know it’s kind of a big deal for women, namely because women should be doing it, and they’re not. Why does that matter? Well, for starters, these industries are the companies, banks, hospitals and innovations that shape our society. It’s also where the money lies. STEM companies bring £127,580,000,000 to the UK economy. Which is why it’s a sad fact to report that women account for only 14.4% of the UK STEM industry, and why, with that depressing statistic, it is unsurprising that the gender pay gap is alive and well.

The lack of diversity in the industry, of course, starts young. I spoke to Emma Bunce, Professor of Planetary Plasma Physics at the University of Leicester, who thinks that gender stereotyping children is at the root of the issue. "It’s dangerous to assume anything about what a young child wants to play with," she says. "Don’t just assume that boys will do one thing and girls another. It sets us on that path of being put into our boxes and once it’s there, it just gets reinforced."

Her own upbringing was, thankfully, devoid of that mentality. In fact, she even wrote to NASA at 14 asking how she could get a job – and they wrote back. Dr Megan Rossi, a leading gut health specialist and research associate at King's College London, tells me she had a similar childhood, making science experiments in her back garden with her science teacher mother.

Anne-Marie Imafidon MBE is not only a childhood computing and maths prodigy and the youngest girl, aged 11, to pass a computing A-level, but is the founder of leading initiative Stemettes, created to encourage girls to get involved in STEM. She too had a childhood marked by encouragement: "I never had the feeling that STEM was not for girls. It was always my thing, not even my thing as a girl, it was my thing as Anne-Marie," she says. "It was genderless."

If you tell me I can’t do something, I want to do it more.

Their experiences differ from many other young girls, including Dr Patricia Vargas, a robotics specialist and associate professor who was told her passion was a man’s career, and not for her. "But if you tell me I can’t do something," she says, "I want to do it more."

Not everyone has Vargas' strong will, and Imafidon agrees: "Being in STEM means solving problems, you shouldn’t have to be someone who is either thick-skinned or someone who was lucky enough to not have gender stereotypes pushed on to them."

So how to solve the problem? Stemettes is doing serious work to encourage girls. Formed in 2012, after Imafidon realised the stark reality of women in her industry, their mentorship programme has seen huge successes and over 13,000 girls from the UK, Ireland and Europe have attended their events, which aim to get girls stuck in with hackathons, maths challenges and science tasks, to realise that STEM is for them too.

Yet girls need to see women in the industry to believe it’s a viable reality for them. Imafidon thinks this is especially true when it comes to representation in the media. Stemettes is hoping to branch out as either a documentary or a sitcom about girls in tech. "You don’t see technical women at all," she points out, "even in fiction. It feeds into what people think is reality and that forms a conditioning of girls."

Visibility is a crucial concern of accelerateHER, an initiative formed through the tech network Founders Forum, by Laura Stebbing and Poppy Gaye. AccelerateHER, which harnesses the 5,000-strong company network of Founders Forum and connects them to women in the industry, has partnered with InspiringFifty – a project which strives to spotlight women in tech.

"Only 25% of tech employees and only 5% of tech leaders are female," says Stebbing, "but within those percentages are extraordinary women we don’t know enough about." InspiringFifty will select a list of 50 women in tech in the UK, announced in November, including those hidden, hardworking names not in the limelight. The result should help not only aspiring tech girls but women already in the industry.

"The quit rate for women in tech is something like 41% which is over twice as high as men at 17%," says Stebbing. "We need to support these women and show more variety of roles in tech to inspire them."

AccelerateHER not only aims to motivate women with InspiringFifty, but their own work with the company Male Champions of Change, aims to encourage best practice within companies. They believe that men have to play a crucial part in reshaping the industry and their impressive roster of connections means they are uniquely placed to do that. They are, in their own words "bullish" about male attendance and participation at their events and have seen tangible change happen because of this – with CEOs changing flexible working policies and investing in female tech companies.

There is a real perception that you have to have a geeky computer science brain to get into tech. But there are so many women succeeding in this industry who did humanities degrees.

Bunce had a vital male mentor in her own career yet still sees an alarming lack of gender parity: "There are nearly 50 academic staff in my department and I am one of three females. I am also the only female professor there has ever been in this department." Vargas and Rossi both cite feeling as if they have to work twice as hard as men just to "be visible" and Vargas points to the gender pay gap that still persists in her industry: "I think there is still this perception that men can do the job better."

Vargas talks of wanting to reach out to girls in poverty in her native Brazil, who have no access to a computer, let alone a female role model, and points to the success of a group in her own robotics centre, formed by her female students, called WIRE (Women In Robotics in Edinburgh). When she brings young students to the centre through her own outreach work, this group stays in contact with them. "We need to show girls there is a place for them," she stresses.

This is the driving force behind InspiringFifty, accelerateHER and Stemettes, all of which want to not only highlight women in STEM but debunk misconceptions about the STEM industries. Imafidon would like to disabuse everyone of "the genius trope" as a necessity for getting into science or tech and Rossi would like to sex up science, believing it has for too long been marketed as "dull, boring and unappealing for women".

For Stebbing and Gaye, they want more transparency about the industry. "There is a real perception that you have to have a geeky computer science brain to get into tech," says Stebbing, "but there are so many women succeeding in this industry who did humanities degrees. There a million different paths into tech."

Getting girls into STEM and supporting women within the industry is not just a strident feminist move but actually a prudent economic decision. It is estimated that women getting into STEM could increase our GDP by $28 trillion by 2025. Findings from the Stemettes Incubator, where 36 girls from all over the world took part in a six-week STEM summer programme, prove that it could also have a hugely beneficial societal impact.

"They were tasked with creating their own start-ups but we didn’t tell them what to do," says Imafidon. "All 29 start-ups came up with a solution that benefitted society or solved an educational or medical problem – from aiding Parkinson’s sufferers to finding lost pets. This is why we need more women in STEM!"

Perhaps, then, the future is bright. Bunce agrees, seeing hope in her own young children. "They are much less tolerant of being pigeonholed," she tells me. "Science is for boys? I think that will be a thing of the past."

Anne-Marie Imafidon, Megan Rossi, Patricia Vargas and Emma Bunce will be speaking at New Scientist Live, a four-day festival of ideas and discovery, with over 100 other influential speakers from 20th–23rd September at ExCel London. Tickets are available with 29% off at live.newscientist.com/refinery29 using discount code REFINERY29.

You can nominate an inspiring woman in tech as one of the InspiringFifty at www.inspiringfifty.com by 30th Sept 2018.

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Throughout my school years, my reports read: “Laura works very hard. We’re happy with her progress. She applies herself rigorously to her studies”. Working hard to see results has always been my vibe. I wasn’t naturally gifted per se, nor a boffin, I was a grafter. The same could be said about my working life. I happily put in the extra hours in my career in fashion, working late nights and weekends, answering emails quickly and getting shit done. That was the way I operated. I was an achiever, a meticulous planner and I loved it.

Naturally, I tried to apply this logic to motherhood. I prepared religiously for my zen home birth, walking to and from work every day, doing yoga every night and practicing my hypnobirthing mantras until I was blue in the face. All these preparations went out the window when my son was in fact the wrong way round and not able to get out. Two days of huffing and puffing around my living room finally resulted in the sorrowful switching off of my ceremonial salt lamp, screwing up my tiny jars of essential oils and heading to the hospital for an emergency C-section.

I started to get the feeling that even with my track record of swatting and careful planning, this new section of my life called ‘motherhood’ was going to be completely out of my control. Where I used to be out the door before 9am strolling to work with a coffee in hand, I was now barely managing to get dressed by midday and frizzy curls had become my daily look, not out of choice but convenience. I had to make the biggest adjustment of my life: to slow down and realise that I couldn’t use a to-do list to raise my beautiful son.

In becoming a mother, you learn a million new things every day, and over the last few months, I’ve relied heavily on the advice of my other mum friends. Of course, being an organiser, I thought it might be helpful to compress and compile these into 10 bullet points – the bite size guide I wish I’d had prior to embarking upon this crazy ride.

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Christina Grant, a Black hand model, has become used to seeing images of herself that have been digitally altered. “I have seen my hand lightened in post[-production] to the point where I thought, ‘Wait, that doesn’t look like me,’” she tells Refinery29. Over the course of her career, she’s worked with about 15 different beauty brands and knows firsthand how an image can be doctored to get the effect a brand is looking for — sometimes even before the shot is taken. “I remember one time on set, the makeup artist put all of this makeup on my hand, which is normal sometimes, but she made my hand three shades darker. I asked her if she was going to blend it out, but she said she was done.”

Beauty photographer and makeup artist Hayley Kassel is also familiar with the lengths some brands go to for perfect campaign images. Things get especially murky when beauty brands don’t make the products that suit the skin tones of the models they hire. “Sometimes a brand doesn’t have a particular model’s exact shade of foundation,” says Kassel. “So they end up Photoshopping [her] skin tone. Honestly, it confuses the hell out of me. I feel like some brands think the people won't notice, but we do, and we care.”

"I have seen my hand lightened in post[-production] to the point where I thought, 'Wait, that doesn’t look like me.'"

It’s an issue that’s become especially prevalent in a post-Fenty era. As brands race to develop new foundations, or add shades to existing lines, swatches — images that show the full extent of a brand’s shade range by painting product directly onto the skin – have become the name of the game in an increasingly e-commerce driven world. It’s one of the many ways these companies can try to prove their new inclusive products are legit (years of mistrust aren’t erased overnight). Get them right, and the brand will be a hit before the products even hit the shelves. Get them wrong, and you might end up like StyleNanda, Becca Cosmetics, and Il Makiage, three brands who have been accused of Photoshopping swatches of their products recently.

“Swatches really become the only way someone can accurately guesstimate which shades to purchase when shopping online,” says Ofunne Amaka, founder of @Cocoaswatches, an Instagram account and mobile app that showcases swatches on underrepresented skin tones. “Swatches are especially important for women of colour and people of colour who often aren’t able to find their shades in store.”

Even if a brand does have a great shade range, it can get skewered on social media for a Photoshop fail. Tweaking skin tones or lazily superimposing computer-made swatches over a model’s arm undercuts the admirable efforts brands are making in product and shade development. Companies are rendering their own product swatches useless with excessive — and often offensive — photo editing.

Earlier this summer, StyleNanda was called out for showcasing its nail polish on a hand that appeared “blackfaced.” The brand didn’t reply to our requests for comment. However, the team did apologise on Instagram for the questionable swatches and removed the image from its social media feed. But this was just the first in a string of incidents.

In the case of Becca Cosmetics, the brand posted a now-deleted Instagram photo of the new 24-shade Skin Love Weightless Blur Foundation swatched on four different arms. It seemed as if the models’ skin had been altered in order to check off the light, medium, dark, and deep skin tone boxes. The resulting effect looked fake, and nobody on Twitter or Instagram was buying it.

A post shared by Mai (@ohmeohmai) on Aug 8, 2018 at 6:17pm PDT

"So did Becca Cosmetics really refuse to hire black women for these swatches? They just edited a white hand darker?" Twitter user @xfarahalyx asked, before going on to add, "Sometimes, I wonder if these people have actually met a Black or brown person in their lives." Users on Instagram, including beauty blogger Mai Thy Ly, were equally confused. “Most people don’t have palms that are the same colour as the rest of their arms,” she wrote in the caption of a repost of Becca Cosmetics’ now deleted image. “This is Photoshopped as heck and it is shameful that you’re trying to promote your ‘inclusive’ foundation range but can’t even bother to hire real models for the swatches.”

When we reached out to Becca Cosmetics, the brand directed us to its Instagram statement which is, for now, its last word on the matter. In a post featuring a new swatch photo (right), Becca Cosmetics asserts that it did in fact hire four different models for its original shoot. Becca also acknowledges that “the way we adjusted the image missed the mark” and maintains that the brand is “committed to showcasing the lightest to the deepest skin tones and hiring inclusive models for our campaigns.”

Fledgling brand Il Makiage got called out for a similar incident. In its case, the swatch photo featured four arms of different skin tones wearing an array of 50 foundation shades (yes, the brand one-upped Fenty Beauty). Commenters called foul, saying that the hands weren’t from actual models of colour. Co-founder Shiran Holtzman Erel says that’s not the case: “The models used were four diverse women, including an African-American woman,” she told Refinery29 over email. “The only digital alterations performed were in order to differentiate between the shades to help shoppers choose accurately.” So in this case, it wasn’t the hands that got touched up, but the foundation colours themselves.

We’ve got a shade for everyone. 50 😱 to be exact, b. #WokeUpLikeThis

A post shared by IL MAKIAGE (@ilmakiage) on Jul 25, 2018 at 10:17am PDT

By making it a point to hire models of colour, both brands prove they’re backing claims of inclusivity with behind-the-scenes choices, but that doesn’t completely dismiss the shady swatches. When we followed up with Ly, the blogger, over email about Becca Cosmetics’ statement, she held her ground. “The Becca swatches might be due to the use of makeup vs. Photoshop, but the issue still stands,” she writes. “It’s pandering and deceitful to recognise the buying power of people of colour without ensuring that they meet the needs of their customers.”

It’s not necessarily shocking that Photoshop was involved in these social media images. Post-production editing is regularly used on makeup and skin-care campaigns to get rid of a pimple, erase a smudge, or whiten teeth before finalising an ad. Beautiful images are the goal, after all. Osase Emokpae, creator of @BrownGirlFriendly, an Instagram account that showcases new beauty launches on deep skin tones, understands the delicate balance brands are facing. “Brands have it in their best interest to create the most visually appealing photos and swatches for their promotional material,” she says. “I absolutely expect to see a brand’s swatches looking almost too perfect, but I don’t really mind because I understand that it’s meant to look as enticing as possible.”

“It’s pandering and deceitful to recognize the buying power of people of color without ensuring that they meet the needs of their customers.”

But along with beautiful images, brands are responsible for supporting their customers with useful — and truthful — information. Emokpae is quick to point out that inaccurate swatches are bad for everyone. “No matter who you are, from the very fair to the deepest dark, we all have the same question: Will this product look good on me? That can’t be answered without accurate representation.”

Where brands fall short in authenticity, Instagram bloggers like Amaka and Emokpae pick up the slack. Both women have built their social media followings around swatches for darker skin tones, and thousands of followers check in for their content when a new launch hits. The whole purpose of these swatches is to help women find shades that work; whereas brands are always hoping to sell more product.

For Emokpae an image can take hours to create, and post-production isn’t a priority. “I always post video of my swatches so people can see them in action and know that they’re actually legit,” she says. “It’s a very time-intensive process for me. I’m not paid to do any of it, which sucks because countless times, people have thought my swatches and product photos are official images from the brand or that they look better than what the brand has produced.”

Until we can be sure that the swatches brands offer are free of retouching, we’ll be turning to bloggers and influencers who don’t stand to gain financially from jumping on the inclusivity train. “It's more than just giving us a 40-shade foundation line and going back to your regularly scheduled program,” says Amaka. “True diversity and inclusion require a holistic approach. You can tell when a true effort is being made and when it's not.”

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Another day, another gross story of misogyny and sexism coming out of Hollywood. Earlier this week, actress Rosamund Pike made an appearance on Amazon's Audible Sessions, where The Independent reports she recalled being asked to strip for an audition in her early 20s.

Pike, who's built her career starring in films like Gone Girl and A United Kingdom, revealed that she was asked to (and, ultimately, refused to) strip down into her underwear before auditioning for the 2002 James Bond film, Die Another Day.

"My first audition was for a Bond film, and I remember them saying I was to drop my dress and appear in my underwear," she said, according to The Independent. "On the day, I don't know how I got the resolve and strength of mind, but I just thought, 'Actually, sod that, if they're gonna see me in my underwear, they better give me the job.' So, I thought, 'There's no way I'm going to take off a dress in the audition for this tape to be sent around Los Angeles and to be judged on that.'"

Pike said the costume designer at the audition told her that the dress she was wearing (a gift from her grandmother) was "beautiful," but didn't quite fit the overall Bond vibe. Instead, she tried to persuade Pike to wear "three pieces of string."

"I realised I was in a completely different world and way out of my depth," Pike said. "So, I put on this shimmering sheath, or whatever the order of the day was, but I didn't drop it."

Ultimately, Pike did take a role in the film and had nothing but positive things to say about producer Barbara Broccoli who advocated for her and ensured the set was respectful and free from additional sexism. (Barbara wins here on two fronts: having the best name in the business, and being a defender of human decency.)

Pike's story is, unfortunately, all too familiar for many prominent Hollywood stars. Last year, Jennifer Lawrence shared a harrowing casting experience in which she was asked to stand in a "nude lineup."

"During this time a female producer had me do a nude lineup with about five women who were much, much thinner than me," she recalled during Elle 's Women in Hollywood event, according to BuzzFeed. "We are stood side-by-side with only tape on covering our privates. After that degrading and humiliating lineup, the female producer told me I should use the naked photos of myself as inspiration for my diet."

Another horrifying audition story comes from actress Emmy Rossum, who claimed that a director once asked her to meet him wearing nothing but a bikini in exchange for a part in his film.

Something's got to change, and it's not women's expectations that they'll be treated fairly and professionally.

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ASOS is working with one of music royalty's favourite luxury designers to launch its biggest collaboration to date. The ASOS DESIGN x LaQuan Smith collection, coming on 29th October, will feature both menswear and womenswear pieces, including ASOS Curve, ASOS Plus styles and accessories.

The young, New-York based Smith has dressed a string of world-famous artists including Beyoncé, most recently during her joint On The Run II tour with Jay Z, as well as Cardi B, Rihanna, Jennifer Lopez and Justine Skye.

It's the first time that lusted-after designs by Smith, who started his brand at just 21 and debuted it in 2013, are being made available to the masses.

A post shared by Beyoncé (@beyonce) on Jun 6, 2018 at 1:21pm PDT

The line, which starts at £18, will include shapes from LaQuan’s mainline collections, such as off-the-shoulder and bodycon dresses, as well as the vertical glitter stripes (as seen on Beyoncé) that he's become known for, on bodysuits with matching shorts and T-shirts. Bomber jackets, a faux fur maxi coat and low-slung camouflage trousers will also be available.

The bold range of accessories will feature velvet knee-high padded boots, micro silver sunglasses and a crystal mesh du-rag, while the menswear will include a button-down contrast tartan coat with matching structured trousers and cross-body bag.

Bardi! #LaquanSmith 🔥❤️

A post shared by LaQuan Smith- Designer (@laquan_smith) on Jan 8, 2018 at 1:35pm PST

The online retailer said it wants to give "customers the confidence to express their individuality as they enter party season." The 29-year-old designer echoed the company's sentiment, saying the collaboration stands for "confidence and being unapologetic in who you are."

He told ASOS Magazine: "It’s always about accentuating the body and this concept collection will reinforce that in an affordable and attainable way."

The take over @badgalriri wearing custom #laquansmith 🔥🔥🔥

A post shared by LaQuan Smith- Designer (@laquan_smith) on Sep 28, 2015 at 4:52am PDT

ASOS has won praise for the upcoming line on social media, with some describing it as an example of the company giving a platform to a black designer making waves in the industry. Lola Okuyiga, a former buyer at ASOS, was reportedly instrumental in getting the collaboration off the ground.

Smith thanked ASOS on social media accounts earlier this month. "Remember, God doesn’t close one door with out getting ready to open another with bigger and greater things. LaQuan Smith x ASOS concept collection dropping in October!," he wrote, before tagging the brand.

Remember, God doesn’t close one door with out getting ready to open another with bigger and greater things. LaQuan Smith x ASOS concept collection dropping in October! Major thanks to @rayalexsmith @wsj @asos 📸 @photodre

A post shared by LaQuan Smith- Designer (@laquan_smith) on Aug 4, 2018 at 8:32am PDT

ASOS' Made in Kenya range, which launched back in 2009 in partnership with SOKO, saw the brand work with brother and sister duo 2ManySiblings on a range of bold summer pieces earlier this year. The eye-catching line also received creative input from radio presenter Julie Adenuga, and model and activist Leomie Anderson.

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I had to face the music. I wasn’t 30 going on 13, I was 26 going on 27 and becoming cripplingly uncool.

XXXTenacion had died and I didn’t know who he was; I've had to admit I'm more familiar with Shaun the Sheep than Shawn Mendes and then with my dignity in tatters I asked my cousin if Ikr was an off-shoot of IKEA. There was only thing to deduce from this – I was getting older. I was becoming out of touch with a younger generation who could never fathom the heartache caused by scratched CD-ROMs or Nokia’s monophonic ringtones. In Gen Z’s eyes I was probably just another old fart, the kind they think plagues Facebook – alas, what’s a millennial to do when they start losing their cool?

Alas, what’s a millennial to do when they start losing their cool?

If you graduated from university deep into the recession you may be acquainted with the premature quarter-life crisis. It hits early, around 22. That’s when the real world crushes all your hopes, expectations and dreams to smithereens, but on the plus side, you still fit into your Depop crop and can get away with having one bev on a weeknight without feeling like your insides have been hung, drawn and quartered the next day.

25-year-old advertising executive Norma Nwokenna reflects on this: "We’re still so far away from becoming successful adults, the only quantifiable thing I could hang onto was being young and cool. Instead, now I’m a loser, crippled in debt, unable to afford a house and with zero career prospects – at least being cool made me feel warm inside". Silver linings, right? Think again. After barely surviving your quarter-life crisis and you’re creeping into your late 20s but fast approaching your 30s, the millennial mid-life crisis comes out of nowhere. Hitting you like Theresa May’s curtsy, one moment upright and tall, then suddenly – bam! – contorted limbs collapsing into an incomprehensible heap. You’re not only re-evaluating your life as you approach a milestone birthday, but now keeping up with the Gen Z’s seems more arduous than keeping up with the Kardashians.

Of course social media must be held accountable; Instagram offers endless and easily accessible points of comparison, as you wistfully watch Gen Z’s like Iris Law and Kylie Jenner living their best life better than you would if you had nine. Factor in Instagram is the worst app for our mental health and us ‘idealist’ millennials are its heaviest users – it’s a one-way ticket for self-sabotage.

It turns out technology has lots to answer for, as 29-year-old Content Manager Hannah Parry reveals. "My nieces ask me to add them on Tik Tok. I thought that was a Kesha song, turns out it’s an app. Kick’s another one – #confused."

Meanwhile 27-year-old PA Georgina Dilkes is hooked on acronyms. "You know when you say something to be ironic, but you’re just being uncool? I say YOLO once a day and can’t get it out of my vocabulary – that and bae. I hate myself for it, but I can’t help it. Gotta roll with it.’

For 26-year-old homeware buyer Merran Mills the struggle to stay on-trend keeps her on her toes. "Can someone tell me if I’m tying my trainer’s right, what’s the cool way to lace them? I just don’t know." A pair of fresh creps would come in handy for her next concern..."Not knowing the latest hype dance – from Macarena to Le Bloc Boy, from Cha Cha Slide to Flossing – I feel old." How fussed is she really? "Too tired to keep up."

For 30-year-old marketing manager Alessandra Campos dark and dingy nightclubs bring to light the disparities between her and Gen Zs. "Vision’s Video bar is swarmed with 19-year-olds in health goth from Kayne’s collections. Then imagine me, in my yoga pants." Does it bother her? "I’m totally cool with being uncool. Still, I don’t get trap music – it wasn’t a thing growing up. Who are these players and why is Tyga spelt with a 'y' – sorry, why are we spelling things incorrectly?"

It’s not just the stress of what to wear clubbing and misspelt artists, but also where to go. Norma elaborates: "I ask my mate’s younger sister every time if we go on a night out if I’m becoming uncool, but by doing that I’m automatically fucking uncool, but I still ask." Ultimately does she care how she’s perceived? "I don’t get worried about it because I’m still hanging on to enjoying going out by the skin of my teeth. Only when I’m faced with younger people is there the drastic realisation I have 2000 more things to worry about – and that’s why they’re so cool".

While the millennial mid-life crisis entails a constant battle between cultivated indifference and suddenly freaking out we’ve turned into a frump – are we losing any sleep over it? No. The general consensus seems we’d rather accept that becoming uncool is the new cool so we can go to sleep soundly, reminiscing over Tammy Girl and Tamagotchis. It’s only natural our interests and definition of what’s on-trend evolves with age – like a preference for crockery shopping over Cabernet Sauvignon (don’t judge).

Regardless, our definition of cool should always be grounded within ourselves. Chidera Eggerue (The Slumflower) reiterates in What A Time To Be Alone: " Hanging out with people who you think 'look cool' won’t necessarily make you cool if you are doing nothing to develop yourself to a level where you can be cool with you, without any other association with anybody." Ultimately, you’re only as cool as you feel and that’s all the validation you need. Now Google Shawn Mendes before anyone else sees.

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As one of the first women to come forward with accusations of sexual misconduct against movie producer Harvey Weinstein, actress Asia Argento has positioned herself as a prominent voice in the #MeToo movement. On Sunday, the New York Times reported that in the months following her accusation, Argento allegedly paid £285,000 to an accuser of her own.

In 2013, Argento allegedly had a sexual encounter with then-17-year-old actor Jimmy Bennett when she was 37. Bennett had starred alongside Argento in The Heart Is Deceitful Above All Things, and the two had developed a "mother-son" relationship, according to a statement from his lawyer, Gordon K. Sattro.

The documents of the arrangement, which were sent to the New York Times, detail Bennett's account of the events of May 9, 2013. He says he came with a family member to visit Argento at her room in the Ritz-Carlton in Marina del Rey, California. Argento allegedly asked the family member to leave, gave Bennett alcohol, and then performed oral sex on Bennett before the two had sexual intercourse. After they had lunch, Bennett was driven home, and during the ride, he began to feel "extremely confused, mortified, and disgusted," according to Sattro. Reps for Argento and Bennett did not immediately return Refinery29's request for comment, and Argento did not respond to requests for comment from The New York Times.

It wasn't until Argento became a public face for the #MeToo movement that Bennett's feelings about their encounter prompted him and his lawyer to ask for £2.6 million in damages for the intentional infliction of emotional distress, lost wages, assault, and battery. He says the trauma from this encounter is to blame for his loss of income, which dropped from £2 million in the five years prior to the 2013 incident to £45,000 a year since. The agreement between the two parties stipulated that Argento must pay £285,000 over the course of a year and half, beginning with £150,000 in April. According to the Times, Argento received guidance on this matter from her late boyfriend Anthony Bourdain, who died by suicide in June. Bourdain and Argento shared the same lawyer, Richard Hofstetter, who received Bennett's initial intent to sue, although Carrie Goldberg was the lawyer who ultimately handled Argento's agreement.

Notably, the agreement does not include a nondisclosure agreement, something Argento and others have spoken out against due to their role in silencing victims of sexual assault. However, the agreement does not allow Bennett to sue Argento over his claims, nor can he post a photo that he took of the two of them during the encounter.

Argento broke her own silence in October 2017 when she spoke to Ronan Farrow for a bombshell article in The New Yorker. She claimed Harvey Weinstein sexually assaulted her in 1997 when she was 21 years old. Through his lawyer, Weinstein has denied all accusations of nonconsensual sex.

If you have experienced sexual violence of any kind, please visit Rape Crisis or call 0808 802 9999.

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In May, when Kickstarter named Meredith Graves, a former journalist who founded the punk band Perfect Pussy, its new Director of Music, Graves went one place to announce the news: Twitter.

But this was not just any announcement. It was a “some personal news” kind of announcement.

“Every child dreams of the day they can grow up and start a tweet with ‘some personal news…’ !!!” Graves tweeted.

every child dreams of the day they can grow up and start a tweet with "some personal news..." !!!!! @kickstarter https://t.co/SIrCJypYJ0

— meredith graves (@gravesmeredith) May 14, 2018

Those three little words have become indicative of the “big announcement” post. It's a construction that might be taken at face value when spoken in person but has taken on a whole new, elevated meaning on social media. Sometimes used to introduce babies or marriages, though more often used to share new jobs and promotions, “some personal news” has rapidly grown in popularity becoming one of the most well-known insider phrases, and, in some cases, inside joke, on Twitter today. On a platform that has been full of negativity and misinformation of late, it has also become one of the rare, welcome signals that what you’re about to read is good news or, at the very least, news that will make you laugh. Circa 2009, you might have shared this information on Facebook. But nowadays, Twitter is the far timelier and relevant alternative: A place where you know your message will reach your peers, both professional and social.

A Twitter search for “some personal news” shows that the phrase started showing up in tweets from public accounts in 2010. For the most part, users — primarily those working in media — directed followers offsite, to a blog post (a blog!) where the job announcement or other personal news was explored in depth. In 2012, author and political activist Donna Brazile put the phrase to sarcastic use, foreshadowing some of its current purpose as a satirical vehicle. It wasn’t until 2013 that “some personal news” became a regular, even expected way to not only announce a new job, but also react to the mundane with irony. According to Twitter data, use of the phrase has steadily increased every year since 2010 and tripled in use over the past five years.

Breaking personal news: I am not ready for snow! Just saying. Time to stir up some shrimp & grits. No work today, so I'll read my magazines.

— Donna Brazile (@donnabrazile) October 29, 2012

Its most obvious predecessor was “So, I wrote a thing” a phrase that devolved into mockery sometime around 2014 and, by 2016, turned into highbrow humour pieces in The New Yorker and Reductress. Saying “So, I wrote a thing” was the humblebrag equivalent of saying, “I wrote something that I think is incredibly wonderful and I am a genius who would appreciate if you would click on this link and revel in my extremely intelligent work.” At least that wordier alternative was straightforward in its snobbery. The understated manner of “So, I wrote a thing” turned it into a phrase that was reviled for its lack of self-awareness, like that friend who got an A+ but says they didn’t do that well.

Currently, “some personal news” straddles the line between the literal and ironic. While it is still frequently used to announce job changes, it can also be used to hyperbolic effect. Take Abby Tannenbaum who used the phrase last week when she announced she was going to Sweetgreen for dinner. This hardly qualified as "news" for Tannenbaum, a digital strategist living in D.C., who told Refinery29 she goes to the salad shop approximately five days a week. But with "some personal news" attached it was suddenly funny, in an almost exclusive way that only a Twitter audience familiar with the phrase can comprehend.

Some personal news: In a shocking turn of events I’ve decided to go to sweetgreen for dinner

— Meryl Streep's Overalls (@abbytbaum18) August 12, 2018

Lately, it seems like it’s hard to scroll past even 15 posts without hitting a “some personal news” tweet. This frequency may be a direct result of Twitter’s decision to launch threads last December, which made it easier for people to string together thoughts about leaving a current job, or tell the full story of “some personal news” in one go. (Farewell, blog posts of yore.) As with any phrase, overuse threatens to ruin the joke, or even the effectiveness of the message when it is delivered seriously.

“[It’s] definitely overused,” says Kami Mattioli, a digital marketer in New York who used the phrase in irony last month in a tweet about her fake website. “Every time someone uses it, particularly on Twitter, I roll my eyes.”

Some personal news: I’m starting my own site — The Unathletic — where we just bitch about flight delays, bad press box food and those damn Milennials and their social media.

— Kami Mattioli (@Kami) July 16, 2018

Though Mattioli says she prefers the sarcastic uses to the literal, “even that is getting tired.”

Even if it is overused, that doesn’t mean it isn’t still appreciated. In the same way that it's hard to scroll past 15 tweets without hitting "some personal news," it's near impossible to scroll past even five tweets without coming across bad news. In this scenario, most people would take the repetitive positivity associated with the former any day of the week.

“I love it — regardless of what people attach to the phrase, I always find myself smiling,” Rishi Magia, a creative director in Brooklyn who recently used the phrase, to viral effect, to announce the adoption of his new rescue pup, Henry. “I feel like ‘some personal news’ has, as the kids say, the range. I’m going to enjoy it before the next bizarre Twitter thing comes along.”

some personal news, @d_plaut and i got a pup!!! meet henry, rescued from a kill shelter in upstate new york 💞 @darth @dog_rates would love to know if he deserves a proper twitter welcome, 13/10 we're a bit biased 😍 pic.twitter.com/LaMbR7FCeP

— rishi (@rmagia) August 7, 2018

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First lady Melania Trump took the stage at a cyberbullying summit as part of her Be Best campaign Monday — on the same morning as President Donald Trump attacked a Department of Justice official on Twitter.

In her remarks at the Federal Partners in Bullying Prevention Cyberbullying Prevention Summit, she warned against the "destructive and harmful" effects of using social media "incorrectly."

"Let’s face it: most children are more aware of the benefits and pitfalls of social media than some adults, but we still need to do all we can to provide them with information and tools for successful and safe online habits," she said, praising programs such as Microsoft’s Council for Digital Good, a panel of teens that works to bring issues like sextortion to the government's attention.

Wearing a pussy-bow blouse, Melania also promoted Be Best, a three-part initiative focusing on "wellbeing, social media, and opioid abuse," which she launched back in May. "Be Best chooses to focus on the importance of teaching our next generation how to conduct themselves safely and in a positive manner in an online setting," she said.

.@FLOTUS Melania Trump: "Social media is an eventful part of our children's daily lives. It can be used in many positive ways but can also be destructive and harmful when used incorrectly." pic.twitter.com/AnMbBhHVR0

— CSPAN (@cspan) August 20, 2018

Meanwhile, the president spent the morning calling Robert Mueller's special counsel investigation into dealings with Russia a "Rigged Witch Hunt," as well as disparaging Democrats, former CIA director John Brennan, and Bruce Ohr, the Justice Department official with ties to the infamous Steele Dossier.

Less than a week ago, the president called his former employee Omarosa Manigault-Newman — who recently said there's a recording in which he used the n-word multiple times — a "lowlife" and a "dog" on Twitter. "When you give a crazed, crying lowlife a break, and give her a job at the White House, I guess it just didn't work out. Good work by General Kelly for quickly firing that dog!" he tweeted.

In summary: The first lady promoted anti-cyberbullying initiatives while her husband went on a tweetstorm in which he attacked multiple people in personal way.

Asked by a White House pool reporter about this seeming hypocrisy, Stephanie Grisham, Melania's communications director, said:

"The first lady’s presence at events such as today's cyberbullying summit elevates an issue that is important to children and families across this country. She is aware of the criticism but it will not deter her from doing what she feels is right. The president is proud of her commitment to children and encourages her in all that she does."

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The name “Harvard” evokes a picture of an institution on the cutting edge, an image filled with brilliant academics and Supreme Court Justices; life-saving researchers and paradigm-shifting writers. Yet Harvard sits on the precipice of disaster as opponents of affirmative action seek to ruin the school’s ability to intentionally create a diverse learning environment that fosters the creativity, scholarship and leadership the university is famous for.

These opponents of affirmative action — Edward Blum with Students for Fair Admissions (SFFA) — are suing Harvard for its race-conscious admissions policies, under the guise that they limit the acceptance of Asian American students. However, SFFA’s true intentions — to pit one marginalised group against another in an attempt to obliterate affirmative action — have never been more obvious.

Just last week, the group requested that the court block out the voices of student associations like the Association of Black Harvard Women and the Harvard-Radcliffe Black Student Association, both of which I am a member, as well as the Harvard Korean Association, the Harvard Asian American Women’s Association, the Harvard Vietnamese Association, and many more. It is narrow and backward of Edward Blum to attempt to debate the merits of affirmative action by striking students’ lived experiences, especially from a case that is supposedly about improving the experience of students. But I refuse to be silenced.

If affirmative action is erased from Harvard’s admissions process, with it will go the futures of many brilliant students of colour. Affirmative action is designed to address the historical inequities that have devastated communities for generations. It also works to rectify the ongoing systemic bias in school systems and admissions offices that rob students of color of classroom seats in colleges and universities across the country. Today, white students are still four times more likely than Black students to be enrolled in top-scoring schools.

According to The Harvard Crimson, the makeup of this year’s admitted students was 22.7% Asian American, 15.5% African American, 12.2%t Latinx, and 2% Native American — making it the first time that most of Harvard’s admitted class is made up of people of colour. Yet, even going to the best schools in the country does not ensure an equal educational experience for Black students. Most of the Black students I’ve talked to at Harvard have been locked out of an academic opportunity during their schooling. At my predominantly white, Houston high school, one of my duties as a leader for our African American Affinity Group was to create study groups for Black underclassmen because they were excluded from on-campus study groups inherited by their white counterparts. Their parents were not invited to conversations where other parents discussed the best tutors and the tricks of navigating an expensive and stratified private school.

The inequities continue as standardised testing plays a central role in the college admissions process. It is myopic to compare the test scores of students without taking into consideration the disparate support they have been able to access. In fact, SAT scores are less a metric of intelligence or worthiness of a college education than a determinant of privilege. SATs are constructed year-by-year by discarding the questions that students who do not typically do as well on the SAT (read: underrepresented students of colour and students from low-income communities) do well on, essentially keeping in power those who are already afforded educational opportunity. And when used as a determinant of success in college, SAT scores have little correlation with freshman year GPAs.

Affirmative action is an essential tool for any school that wants to create a diverse and inclusive student body. Admissions officers, like all of us, retain learned societal racial bias and may — consciously or unconsciously — apply this bias in the process, making them more willing to closely consider white students. If these admissions officers are not allowed to take into account the racism that Black, Latinx, and Native American students have experienced that has blocked their opportunities for academic achievement, they will only deepen the racist systems that have locked these students out of the ivory tower for generations.

People of colour make many contributions to Harvard – yet many of our contributions go unrecognised in discussions of the success of affirmative action because they are not easily quantifiable. How do you measure the importance of a student’s presence in a classroom conversation that would otherwise lack the perspective of a person of colour? How do you characterise the impact BlackCAST, Kuumba, Eleganza, HC TEATRO! and individual students of colour have had on Harvard’s arts scene? How do you measure the impact that Black students have had on the spiritual life on Harvard’s campus? How do you measure the impact we have had on activism, ensuring that Harvard is physically safe for Black students and undocumented students, and that it provides health care and unionisation for its most vulnerable workers? These contributions cannot be quantified, but their impact ripples through the Harvard community and beyond.

This is important, not solely because of how negatively it would affect Harvard to lose the attendance of brilliant Black and brown students, but also because removing affirmative action at our school could have damaging aftershocks at educational institutions across the country. It would limit the college enrolment of people from historically marginalised communities nationwide by blocking their admission. And because we have so much to give to the world that education can help us unlock, everyone else will also lose when these institutions limit access to opportunities for success.

A system that does not use affirmative action does not adequately reflect or correct for the racism students encounter. Failing to account for the systemic denial of educational resources to students of colour, or for the racist tendencies of those in power, would make Harvard itself complicit in racism. And that is not what I want people to picture when they think about the school I love.

Madison Trice is a rising sophomore at Harvard and a member of both the Harvard Black Students Association and the Association of Black Harvard Women. She hails from Houston, Texas.

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Fixated with Ariana’s Grande’s love life this year? She knows. She indulges the gossip – her split with Mac Miller and her very public (and strangely endearing) whirlwind engagement to Pete Davidson – on Sweetener, her fourth studio album, putting her diva-power pipes to some sad and some sugar-coated tracks about men, romance, heartache, and sex. But the real guiding event behind the album is Manchester and her recovery and search for normalcy after that attack.

With Grande writing so much of the album, her strange but delightful sense of humour comes through much more prominently than in her past work. Part of that also comes from working with Pharrell, who produces the vast majority of the tracks and enjoys a kooky musical turn as well as an unexpected turn of phrase. The two perform together on “blazed,” where they sandwich the divine search for a soulmate between a lyric about getting high (“Don't think that it cannot happen, 'cause it can / Shawty, you can get blazed / Sleep if you want, and wake up in love again"). He compliments Grande’s unpredictable creative impulses, and “successful,” with its Us3 “Cataloop” sounding groove, is a particular standout in a sea of off-kilter songs, as are “R.E.M.” and the album’s title track. Together, Pharrell and Grande make a pop sound unlike anything else happening right now. It’s a mixture of signature N.E.R.D. beats filtered through the negative space so popular in SoundCloud rap, with Grande’s distinct, feminine signature embossed on top. It’s a giant step away from the standard Max Martin template, and nothing like the Jack Antonoff production scheme that has come to define the sound of women in pop.

Following the suicide bombing at one of her concerts in Manchester in 2017, the singer has had a lot to overcome: anxiety, panic attacks, and depression. But Grande seems to have taken to heart the idea that living one's best life is a way to combat that darkness. She celebrates those ideas all over Sweetener, but they come through strongly in “breathin,” “the light is coming,” and especially in “ God is a woman,” the only song with a capital letter in the title. “God,” along with “successful,” is an epic dismissal of the religious dogma that subjugates women and the art they create. Grande has always identified as a feminist, but after what she has been through and the place American women currently find themselves in, it’s radical to hear a young, female artist talk about how she’s excelling and why she’s influential.

The album does have its lighter moments, most of which are focused on relationships. The lightest of the light is, hands down, the brief track written for her fiancé, “ pete davidson.” There’s a universality in the Imogene Heap-sampling “goodnight n go” as well as “everytime.” In the end, Grande is an optimist on “ get well soon,” a love letter to the fans who are struggling to get through the day. There is less vibrato, less of that signature high-pitched melisma and more from Grande’s lower ranges. It feels like with every “yup” and “woop” we’re hearing Grande’s id in a way we never have before.

Via humour, true ferocity, charismatic wackiness, and not much sentimentality, Sweetener paints a completely unexpected and honest (if at times abstract) picture of Grande right now – a year after tragedy and in the throes of romantic bliss. She seems to have unlocked a new level of creativity, one that goes beyond a good single here and there.

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Imagine letting your mum set you up with someone of her choosing. How would you feel? Terrified? Hysterical? Disorientated? Me too. It’s simple crush maths. Parent likes partner = daughter is repulsed by them. Parent disapproves of partner = daughter goes out of her way to be with them. But if we put our memories of teenage heartache aside for a moment, there’s another perspective on parent-approved dating to consider…

In a new one-off Channel 4 documentary show called Manhunting with My Mum, Blackburn-born TV presenter AJ Odudu heads to her family’s native Nigeria with her mum, Florence. The aim of the trip is to (yes, you guessed it) find AJ a man. Florence gets to play matchmaker and sets her daughter up on some carefully selected dates with a few very different men in hopes that one of them will be what AJ is looking for. For AJ, though, the journey is as much about finding a boyfriend as it is learning a bit more about the traditions and etiquette of Nigerian dating culture.

“A lot happened at the back end of last year. A lot being my turning 30,” AJ tells Refinery29 UK. Up until now, she's spent most of her time focusing on her career. Having become a familiar presence on British television screens (you might recognise her from Big Brother's Bit On The Side, or 4Music's Trending Live), landing a gig as one of the faces of L'Oréal's TrueMatch foundation and fronting a number of fitness campaigns – work has very much been at the forefront of her agenda.

Hitting 30 prompted AJ to reflect on what she's achieved so far and who she's got to share it with. “I never thought that I would get stressed about turning 30. I think it’s the realisation that life moves so quickly and you can just be working all the time and then … despite everything I’ve done, I’m not sharing this with someone I truly love, so to speak, and I thought that was something I wanted to focus on as well."

It’s okay to want to be loved, its okay to want to be in a relationship. It doesn’t mean that you’re not independent, it doesn’t mean that you are sacrificing your belief

It's a dynamic many of us are familiar with. At one point or another, we've all felt the pressure to prove ourselves as exemplary #IndependentWomen who don't need no man. It's an unfair image that can't help but make you feel guilty for craving companionship, but AJ is embracing this proactive quest for a boyfriend. "It is quite tricky sometimes, when people on the outside look at you and they go 'but you’ve got everything I don’t understand what’s wrong with you' and then you start questioning what’s wrong with you and actually I’ve just realised that it’s okay to want to be loved, its okay to want to be in a relationship. It doesn’t mean that you’re not independent, it doesn’t mean that you are sacrificing your belief, it just means that that’s an additional thing that you want to have. And even just admitting that was quite a big deal for me this year."

Hitting the big 3-0 also prompted the realisation that it had been almost a decade since she'd been to Nigeria. "When I went aged 21 I absolutely loved it. I felt really connected, I had the best time and I was like 'yeah yeah I’m going to come back every year' and I just didn’t."
So an opportunity arose: a road trip to find guys and reconnect with her heritage in the process.

By her age, AJ's mum Florence had emigrated, married and had five children. "And even though we've had very, very different careers, she still finds it baffling that I don't have children!", AJ says. She and her mum have had very different romantic journey's too. AJ's parents had an arranged marriage. "That is one thing that my mum said, that an arranged marriage for me wouldn't necessarily be the same way that she had an arranged marriage. The way she felt about her arranged marriage was actually really positive, therefore I've never had any real negative connotations from a personal point of view."

Five years ago, if you'd have asked AJ whether she'd ever have an arranged marriage and let her parents set her up with someone, the answer would've been a resounding "No way!" but her perspective seems to have changed. "My mum has always been like, 'yeah, do what you want' however my mum also finds this way of dating just absolutely mad. She can’t believe people are on dating apps, flicking through like it’s the yellow pages," AJ explains. "Its really weird because we always turn to our friends. If were not on dating apps you might ask to be sat next to the the single hot guy at a wedding, or you think 'surely someone in this office has a friend to hook me up with'. We never actually ask our parents and they know so much more than you think."

As AJ discovered over the course of the programme, Florence played cupid pretty well but the matchmaking wasn't all plain sailing. The biggest barrier with a couple of the men AJ met was their differing perspectives on what a woman's role should be in a relationship and how some of the traditional aspects of Nigerian relationships don't always translate to Western norms. AJ was not on board with being subservient. Nevertheless, now that AJ is back in the UK she says she'd be open to repeating the process. "I’ll definitely be more open to going on dates that my parents have recommended for me to see, even though it is still really cringe!" she says. "But actually now I’m like, 'yeah, bring on the Nigerian wedding, hook me up with whoever, I trust you now', I’ve found a new level of trust!"

Manhunting With My Mum is on Channel 4 on Tuesday 21st August at 10pm

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"A rejection is nothing more than a necessary step in the direction of success."

"Rejection is a challenge."

"Rejection gives you more power to push forward."

If you linked the number of faux-inspirational phrases about how to turn rejection into a positive thing, you could probably make it to the moon and back. It's become fashionable to start networking conversations with strangers about how many times you have failed. Failure is not the same as rejection. You might fail to do 10 squats in the gym but you can try again tomorrow. Rejection is the instructor telling you you’re too unfit to work with and he won’t even dignify the situation by taking you on as a client. Rejection stings, while failure can be motivational.

Rejection stings, while failure can be motivational

I am a rejection junkie. Since I started writing plays, I’ve received a rejection email on average once a day. Glass-half-full types high-five me and say: "Yes! That means you’re trying! Keep at it!" The rest of the world says: "Probably just stop."

When I started out in journalism many moons ago, I would send out a pitch, chase three times for a reply and then finally get a solitary "no". At least in theatre, writers often get a rambling response: "Sorry we felt the play didn’t have enough sharks in it, and as a pro-shark organisation we are sorry blah blah blah..."

My favourite thing is being rejected by companies I don’t remember submitting to months and months later, because by that point I don’t care. The other week I was rejected by two theatre companies in one day, one at 06:45 and the other at 21:32. Once, after being shortlisted, I was rejected from the Royal Court Writers Group at nearly midnight on a Friday. I was drunk and confused, and it’s fair to say it bummed me out. I mean, c’mon guys.

Most creatives accept that rejection is a way of life, but should we stop always dressing it up as a positive thing? When, if ever, is it the right time to listen to rejection and accept maybe we’re just not good at something? Is pure self-belief enough to drive a career?

I networked and worked my ass off, but I was rejected all the time

Laura* now works for the NHS, but for seven years she tried to make acting work. "It still hurts to admit it, to be honest," she says. "But I realised I probably wasn’t good enough. I went to a mid-level drama school in a world where these things matter and I did bit-parts, extra work, unpaid Fringe work. I networked and worked my ass off, but I was rejected all the time. I think in total, in seven years, I earned about £500 quid from acting and made the rest of my money from working in a bar."

She says she was "embarrassed" that she failed and gave up, but it was important she did. "Rejection was destroying my mental health. I felt worthless, and I realised I was keeping going because that’s what I’d always done, like I owed it to myself and all the work I’d put in over time. I was happy, eventually, to be out."

Rejection, whether for your dream job or by a person you thought fancied you but actually hated you, hurts. Studies show that the same neural pathways become activated when we experience rejection as when we feel physical pain. Scientists think we react so strongly to rejection today because it served a vital function in our evolutionary past; if we were rejected by our tribe we would struggle to survive, so we began to experience rejection more acutely to help us notice when we needed to pull up our socks to re-ingratiate ourselves.

Rejection can trigger feelings of shame ('Why did I bother?') and humiliation ('God, I must have been really terrible'). We like ourselves less after rejection, so should we really pay attention to all of these inspirational articles about 'getting rejected in order to succeed'?

It is how we are taught to cope or manage rejection that will determine our mental strength in the long term

"Everyone learns about rejection by experiencing it directly in some form and then coping with it, i.e. exam results, job applications, relationships," says Joy Scholes, director at Greenacre CBT and a CBT therapist with over 10 years’ experience. "Everyone needs to experience rejection but also learn how to manage and cope with that experience for the next time. Avoiding it completely would not be good for anyone’s mental health. In essence, it is how we are taught to cope or manage rejection that will determine our mental strength in the long term."

Keeping going is helpful, up to a point. If we all gave up the second we were rejected by something that mattered, we’d probably be setting ourselves up for a life of misery. But while pushing and being resilient is important, rejection can also teach us that maybe we’re not suited to doing something after all.

Jacqui Rose tried being a stand-up comedian before concluding it wasn’t for her and instead became a bestselling author. "I went [to a stand up night] along with a couple of pals and decided to go for it. Armed with a scruffy piece of paper with my notes on, I stood up in front of all of five people and rambled my way through my set. I did get a laugh, but stupidly, I didn’t realise the laugh was coming from my supportive friends and the five or six drunk people at the back."

She recounts how at another gig she stood in front of a large crowd and died. "A person from the crowd shouted something along the lines of, 'Come on we’re here to see comedy not to watch a wake.' After I’d muttered my way through, I hurried off only to hear the compere say, 'Give her a hand of applause, this was her dying wish!'"

She explains how she gave up comedy because she "wasn’t funny!" She says: "And I hated it, because I wasn’t wrapped up in the security of a character, I was being me. But do I regret it? No way. Would I do it again? No way."

One or two rejections can be dismissed as subjectivity. They’re clearly wrong and you’re great. End of. But after 29 rejections for all the plays, short plays, monologues and competition entries you’ve ever submitted, doubts begin to grow. What keeps me going is that one person in 50 will say they love your work. And maybe it’s dumb and misguided, but that one person keeps you going until the moment you can’t afford to eat because you spent your last penny investing in your passion.

Chris Ogle, business development manager at Flow Digital Agency, says: "Constant rejection from a promotion or new job hurts, and often the reasons are not always what you'd expect. [As a recruiter] you receive a CV which is poorly formatted, has irrelevant career history or is just downright boring. It's rejected and often no feedback is given. The candidate applies and applies and gets nowhere.

"Instead of just accepting rejection, try to find the real reasons behind what's going on," he advises. "Try something like 'I've experienced quite a bit of rejection recently and I would like your honest opinion as to where I'm falling short, feel free to be blunt'. This tells the decision maker that you’re ready for honest feedback that can actually have a positive impact on your career."

Blind passion isn’t positive, nor is blind self-belief, but if what you do makes you happy, and the rejections aren’t too crippling, keep going. Because that’s what I’m going to do in theatre until someone pulls me aside, probably after one too many white wines, and says: "Look, mate, you’re rubbish. Stop deluding yourself. You can’t write. There aren’t enough sea creatures in your work, and you’ll just never get anywhere without those, so have another drink, and just stop."

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No one sets out to have a bad marriage. When many couples say their vows while gazing into their partner's eyes, they're envisioning a lifetime of wedded bliss, complete with an endless supply of back rubs, emotional support and sex on tap. But as the current UK divorce rate shows – 42% of them end in divorce – marriage isn't always what it's cracked up to be.

Of course, there are usually legitimate reasons why people get divorced and there should be no stigma around it (arguably, the process should also be made easier). If you want to reduce the risk of divorce, you'd be wise to implement some damage limitation. A recent study of heterosexual couples, presented at the International Association for Relationship Research (IARR) conference in Colorado, found that marital disagreements take a toll on our mental and physical health. Disagreeing over topics such as children, money, in-laws and leisure activities can be as bad for us as smoking and drinking, which is as good an incentive as any to work on your marriage or long-term relationship.

Refinery29 UK asked six women what they've learned in their first year of marriage about dealing with conflicts and disagreements. Take notes.

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Every other week, a high street giant announces its latest designer collaboration, but there's one brand we can always rely on to produce a capsule we get truly excited about. & Other Stories has a long history of working with up-and-coming, sustainable, offbeat partners, whether it's Sonic Youth musician and author Kim Gordon, interiors brand House of Hackney, luxury labels Rodarte and Sadie Williams, or Swedish singer Lykke Li.

Once again, the brand is treating us to a capsule we'll be racing to get our hands on. A line of brightly hued, '70s-style slogan T-shirts, produced in collaboration with LA-based collective The Deep End Club, will be available online at & Other Stories on 22nd August. If you're not already familiar with The Deep End Club, founded by drummer Tennessee Thomas, you'll definitely have seen its trademark tee all over Instagram – reading 'Give A Damn', it's been worn by the likes of Alexa Chung, just one of the women in Tennessee's gang.

The 'community clubhouse' and online shop was founded back in 2013 by Tennessee as a space for artists and activists to voice concerns, find like-minded souls, and create positive solutions to the world's growing problems. Originally born out of the Occupy Wall Street movement, it continues to support and rally behind causes, from promoting gun safety to fostering community gardens, all while hosting Radical Open Mic Nights on Friday evenings in LA's Echo Park.

After visiting one of The Deep End Club's open mic nights, & Other Stories reached out to Tennessee about working together on a line of her signature T-shirts. "Tennessee inspires us with her unbounded creativity and her determination to create positive change in the world," Anna Nyrén, Head of Co-labs at & Other Stories, explains. "Thomas' energy shines through in the T-shirts, and we’re so excited to include two pieces uniquely made for us in the online pop-up."

The collection will include the trademark 'Give A Damn' slogan – recently on display at MoMA's Items: Is Fashion Modern? exhibition – alongside its 'In Solidarity' tee, plus two bespoke pieces featuring more psychedelic prints in mood-boosting colours. The lookbook and accompanying video (watch below) for the collection features Deep End Club members, Sasami Ashworth, Kyleigh Kuhn and Ariel Van Pelt, who grouped together to create the designs.

Political slogans may have become an easy trend for brands to tap into over the past few years, thus losing some of their clout, but with Tennessee and her band of artists and activists using their platforms to highlight injustices and bring communities together, this is one collection we'll be shouting about.

On the eve of the launch, we caught up with Tennessee, who told us about the causes she's rallying behind right now, who inspires her, and what's up next for The Deep End Club.

Why did you found The Deep End Club?

After Occupy Wall Street I wanted a place to hold space for these feelings and ideas. A place for communities to come together with the intention of being conscious of all the issues in the world – and seeing what we could do to feel less scared, isolated, indifferent, plus to collaborate on creating solutions, however small.

You met the & Other Stories founders at your Radical Open Mic Night in Echo Park – tell us about those events and why you host them...

I have a lot of incredibly creative and imaginative friends who have these profound radical ideas. People come through the space and tell me about all the incredible work they do, organisations they’re involved with, and inspiring stories and ideas from the past. I thought it would be fun to have the opportunity to present all of their ideas to the community through an open mic set-up. Sometimes there’s music too!

Your collaboration features your signature 'Give A Damn' slogan plus 'In Solidarity'. Which political and social causes are you in solidarity with right now?

The Democratic Party and moving towards the midterm elections in November, our revolution, and Bernie [Sanders]’s endorsement of progressive candidates. We have been donating money from most of our recent events to RAICES Texas, working to reunite parents separated from their children at the border. We just had a benefit for Baby2Baby which provides nappies for families that need them. We also recently had a benefit for Friends of the LA River – a local environmental nonprofit. We made signs at the clubhouse and then went to marches supporting anti-gun legislation, March For Our Lives, and anti-ICE [detainment of immigrants]. There’s no end to the list of issues and marches we want to help.

What happens at a Deep End Club meet-up?

We start by asking the community what they’re concerned about and then create actions and events to help on various different issues. We recently wrote letters to city council handling proposals to expand local oil fields and power plants.

Your T-shirts have been worn by a host of cool women – who's in your gang?

My band Nice As Fuck – Erika Spring and Jenny Lewis. All of my amazing friends! I have met so many new people through having the collective. It’s fun now, having done The Deep End Club in New York and LA... I wonder where we should pop up next!

Your pieces have a very '70s feel, what else inspires you?

The illustrator I work with, Cali Sales, always interprets my ideas in a playful way – we have been collaborating for a few years now, and The Deep End Club aesthetic has come from that. I am personally inspired by surrealism, the late '60s films of Jean-Luc Godard, the Happenings scene in New York in the late '50s/early '60s, City Lights radical bookshop in San Francisco, outsider art monuments like Salvation Mountain. I travelled to India earlier this year – that was very inspiring. The Bob Baker Marionette Theatre in Echo Park! The Cabaret Voltaire... places where people dare to dream. I recently enjoyed the new Yayoi Kusama documentary Infinity – art can help make the world more peaceful.

The Deep End Club x & Other Stories collection will be available online at & Other Stories on 22nd August.

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When it comes to combating fine lines, experts often extol the virtues of two skincare ingredients in particular: retinol – a vitamin A derivative, often touted as the 'gold standard' thanks to its ability to increase cell turnover, thus ironing away lines, and hyaluronic acid – a humectant, which reduces the loss of moisture in cells and hydrates and plumps skin from the inside out.

But it looks like there's a new fine line-erasing ingredient on the block, and it's totally natural. Enter: maple leaf extract. New research presented by scientists at the 256th National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society earlier this week found that maple leaf extract – derived from the maple tree – could be used to treat wrinkles, which, as the report suggests, are a result of elastin breakdown in the skin.

"We wanted to see whether leaf extracts from red maple trees could block the activity of elastase," says Hang Ma, PhD, from the University of Rhode Island, who presented the findings at the meeting. How? According to the report, the researchers "zeroed in on phenolic (aka resinous) compounds in the leaves known as glucitol-core-containing gallotannins (GCGs)". They then "examined each compound’s ability to inhibit elastase activity in a test tube" and carried out "computational studies" to see how GCGs react with elastane in general.

What they found was interesting in terms of how this ingredient works its magic on wrinkles. "You could imagine that these extracts might tighten up human skin like a plant-based Botox," explained Navindra P. Seeram, PhD, the project’s principal investigator, who mentioned that maple leaf extract would be a topical application, "not an injected toxin". As maple leaf extract is plant-derived, it's completely natural – but there's more. The study found that the GCGs in maple leaves can also shield skin from inflammation (sometimes the result of things like pollution) and treat pigmentation – the darkening of areas of skin.

The researchers aren't just sitting on their findings, either; the report notes that they have been actively trying to get maple leaf extract into products, having patented their formulation as Maplifa.

While the researchers' face cream might not be ready for a while, there are a few clever beauty brands out there who are ahead of the game. Evolve's Beauty Miracle Mask, £12, employs sugar maple extract (from the sugar maple tree, another variation of maple), which is known as a natural AHA and has the ability to exfoliate the top layer of cells, uncovering brighter, healthier skin. Peter Thomas Roth's Cucumber De-Tox Foaming Cleanser, £28, also harnesses maple to combat dullness as it dislodges makeup and dirt.

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Ready for your thoughts on wellness to be well and truly shaken? A Harvard professor has labelled coconut oil "pure poison".

Professor Karin Michels' lecture, which took place last month but has just been translated by Business Insider Deutschland, was held at the University of Freiburg in Germany, where Michels is the director of the Institute for Prevention and Tumour Epidemiology as well as being a professor at the Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health. It was called "Coconut Oil and Other Nutritional Errors".

In it, she labelled coconut oil "one of the worst foods you can eat" and even called it "pure poison", due to the fact that it almost exclusively contains saturated fats, which have been linked to cardiovascular disease, breast cancer, prostate cancer, ovarian cancer and more.

Michels' lecture comes after an advisory issued last year by the American Heart Association which noted that coconut oil is up there with butter and lard in terms of comparable saturated fats. "I just don't know who is pushing it, but it's not scientists," said Frank Sacks MD, professor of cardiovascular disease prevention at the Harvard School of Public Health, at the time.

According to Michels, there are no conclusive studies on the health benefits of ingesting coconut oil. A review published last year in Current Nutrition Reports says: "Until the long-term effects of coconut oil on cardiovascular health are clearly established, coconut oil should be considered as a saturated fat and its consumption should not exceed the USDA's daily recommendation." According to the NHS, "too much saturated fats in your diet can raise low density lipoprotein cholesterol in the blood, which can increase the risk of heart disease and stroke." They go on to recommend that women should not exceed 20g of saturated fat each day.

So if you do use a lot of coconut oil in your cooking and wish to substitute, what should you use instead? The American Heart Association recommends "healthier" oils like canola oil, corn oil, soybean oil, peanut oil, sunflower oil and walnut oil.

For those of you who use coconut oil as a beauty supplement, Michels' lecture doesn't refer to external use – in fact several studies have shown that coconut oil can be beneficial for a number of skin conditions, from wound healing to skin barrier repair.

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Signing up to train for a 10K with Nike was a crazy idea for me, mostly because I had never run long distance before. Like, ever. The extent of my running experience comes from high school volleyball warm-ups.

But another major obstacle to becoming a runner was keeping up with my thick, curly natural hair. I do exercise to try to stay healthy and somewhat in shape, but my workouts typically consist of 25-30 minutes on the elliptical — which barely breaks a sweat — or choosing to do a class like SoulCycle on a day when I already know I'm going to be washing my hair. Since I went natural eight years ago, my biggest challenge has been that the process of washing, detangling, semi-airdrying, then styling and diffusing all of my hair. The process can take up to two hours.

Running brings two problems: The excessive sweat makes my edges super frizzy. And when I put my hair up in a ponytail or bun so it's out of my face, that flattens my curls, which means after that run, I'll have to wear my hair in a not-so-cute bun until the next time I wash my hair and apply my usual Ouidad products. So running regularly meant I would either have to a) somehow squeeze an extra two-hour hair-washing window into my day every time I went running, or b) figure out how to maintain the shape of my natural curls while running for over an hour.

Safe to say, I knew from the beginning that training both my body and my hair to get used to running was going to be no small feat. Here's how Operation Run With Curls went over six weeks.

WEEK 1
I typically wash my hair about once a week, making my curls last as long as possible with the help of tons of product and by sleeping with them up on my pillow so I don't mess up the shape. My big curls have become my signature, especially as an on-camera personality at Refinery29, and admittedly, I feel less put together, pretty, and "professional" when I have my hair in a bun.

For the first week of training at Nike's headquarters in midtown Manhattan, I wore my hair up in a loose bun to see if maybe when I took the bun down, my curls wouldn't be completely destroyed. Spoiler alert: It didn't work. After just an hour in the "loose" bun, my curls were flat, frizzy, and limp. Not to mention my edges were completely sweated out and in disarray despite the cute yellow headband I wore both to save my edges (and, full disclosure, to complement my colourful Nike React sneakers.)

By the time I got home from the first night of training (a casual three miles — I almost died, I promise you), I was exhausted both physically and emotionally. And it was nearly 11 p.m., so washing my hair was definitely not happening. You can probably guess what went down: My hair ended up in that bun for the next five days. I had to run again on Thursday and Saturday, so there was no point in going through the process until Sunday, when I finally had some downtime to wash it. This, my friends, was my new life.

WEEK 2
After our second Tuesday night training with Nike, I didn't get home until around 9:30 p.m. I knew I needed to get in the shower as soon as possible to begin The Curl Process, because I had a big panel I was moderating for Netflix the following day — that hot-mess bun was not an option. Only one problem: I was starving. So I made myself a super quick dinner, then got in the shower by 10:30 p.m. While I let my hair air-dry for before I diffused it (the key to less frizz), I prepared for the panel. I finally got to bed around 1 a.m., which was not ideal for a 6:30 a.m. wake-up time. I was beat the next day and found myself asking: Why was I doing this running thing again?!

WEEK 3
At this point, the burnout of staying up late multiple times a week to do my hair washing process was wearing me down. So I turned — where else? — to the internet for help. I found a tip from Ada Rojas, a curly hair beauty blogger, on Instagram: She suggested using a silk scarf to push the curls up and forward in front of the face. The only problem is that my hair is too long, so when I did it, my curls were literally in my face. I tried my own spin on it, doing a loose high bun, but keeping the ends of my curls out of the elastic and turned forward so they wouldn't get completely flattened. Then I did a headband instead of a scarf, so I wouldn't be hot.

This ended up being a decent solution. After running, I had a dent in my hair, so I couldn't wear my hair completely out the next day, but I could at least wear it back in a pony so I wasn't just bun-ing it for another week straight. Compromise!

WEEK 4
By this week, I pretty much had a routine: I'd wear my hair down and out at the beginning of the week, then after the first night of running on Tuesday, I'd do a ponytail the following day. And by the end of the week and a few sessions of sweating out my edges and curls, I had no choice but to do a slicked-back bun. And let me tell you, laying down those edges after all that exercise was no joke. Both my morning and nighttime routine included a baby hair brush, edge control gel, and a scarf just to get it in a semi-presentable bun.

WEEK 5
This was a tough week for me, because I developed runner's knee, which slowed down my progress majorly. So I decided to take a week off to rest and prepare for a trip with friends to Coachella. (I couldn't risk being sidelined during Beyoncé, obviously.) The one upside to the minor injury was that it felt nice to be able to wear my hair out for a few days straight without worrying about the effect exercise would have. But after just a couple of days, I was surprised to find that I actually missed running. I know, right?! I couldn't believe it either. As hard as it was to upkeep my hair throughout the process, I was beginning to wonder if the way my body felt after a good run was worth all the hair trouble that came with it.

WEEK 6
Right before I left for the final 6.3-mile Nike Choose Go race, a co-worker commented that she liked the way my hair looked when it was slicked back in a bun. That validation made me feel less self-conscious — and less like a failure — that I hadn't quite mastered my personal workout-while-hair-slaying routine.

In the end, my hair was not at all my focus. I was more worried about actually running 6.3 miles and surviving, which was no easy feat for this beginner runner. After the race, I felt so proud of myself that I cried. Six weeks of training with several start-and-stops — including the runner's knee — didn't stop me. And neither did my hair. So even though I may not feel like my cutest, most professional self in a constant post-run bun, I do feel my best when I'm challenging myself. And that is worth sacrificing a few good hair days.

Travel, accommodations, and training were provided to the author by Nike for the purpose of writing this story.

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Curve model and body positivity activist La’Shaunae Steward isn’t playing around when it comes to championing size diversity. In April, just ahead of the launch of her shoe collection with Jeffrey Campbell, Steward told Refinery29 that she won’t stop until women of all sizes appear in campaigns and on the catwalk.

“Representation is so important. So many models are glamazons who are 5’7” or taller,” she said at the time. “They have small waists and perfect thighs. [For plus-size models, they’re] a size 16 at the biggest. And these are the women ‘representing’ all fat women. I’m 5’3" and bigger, [and I] also deserve the spotlight!”

A post shared by @inclusmodels on Aug 11, 2018 at 9:31am PDT

Now, she’s making good on her promise. Last week, Steward launched Inclus Models, a platform that wants to help unsigned models “who don’t start at 5’8” and don’t end at a size 18” get scouted by major agencies.

The move was inspired by Steward own experience being rejected by over 100 agencies. “I’m over a size 20 and I’m 5’3”, but I work harder than a lot of models,” she tells Refinery29. The problem, she says, is that models who are already signed don’t feel the need to champion diversity at their agencies. “They’re okay with how the world treats bigger people because they don’t have this issue,” Steward explains. “Hopefully agencies will see this and realise how much of a change signing bigger models could be to not only them, but to the fashion and modelling world.”

So far, she’s received more than 80 submissions. To be posted on Inclus’s Instagram account, Steward requires hopeful models to send in a photo of the person’s profile (shot from the waist up), as well as one full-body image in good lighting, along with their social media handle and dream agency. Current aspiring models include 23-year-old Khari, who says her “dream agency is any agency that will accept me in my purest form,” and 20-year-old Amaura, who would love to sign with “@noagency.nyc, @wespeakny, @jagmodels, and any agency willing to represent people who do not fit into society's conventional beauty standards”

Meet Amaura Age: 20 Location: Brooklyn, NY Dream agency: @noagency.nyc , @wespeakny @jagmodels and any agency willing to represent people who do not fit into society's conventional beauty standards” (swipe for digitals)

A post shared by @ inclusmodels on Aug 13, 2018 at 1:02pm PDT

Though no one has been scouted yet (the platform is only a week old), Steward notes that she has “hope for every single gender and person that gets posted because I see so much genuine beauty and potential in them all. I wanted to give aspiring models who have also been rejected or just scared to ever apply to model because they fear being told they’re too big or too short a platform to be included.”

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