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Women with a Past

Factual: Life Stories

Factual: History

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Series exploring the stories of women from the past.

Women with a Past: Series 3

Women with a Past: Series 3: Episode 1

Episode 1

Series 3

BBC Radio Scotland - Women with a Past, Series 3, Episode 1

Susan Morrison explores the life of sex guru and birth control pioneer Marie Stopes.

Susan Morrison explores the life of controversial sex guru, scientist and birth control pioneer Marie Stopes.

Sex guru, scientist, birth control pioneer and controversial advocate of her own brand of eugenics, Marie Stopes never let anything or anyone stand in her way. Born in Edinburgh to a mother who was herself an early feminist. Marie stormed the male-dominated university world and then looked for new realms to conquer. She wrote the best-selling book Married Love, saying married women should have fun in bed with their husbands and telling them how to do it, at a time when she'd just had her unhappy first marriage dissolved as she claimed to be a virgin. She advised on parenthood before she'd ever had a baby. She campaigned for women's rights while treating the other women in her family with appalling condescension. To Mary Stopes-Roe, she was the mother-in law from Hell, yet to thousands of strangers who wrote to Marie in despair as they faced pregnancies they couldn't cope with, she was a helper and lifesaver. Marie made use of popular enthusiasm for eugenics to say that all women should be allowed to space and limit their families so that mothers had enough resources to clothe, feed and love each child, but she still held some beliefs which would now shock us. Susan Morrison explores one the most famous and controversial women ever to have been born in Scotland.

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