welcome to HARDtalk with Lee's Dana Pat are we in New York my guest is the British actress activist and mortal Jameela Jamil after breaking into the u.s. in the critically acclaimed comedy series the good place she's been getting attention for her criticisms of celebrities like the Kardashians for their promotion of diet products to millions of young women on social media is her campaign to make us feel better about our bodies working [Music] Jameela Jamil welcome to hard talk so you were in your early 20s you decided you wanted to go into music presenting and you get this big break you become the solo female host of a very prestigious show on radio in the UK how important is it for you to break barriers I think it's very important for me to break barriers I come from and particularly arrays to people you know you just don't see South Asians in positions of privilege very often especially not in mainstream media and so it's something that means a lot to me because I was very damaged I would say by not seeing anyone like me that I could look up to and I was a child it made me develop a kind of self-hatred because I felt like I had no worth because I couldn't see worth in anyone else similar to me everyone else was quite Eurocentric and their features and they were all white and had long blonde hair and that hurt me and so now I want to make sure that there is at least one and now I'm really lucky that I've grown up in a time with era 5 there's five whole South Asians in this industry who are working at the like you know in Hollywood the man you say with great irony yeah yeah I mean you're the daughter of Pakistani Indian parents but brought up in the UK how important is your ethnicity to you does it inform everything you do yeah it's very important to me it wasn't for the longest time that's what I'm saying that I was shot I shunned it so heavily because I thought it was embarrassing and bad and you know we were so I grew up in the 90s which was such a racist time in England and you know got called a [ __ ] every single day of my life and beaten up for my literally beaten up like you know once was like tennis rackets by a bunch of white children and so I was terrorized at school for my ethnicity and I was one of the only South Asian girls and I was the only South Asian girl of my in my primary school and one of maybe four in my entire secondary school and I went to a large secondary school so it played a big part in my early years of my lack of identity and now as I've grown older and I'm I'm getting into my 30s I've fallen in love with the culture again and love with the food and music and everything and I realized that I've really missed out on not rican reconnecting with my culture but I mean for a child to be attacked by a group of white children boys and girls presumably with tennis rackets I mean how old were you even I mean what did you know what happened I was seven well I think I had a tooth knocked out and you know I had cuts and grazes but I used to get physically abused quite often at school you know often by girls Caucasian women I've nothing against Caucasian people but I had a really rough time growing up and and I think representation is a big part of that because I think if you if you can't the media is such an amazing way to familiarize people the public with different people and if you don't do that then they don't understand people I think that sometimes insights fear and I think children kind of feel afraid of me they felt they disrespected me and they felt afraid of me because I was different but really I'm not different I just have a different level of melanin but you have really had quite a difficult past medically having to you born with congenital hearing loss and you've talked about how you really lacked in confidence when you were at school I mean what was behind that lack of confidence you described yourself as bookish and shy a multitude of things the fact that I was bullied I think life develops but it fed my social anxiety which only if just it's sort of cyclical you know it's a catch-22 situation and the more socially anxious you become the more people bully you and then it just kind of gets worse or worse and worse but also you know I have a list and loss syndrome which is a it's a kind of invisible disability and that's something I've had my whole life I was born with it and that affects my my body in every single way and it means that I'm incredibly accident-prone sometimes and I I bleed for longer than normal people i bruise much more than other people affects all of my organs I think it's part of what affects my hearing and so I think when you were a sick child who misses a lot of school and you lose touch with your peers I think that's also difficult I think generally just being deaf can a literal feeling of a wall between you and other people and again this was the 90s so it was an ableist time much more so ablest than we are now so there was just many factors that just stole my confidence from me and then at the age of 17 fleeing a bumble bee bee yeah he was struck by a car yeah the bumble bee was never chasing me I just still worry it happened I got afraid when I ran into a car and then that car hit me into another car nothing has ever been more my fault in the world than me getting hit by that car and so I couldn't walk for about a year you broke several bones damaged your spine yeah I destroyed my sacroiliac like it it still doesn't feel right I still painful I still have to be very careful with myself but it was a good lesson you know it snapped me out if I'd been very anorexic company until then which is my way of controlling the world around me and it snapped me out man Iraq see and it gave me this new relationship with my body where I realized that this was once once I'd lost what it does for me I'd lost its use I suddenly started to realize everything that I'd had before that I was just hurting and and punishing and throwing away over something as simple and ridiculous as vanity and so knock some sense into things so it put your life into perspective I'd do it all again but you were told you'd never walk again yeah they said it was a possibility they said it was a possibility they told me that I could never walk in because Elliston loss syndrome means that your damage is so much worse than other people's damage and I had really badly hurt myself family members had to help you help me to go to the loo and yeah it's not you were totally dependent yeah and also like most people with ælis tunnel syndrome generally just end up in a wheelchair a lot of people's or not most but a lot of people with my condition end up in a wheelchair very young anyway and so I've been very very very privileged to be able to beat the odds on that and you mentioned the fact that you suffer from anorexia nervosa in between the ages of 14 and 17 in fact you you say you never get I didn't email me oh yeah what lay behind your anorexia I mean you talked about living up in the top being brought up in the toxic 90s do you think that there was something about that decade that kind of income you know meant that you ended up with this eating disorder well it was the era where you had grown adults not ironically using the term heroin chic as if it was something luxurious to aspire to you know when you had people actually dying of fat like famine in the real world in a matter of hours away from you we were emulating that look and forcing women to starve themselves until they could barely function and that was considered glamorous and it was hyper normalized which is so weird when you look back at it so I grew up in that time you know you had very dangerous quotes like nothing tastes as good as skinny feels and you had big famous actresses giving weight loss tips in every single interview and so you know I was consuming all the diet products consuming all of the diet rhetoric I was just marinated in toxicity and and I was just surrounded by bad role models and that's what's driven me to rewrite the narrative on that do you think that it's better now than it was in the 90s yeah yes our society is yeah we finally got some people who are breaking through I mean but we are still you know you hear that the debates or bombarded with tall slim models and I have to ask you though this because you are tall Muslim I'm about five foot ten so why did you become a model than an even a fashion scalped yourself so I what I really paradox isn't it no not the no no no when I was fifteen I became a model because I was a child and I didn't know that that was bad and I was deliberately trying to starve myself and thought that was cool and then when I was 19 I came out of that with this new realization that I'd almost died of anorexia for this fashion industry that I aspired towards so I wanted to change the narrative of the fashion industry and I knew that the only way to do that was from the inside and so I became a scout in the hopes of actually being able to bring in plus-size girls I used to bring in curvy girls all the time and then fight that lead agent about the fact that she shouldn't be told to lose weight she's too young and also she's her body is amazing and try and bring in curvy girls I was where ahead of the game where I had no idea that if I just stuck with it longer plus size was going to become a huge industry but that was something I was campaigning for everything I've always done has been with a Trojan horse intention that's why I'm in Hollywood now I'm here to get my work done when it comes to activism I mean I should say in 2016 you had yet another health problem when you had the breast cancer scare yeah but thank God there's a scared benign lump yeah undeterred you went off to the United States didn't you and you thought oh I try and work in radio broadcasting there you're asked to audition for a part as an actress as an actor and you've never acted before you got the part the yes place and here you are acting very successful in this very popular TV series Larry that was unexpected success very much so I mean the lump I didn't come here in spite of the lump I probably came here because of the lump you know I had a week to find out if the lump was cancerous and in that week I had a word with myself about everything that probably calls that lump all the stresses in my life and also everything that I want I will do if this turns out not to be cancer and the first thing on that list was moved to California because I've always wanted to know what that would be like and so the lump was the fuel for me to go I was like right I don't have cancer I'm very lucky I'm off and I came here and my first audition was with I do auditions one was for a game show or like a magic show that happened was shooting in Vegas replacing Jonathan Ross and then the other was the good place to make sure and acting was the one that I had never done before and I have had a life lived in the deep end and so I've enjoyed I enjoyed challenging myself and just seeing how wrong this can go and the good place is you act you the part of a nation yeah and you're all supposed to you think you're in heaven but you're all actually somewhere else and so on it's incredibly popular but you've used of the fact that you are here and that you've had these health issues and so on to raise your voices and as an advocate which is why a lot of people have applauded your activism but when it comes to talking about body image and so on there was a stylus magazine in August this year where you were featured on the front page smashing a set of weighing scales and Francis Ryan a British author of a book about the demonization of disabled people wrote on the in The Guardian and online British newspaper that about the troubled optics of a slim woman a smashing diet culture and she says you know there's a catch-22 in fighting sexism that women must largely meet the norms a conventional attractiveness before they are allowed to criticize the demand to be attractive fair comment isn't it completely fair I've literally been the victim of what she's talking about because I gained lots of weight when I first joined Radio 1 back at 26 years old I got and I was then nationally fat shamed for about six months so I started campaigning very heavily against fat phobia in the United Kingdom I went and spoke at Parliament about it I released a plus-sized clothing line but my activism could only go so far I was stopped and called bethe bitter and jealous essentially I was dismissed because I was a larger woman now so therefore my opinion didn't count as much because I was too lazy to do the work to be slim and that's why I was sounding off about it and so now that the same woman is slim everyone's listening to me as if I'm saying brand new ideas that people haven't been saying for 30 years and so I feel everyone's frustration there's no part of me that isn't denying that I have privilege I've literally been the person ignored because I was marginal and then one of the criticisms of that magazine cover was that you were featured wearing a white one-piece yeah suit and everybody is saying that's not available in plus sizes yeah I mean you open yourself up to so much criticism doing that was great it was great that that happened because it exposed the fact that the reason that I was wearing clothes that didn't go up to a size 18 is that I was wearing the sponsors of the magazine that's how magazines are funded especially stylists because it's free you don't buy it and so they rely on money from their advertisers so Stella McCartney etc all these different designers these designers do not go do not cater to Plus Sizes the problem is is that the companies that do go up to Plus Sizes don't have the kind of money to be able to fund a magazine like stylists they can't afford that level of appetizer if they were funding it I would wear their clothes alright so so once I explained that I think it highlighted that the issue is are it's industry-wide and I understand what I sometimes get made the scapegoat I've put myself out there but it doesn't make me angry it's a really important conversation and you set up a way which in last year in 2018 and you know to discuss all these kind of issues to act as a kind of platform for you and you've criticized the Kardashians in particular Khloe Kardashian I mean first of all you you actually said they shouldn't just be reduced to women with you know beautiful bodies or whatever but you have this campaign to stop celebrities endorsing a meeting suppressant products but just it's fine just why you had to fall into a kind of minor clash with the Kardashians over this well I just think we're living in this really bizarre time we're now celebrities just have carte blanche to sell whatever they want however they want to young impressionable people there's no regulations there are no legal implications to what they're doing they're selling toxic products that often are laxatives not declaring that they're laxatives not doing what we do with cigarettes and all kinds of other different things which is declaring the ingredients and declaring the side effects for some reason they're allowed to just post a heavily photoshopped picture and a lie and pretend they take this they drink this shake or eat this lollipop will be a magical weight-loss banana or whatever is that they're selling and and be able to get away with that you use very extreme language is that necessary I mean you said for instance of the Kardashians their pockets aligned with the blood and diarrhea of teenage girls or is it referring to the fact that some of these products have a laxative effect Kim Kardashian's response was you're going to get a backlash for almost everything so long as you like it or believe in it or it's worth it financially whatever your decision may be as long as you're okay with it that's all right yeah sell heroin to children as long as you're back it yourself that's fine I'm not saying that's what she sells I'm not saying as he thought Kardashians I am I wouldn't be here right now sitting opposite you or speaking at the UN or any of these things if I hadn't made a big noise and sometimes you have you shop culture and it's particularly shocking when a woman and a woman of color speaks out because we are the ones who are the most under pressure to be obedient and so I was genuinely angry it wasn't just a shock tactic I was furious and it poured out I don't tend to have a filter because I think that that's something that is only really reserved for women white men don't seem to have to have a filter in our day and age especially not the more successful ones Piers Morgan Donald Trump they're mouthing off about whatever they want saying the first thing that comes into their minds brought I reserved yeah I would like I reserved that same right and so I say whatever I want and and I wanted to say something that would wake people up and make sure that they knew that it was okay for me to tell truth to power and in fact as a result of your campaign it's been successful Instagram have introduced restrictions on the promotion of diet product so that's yeah you must feel like that so further in your cap it wasn't with me I mean it was yeah it was it wasn't I think I had a significant impact on that change but there were also just to be clear experts and like charities involved and related to this body image work and activism that you're doing so that young girls and older women don't you know fall foul of these kinds of things you have also talked about the sexual ization of women and some formers and for instance you have said of Beyonce that she is sexualized herself to sell her records and of doing everything other than having a live smear test on stage right but you're bringing up something I said like 10 years ago that I've repeatedly apologized for and explained and it's my pinned tweet all right okay but you have said similar things about the over-sexualization of Rihanna same times same time yeah so you don't you don't know withdrawal all those no ice publicly withdrawn them maybe a hundred times I've done it in magazines I've explained what I was a rape victim a multiple rape victim who didn't know where to project my anger and so I used to take aim and finish sorry I've used to take aim at the wrong target which was women and the way that they sexualized themselves I should have been taking the patriarchy that a forces us to do that in a way that I'm not saying that it's never a woman's choice I believe sometimes it is a woman's choice and that's great but I think that I should have been taking aim at the system that sexualized me from the age of you know being a very young child I've been sexualized for as long as I can remember by grown men and so I was angry and I didn't know who to direct that rager and I I felt like women who sexualized themselves were the reason that I was being sexualized by men it was men who were the problem those men Britany women oh all right so not about the criticisms that you've made a Beyonce but just looking at the framework in which one can cast this conversation I mean there is such a thing as sex-positive feminism as I'm sure you know a movement that began in the 1980s the belief that the freedom of sexual expression is important part yeah of women achieving equality and Beyonce is often seen as the epitome of this and she herself has said look men are free women are not you can be a businesswoman a mother an artist and a fun minute feminist whatever you want to be and still be a sexual being it's really exclusive no you don't need to explain that to me now so eight years ago you could have I could have done with this chat but at this point I fully understand I've really supports sex workers I support the sex industry I support the sexualization of women in if it isn't their power and it was with their if it's their prerogative I have not said a word in eight years like to sex-positive feminism yeah woman if she wants to use her sexuality and so on just don't sell laxatives to children right like that's all I care about just don't be a bad dangerous don't sell dangerous on regulated products to children and do not ever attribute your physique that is down to a personal chef a personal trainer a surgeon a heavy use of Photoshop but you never declare and pretend that you look like that because of some dodgy outers then you say well I just say talking about personal chef Khloe Kardashian says she does not employ a personal chef just putting that out there but in terms of message to do so she hasn't had any surgery or but cosmetic surgery is that not the right for a woman to choose yes if she wants to have cosmetic surgery or not I don't think I I think I was clear in saying that don't pretend that if you have had surgery that that you haven't and actually you're a milchester freelancer I demand transparency from celebrities it's the very least we can do we're role models and we owe it to young people who look up to us to be transparent and to tell them the truth so if you want to have your whole face redone if you want to look like a lion or a giraffe you want to do whatever you want just make sure you declare it and you are you are honest about it because they need to know yourself don't want to keep quiet about it so celebrities are different from normal ordinary we're not celebrities because they're role model you're profiting off all right well I don't I take it well I'm not finished sorry yeah so you're profiting off people who are idolizing you and who aspire to look like you but the this is not an even keel that we're operating on you have all of this privilege you have all of this money there are many reasons that you look the way that you do and young people feel bad about themselves for not looking thank you you can feel like you're justified in trying no I understand so that's that's what that's my main point with everything got that one so the fact that you are a role model for so many young women was the reason why Megan Duchess of Sussex chose is one of her 15 female icons on the front page of Vogue British Vogue which she guest edited so you must have been quite surprised by that read that you thought that it was that it was a hoax yeah yeah it was ridiculous I didn't pick up my phone the first time I don't know who was calling me and then you've gone on from that because you've described the Sussex is as very kind smart funny people and of course there has been some criticism in the press about Megan Dutchess of Sussex and you said this of her in a tweet in August dear England and English press just say you hate her because she is black and the Duke for marrying a black woman and be done with it so what evidence do you have that racism is informing the citizens of the Duchess it's so insidious in England that you can't categorically prove it all at the time as someone who grew up in insidiously resisting that you're not always lucky enough for someone just to call you a [ __ ] to your face it comes in discrimination and the fact that you can hold up I identical things that white members of the royal family do - Megan Markos she does the same exact thing as one of them they get hailed for it and she gets torn apart for it with such vitriol and you know perhaps I'm wrong call me crazy but the one brown member of the royal family seems to get an awful lot of stick stick stick one yeah the one brown member of the royal family seems to get the most abuse by about a country mile finally Jameela Jamil what next for you well I'm launching my way into a full activism platform for young marginalized activists who don't have my privilege in my platform and I'm finding a way to give them a voice and give them access to the people who can actually change the world and bring to life their vision and so it's going to be content and it's going to be podcasts and books and and just a safe space for young people on the Internet Jameela Jamil thank you very much indeed for coming on hard to know [Music] you [Music]