Speaker 1: Hey fam, Hello Sunshine.
Speaker 2: Today on the bright Side, we're talking to the unstoppable
Speaker 2: Sophie Morgan. She's a best selling author, fierce disability rights advocate,
Speaker 2: and an NBC host for this year's Paralympics. Join us
Speaker 2: as Sophie shares how she's changing the narrative around disability
Speaker 2: in the media.
Speaker 3: Honestly, I know this is a naughty thing to say.
Speaker 3: We're going to say it anyway. I think the Olympics
Speaker 3: is kinda boring compared to the Paralympics. I mean, watching
Speaker 3: somebody who is blind skiing behind a guide at seventy
Speaker 3: eighty miles an hour. You tell me that is not
Speaker 3: more interesting to watch than just somebody who's regular skiing.
Speaker 2: Plus, we'll take you behind the scenes at this year's Paralympics.
Speaker 2: It's Thursday, September fifth. I'm Danielle Robe.
Speaker 1: And I'm Simone Boyce.
Speaker 4: And this is the Right Side from Hello Sunshine, a
Speaker 4: daily show where we come together to share woman's stories, laugh,
Speaker 4: learn and brighten your day.
Speaker 2: Simone, we get to talk with one of our Hello
Speaker 2: Sunshine girlies, one of our sisters today.
Speaker 4: I'm so excited, you know, I love Sophie Morgan. She's
Speaker 4: a powerhouse, and we had the pleasure of hanging out
Speaker 4: with her this summer in Nashville. We all had brunch
Speaker 4: together and I happened to sit across from Sophie and
Speaker 4: my friend Danielle and we were just gabin having the
Speaker 4: best time it was. Sophie is a great brunch partner
Speaker 4: and so many other things too. She's so much fun.
Speaker 2: But I want to give everybody a little bit of
Speaker 2: her backstory. So Sophie became disabled as a teenager and
Speaker 2: since then has been on a crusade to change the
Speaker 2: perception of disabled people in the workforce and in the media.
Speaker 4: Yeah, this makes me think about this conversation that I
Speaker 4: had with Madeline Denono on our show about representation and media,
Speaker 4: and she pointed to a study that highlighted that of
Speaker 4: the moms in the title cast on television shows in
Speaker 4: twenty twenty two, zero of them were disabled.
Speaker 2: There's just not a lot of representation, and not a
Speaker 2: lot of representation that's not pointed. So for instance, like
Speaker 2: you can just cast a show and the mom happens
Speaker 2: to be disabled, you don't have to make her a
Speaker 2: disabled character, if that makes sense. But Sophie is changing
Speaker 2: so much of this. She's the co founder of Making
Speaker 2: Space Media, which focuses on producing TV, film and promotional
Speaker 2: content that centers the disabled voice. She also has a
Speaker 2: first look deal with Hello Sunshine and if you want
Speaker 2: to check her out right now, she's a host of
Speaker 2: this year's Paralympics on NBC.
Speaker 4: Yes, the Paris Paralympic Games are officially underway and more
Speaker 4: than four thousand athletes around the world are there right now,
Speaker 4: competing in twenty two different sports. And what's interesting to
Speaker 4: acknowledge is that a lot of people tend to conflate
Speaker 4: the Olympics and the Paralympics, but the two organizations are
Speaker 4: actually completely separate, and the prefix para doesn't have anything
Speaker 4: to do with disability. It actually means alongside or parallel.
Speaker 1: That's great to know. I didn't know that.
Speaker 2: All right, we're going to talk to Sophie about all
Speaker 2: these Paralympians and the awesome work she's doing. Sophie, Welcome
Speaker 2: to the bright Side.
Speaker 3: Thank you for having me. Oh, it's so us to
Speaker 3: be here.
Speaker 4: You just posted this throwback photo on ig that gave
Speaker 4: me all the feels from twelve years ago when you
Speaker 4: were reading the weather in the Paralympics Breakfast show on
Speaker 4: Channel four. And now you are covering the Paralympics for
Speaker 4: NBC and making history as you host your own show
Speaker 4: right side Bessie. She literally just got off the air
Speaker 4: a few minutes ago. What does this moment mean to
Speaker 4: you personally?
Speaker 3: I don't know how to put words to it. I
Speaker 3: tried and failed on that Instagram post because you know,
Speaker 3: sometimes when you recognize that you've achieved something in your career,
Speaker 3: there aren't I suppose social guidelines for how to celebrate
Speaker 3: these things. I think that we have them with other
Speaker 3: milestones that we have in our lives. But for me,
Speaker 3: it was this like, Wow, I've achieved this thing I
Speaker 3: set out to achieve all those years ago. It's such
Speaker 3: a privilege to be part of the Paralympic movement and
Speaker 3: to be broadcast day it. And like you said, like
Speaker 3: at the beginning, I was just reading the weather. I
Speaker 3: set out twelve years ago with the intention of you know,
Speaker 3: becoming a host and having, yeah, my own show, and
Speaker 3: the dream to take that mission from the UK over
Speaker 3: to the US was always in the back of my mind.
Speaker 3: I had no idea how I was going to do that,
Speaker 3: So to be here now and to literally, as you say,
Speaker 3: just come off air. I'm still really high, you know,
Speaker 3: with adrenaline. I'm just I'm so buzzed and I'm so excited.
Speaker 3: I think I just feel really proud.
Speaker 1: I'm glad that.
Speaker 4: You're actually vocalizing your pride. Because we're so socialized as
Speaker 4: women to not do that. It's socially unacceptable. We have
Speaker 4: to always be humble and never say that we're actually
Speaker 4: proud of ourselves for our accomplishments, and.
Speaker 3: I think we should. I do it to my friends
Speaker 3: all the time, you know, and I'd make a point
Speaker 3: to say, like, you just killed it in that promotion,
Speaker 3: or well done, you know, standing up for yourself or
Speaker 3: saying something in your job, or advocating for yourself in
Speaker 3: your professional life or something right. But I think for me,
Speaker 3: I am proud of where I've got to. It's not
Speaker 3: been easy, and I I think I, as a disabled
Speaker 3: woman as well, feel particularly like, yes, I'm representing, you know,
Speaker 3: to be sitting on a studio in my wheelchair and
Speaker 3: I'm one of the first women to ever do that
Speaker 3: for NBC, it just feels hell. Yeah, I'm proud.
Speaker 1: I'm really proud. Yeah, you hold a lot of titles.
Speaker 2: You're a founder, you are now a broadcaster for NBC,
Speaker 2: which is so major, and you're a disability advocate and Sophie,
Speaker 2: I actually didn't know the story of how you became
Speaker 2: disabled until I started researching for this interview.
Speaker 1: Are you willing to share? Of course?
Speaker 3: Of course, thank you for asking.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: So I had a car crash when I was eighteen
Speaker 3: years old. It was actually the day I left school,
Speaker 3: so it was a very significant time in my life.
Speaker 3: You know that time when you're just sort of stepping
Speaker 3: out of girlhood into adult life. And I was so excited.
Speaker 3: I was ready to go to become an adult and
Speaker 3: I left school, and unfortunately I had a car crash
Speaker 3: and I was driving. When I lost control of the
Speaker 3: car I was driving, I wasn't very experienced, like I
Speaker 3: kind of learned to drive once I passed my test,
Speaker 3: really which was so dangerous, and I crashed the car,
Speaker 3: lost control of it, and in the crash, a lot
Speaker 3: of me was damaged. My face was almost completely destroyed.
Speaker 3: I won't list out the actual injuries because it's a
Speaker 3: bit gruesome, but it was really bad. And then my
Speaker 3: spine was damaged at the point where the seat belt,
Speaker 3: so the seatbuck crosses over you from right to left.
Speaker 3: Obviously in the UK drive on the right, so that
Speaker 3: seatbuck comes across and where the seatbuck crosses my chest,
Speaker 3: it held me so tight that part of me twisted
Speaker 3: and part of my vertebrae twisted, so it damaged my
Speaker 3: spinal cord and I was just paralyzed instantly. So I
Speaker 3: went to hospital and I nearly died, but I came through,
Speaker 3: and yeah, went into rehabilitation, and three months later rolled
Speaker 3: out of that hospital as a wheelchair user. And so
Speaker 3: now I'm a full time manual chair user and a
Speaker 3: paraplegic from the chest down. So it's been a journey.
Speaker 2: Is there something that you are aware of every day
Speaker 2: now that you never thought of before?
Speaker 3: I mean everything listeners to this who identify as disabled,
Speaker 3: perhaps if they've acquired that disability, if they weren't born
Speaker 3: with it. I think when you live in a new body,
Speaker 3: you genuinely see the world in a very different way
Speaker 3: all the time, every day. And I'm not just talking
Speaker 3: like the obvious things like, for example, the lack of
Speaker 3: access somewhere, lack of ramps, although that is something that
Speaker 3: you do obviously see. I think it's more the subtle
Speaker 3: nuances around how other people treat you, how other people
Speaker 3: behave around you, the awkwardness that comes with being a
Speaker 3: wheelchair user, the fear that people have, or the pity,
Speaker 3: all these kind of emotions that I don't really want
Speaker 3: to be around. You know, I as certainly as a
Speaker 3: young woman, I was really confronted by and struggled. Now
Speaker 3: I'm better prepared and I know how to deal with it,
Speaker 3: but it's ongoing and obviously it changes everywhere you go.
Speaker 3: So yeah, I think, to be honest, it's a hard
Speaker 3: question to answer because I think the list is so long.
Speaker 3: I see things so differently, But you know, it's not
Speaker 3: all negative. I would love to just say that that
Speaker 3: I do think I see the world from a different
Speaker 3: perspective now, which brings me a huge amount of gratitude
Speaker 3: and joy. I'm a very glass half full kind of person,
Speaker 3: and I think that's got exaggerated after my injury. You know,
Speaker 3: I'm grateful to be alive. I'm always like, yes, I'm
Speaker 3: so happy to be here, and so like, I'm always
Speaker 3: kind of looking for the joy where I can because
Speaker 3: I'm alive, and yes, I might be disabled, but there's
Speaker 3: worse fates, Sophia.
Speaker 4: I think we have so much to learn from people
Speaker 4: who have endured near death experiences like yourself. And I've
Speaker 4: heard you talk about this one voice that came to you.
Speaker 4: I don't want to tell the story for you because
Speaker 4: it's so powerful, but would you tell us what that
Speaker 4: conversation was and how it's you.
Speaker 3: So just after my injury, I was probably three days
Speaker 3: post injury, and I was in intensive care and my
Speaker 3: body was failing, like I think my lungs were filling
Speaker 3: with fluid and everything was just packing in. And I
Speaker 3: think at that point they had told my parents to
Speaker 3: prepare for the worst. And from the way I piece
Speaker 3: this together is it's quite hard to explain it. But
Speaker 3: what happened for me internally was I may have been
Speaker 3: in a body that was close to death and really
Speaker 3: outwardly struggling. So I was convulsing and there was a
Speaker 3: lot of trauma, and I think it must have looked
Speaker 3: really scary the state I was in, But inwardly I
Speaker 3: was in this beautiful space. I was so warm, I
Speaker 3: was so comfortable, and I went away to somewhere else
Speaker 3: and I honestly I think I write about it better
Speaker 3: than I can speak about it. And I wrote about
Speaker 3: it in my book and it took me a long
Speaker 3: time to draft that chapter because I was like, I
Speaker 3: need to put words to this correctly. So I did.
Speaker 3: I went this space and I felt this warmth and
Speaker 3: I was gone. I was away, and I felt good
Speaker 3: with that. But then I heard this voice and the
Speaker 3: voice said, don't go. You have to come back. Don't go,
Speaker 3: please come back, And so I kind of listened to
Speaker 3: that voice and I did. I came back. I mean,
Speaker 3: I don't really know how to explain that, articulate that well,
Speaker 3: but I came back and I went into intensive care
Speaker 3: kind of recovery state. And now, anyway, a few months,
Speaker 3: a few weeks, I don't know what. Sometime later, I
Speaker 3: had this conversation with my mum and I was like,
Speaker 3: do you remember that time when you told me? Because
Speaker 3: I knew it was her voice, I felt like it
Speaker 3: was her voice that was what made sense to me.
Speaker 3: I said, Mum, do you remember that time when you
Speaker 3: told me that I should come back, just around the
Speaker 3: time I think when you thought that I was going
Speaker 3: to go. And she was like, what are you talking about?
Speaker 3: I said, you know when you said, don't go come back.
Speaker 3: She said, I was nowhere near you. I was gone,
Speaker 3: like they had moved me from the hospital room because
Speaker 3: you were about to die. So it was just this
Speaker 3: magical I know, right. I still just I get goosebumps
Speaker 3: thinking about it. Whether it was my mum, my higher self,
Speaker 3: whatever it was, something told me to come back, and
Speaker 3: I think that sense of purpose has never left me.
Speaker 3: I constantly strive to find why did I come back?
Speaker 3: What was the reason? You know, and some people might
Speaker 3: call that a coping mechanism for ending up with a
Speaker 3: life changing injury. I don't care if there's a cynical
Speaker 3: of that. It's helped me. It served me to kind
Speaker 3: of find a sense of purpose and come back for
Speaker 3: a reason. What is that reason? So yeah, it was
Speaker 3: pretty amazing.
Speaker 2: We're taking a quick break, but we'll be right back
Speaker 2: with more from Sophie Morgan. Stay with us, and we're
Speaker 2: back with Sophie Morgan.
Speaker 4: Sophie, I know that you've said that when you came
Speaker 4: out of the hospital as a paraplegic at eighteen, doctors
Speaker 4: told you there were things you want to be able
Speaker 4: to do or places you couldn't go. But the thing is,
Speaker 4: before your accident, you were always an adventurer, you were
Speaker 4: a traveler, you were skydiving, and so this is always
Speaker 4: in your DNA.
Speaker 1: How does it feel to prove them wrong now?
Speaker 3: I You know, I think life is one big game
Speaker 3: of proving people wrong. You know, whether you're a disabled person,
Speaker 3: whether you're a woman, I don't know. You know, there's
Speaker 3: just so many limits that we have on each other.
Speaker 3: And I did come face to face with those very
Speaker 3: early on after my injury, and they really affected me.
Speaker 3: I think because I was such a kind of rebellious
Speaker 3: little kid, and I mean I was a baby, so
Speaker 3: I hadn't done a lot of traveling, but in my heart,
Speaker 3: I'd always wanted to adventure and I've been some places,
Speaker 3: and yes, I'd been skydiving, I'd done some adventurous and
Speaker 3: exciting things. So I felt like I was only getting started.
Speaker 3: And then the fact that my legs didn't work anymore,
Speaker 3: I was like, oh, well, why can't I travel? Why
Speaker 3: can't I go places like I wanted to before? And
Speaker 3: the answer to those questions really became a guiding force
Speaker 3: for me. Somebody's going to say you can't do something now,
Speaker 3: you need to go and check it out and see
Speaker 3: if that's actually true. Not to be fair. As a paraplegic,
Speaker 3: there are some places I can't go, but there are
Speaker 3: so many places I can still go. And I think
Speaker 3: that's where I do get that motivation to kind of
Speaker 3: be a little bit like one finger up. Don't tell
Speaker 3: me what I can't do. I can, you know, let's see.
Speaker 3: And I think that again has been a motivator for
Speaker 3: me for twenty years now. I've been paralyzed yet twenty
Speaker 3: one years this summer, and I have been testing the limits.
Speaker 3: I think since the moment someone said you can't do that,
Speaker 3: I still do.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: It's funny that you say that, because when I think
Speaker 2: of you, that is the phrase I think of when
Speaker 2: someone tells Sophie Morgan not you tell yourself yes. And
Speaker 2: I think that you've done that again, most recently leading
Speaker 2: the Rights on Flights campaign in the UK, which is
Speaker 2: in support of a new law that could be passed
Speaker 2: to protect the dignity of disabled travelers on planes.
Speaker 1: I'm wondering if it.
Speaker 2: Was a specific experience that set this passion and movement
Speaker 2: off for you.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you're nodding, Yeah, it was. It was so I
Speaker 3: had my wheelchair broken by an airline last year. And
Speaker 3: for anyone again who might be listening to this who
Speaker 3: uses a wheelchair or has a mobility device, you'll know
Speaker 3: what I mean when I say it's like having your
Speaker 3: legs broken. It is so hardcore because you can't move.
Speaker 3: I mean, my life just stops when my wheelchairs broken.
Speaker 3: And so that was the sort of the catalyst for
Speaker 3: me going out and using my platform that I don't
Speaker 3: have a huge platform, but I have a platform enough
Speaker 3: that when I spoke about it on social media and
Speaker 3: actually subsequently on television in the UK. Worked on a
Speaker 3: show that was a little bit like The View in
Speaker 3: the US, a kind of chat show of women. And
Speaker 3: I was on that show.
Speaker 1: Is this Loose Women? Yes, I don't ever the moon.
Speaker 1: I love this show? Are you jokers?
Speaker 3: Lose Women? Okay, yeah, I know right, so lose Women.
Speaker 3: So I was on these women in the next day
Speaker 3: and I was, you know, bless them. They gave me
Speaker 3: the mic to have a good old rant and I
Speaker 3: did about this situation i'd found myself in just the
Speaker 3: day before with my chair breaking. And again it was
Speaker 3: like the catalysts. People were listening to what had happened
Speaker 3: to me and were like asking questions themselves, and a
Speaker 3: number of people reached out to me saying how can
Speaker 3: we help, and one of them was an MP and
Speaker 3: Member of Parliament in the UK, and that was the
Speaker 3: beginning of this campaign what we're now calling Rights on Flights,
Speaker 3: which is just a mission to make air travel more
Speaker 3: equitable for disabled people. It's complicated the challenges that we face,
Speaker 3: and every person with the disability will have a different
Speaker 3: challenge when they fly, but for wheelchair users in particular,
Speaker 3: the problem is you have your wheelchair taken away from
Speaker 3: you when you get on the airplane. That's the process
Speaker 3: because you're you know, an aeroplane's not designed to have
Speaker 3: a wheelchair on board, so that means you face a
Speaker 3: lot of problems such as your wheelchair can get lost,
Speaker 3: it can get broken, it can get damaged, and you
Speaker 3: as an individual on an aeroplane without your equipment, you
Speaker 3: can all get hurt and things like you can't get
Speaker 3: around the aircraft itself. So for me, I can't mobilize
Speaker 3: a tool without my chair, I can't go to the toilet.
Speaker 3: It's really really dangerous and it's hard, and I think
Speaker 3: that's where people kind of go Oh my gosh, I
Speaker 3: had no idea. So one of the reasons why the
Speaker 3: campaign is important is to raise awareness, but the other
Speaker 3: is yet to really hold the airlines to account. And
Speaker 3: also that governments. I just can't get over how they
Speaker 3: know that this problem is happening to thousands of disabled
Speaker 3: people on a daily basis, like we're getting discriminated against
Speaker 3: and they're not doing enough. So the campaign has been
Speaker 3: really effective at speaking truth to that power, and we've
Speaker 3: had some traction. We've had the government in the UK's
Speaker 3: listening and now we're going to be working with them,
Speaker 3: which is so exciting, and the US government also amazing.
Speaker 3: So it's been really good.
Speaker 4: I do want to talk about your documentary, Sophie Morgan's
Speaker 4: Fight to Fly.
Speaker 1: Sophy.
Speaker 4: You told me about your film when we were in
Speaker 4: Nashville together, and I came home and watched it, and
Speaker 4: it is so profoundly compelling. It was so substantial and meaty.
Speaker 4: It made me so emotional. And there's a particular scene
Speaker 4: that really stood out to me. It's when you go
Speaker 4: zero gravity and there's this image of you floating, truly
Speaker 4: just floating, and then floating next to you is your
Speaker 4: wheelchair and it's this just this surreal It's almost like
Speaker 4: a painting, Sophie, It's so surreal to see. But I
Speaker 4: want to hear it from your perspective. What did it
Speaker 4: feel like to go zero gravity in the making of
Speaker 4: your film?
Speaker 3: Honestly, I cannot tell you how extraordinary that experience was
Speaker 3: for a number of reasons. So firstly, the actual act
Speaker 3: of going into zero gravity in itself felt just I mean,
Speaker 3: I think I'm the first British paraplegic woman to do that,
Speaker 3: which felt you've already like, you know, great in a way.
Speaker 3: I think the other part of it was this sense
Speaker 3: of like, how am I here? This is the future?
Speaker 3: This is what The reason I do it as part
Speaker 3: of the documentary is just set up this story around
Speaker 3: the fact that travel should be for everybody and the
Speaker 3: future of travel is space travel, and how are we
Speaker 3: going to make that accessible? We need to, you know,
Speaker 3: start working with the space industry to make sure that
Speaker 3: they set the standards for accessibility from the outset as
Speaker 3: opposed to retrofitting access like which one to do with
Speaker 3: the airline industry, right, So there's that element to it,
Speaker 3: But there's also this sort of like for me as
Speaker 3: a paraplegic getting into zero gravity and not needing my
Speaker 3: wheelchair and just being able to mobilize like a little
Speaker 3: bit like I'm in water. But it's profoundly different, and
Speaker 3: it's trippy. It's trippy.
Speaker 1: My head, my little head was like, oh my gosh.
Speaker 2: What is going on?
Speaker 3: It's really exurreal and amazing. And you know what, there's
Speaker 3: also this wonderful thing for me again the privilege of
Speaker 3: being able to experience it, which was one thing and
Speaker 3: understand that the impact it could have both on the
Speaker 3: space industry and seeing people with disabilities in those spaces
Speaker 3: and seeing how important it is to include us.
Speaker 1: But then there's the joy of.
Speaker 3: Watching it on television and seeing how it was put together.
Speaker 3: And I think the thing for me which brought me
Speaker 3: to tears when I watched it was the song that
Speaker 3: we edited together to put over the song, which is
Speaker 3: the song from the Barbie soundtrack, which is what was
Speaker 3: I made for? And the music comes in and that
Speaker 3: is thanks to a woman named Sarah Laismbee who is
Speaker 3: a Hello Sunshine, and she is just genius at what
Speaker 3: she does, and she positioned the song just so perfectly
Speaker 3: that it really packs us punch to a viewer sort
Speaker 3: of question what are we made for? What are we
Speaker 3: here for? What is their purpose? And I think it
Speaker 3: leaves a viewer with this sense of like questioning your
Speaker 3: own ideas of what you can and can't achieve as
Speaker 3: a human being. And we really wanted to put that
Speaker 3: out there in the dock, that we all as human
Speaker 3: beings have this potential to be so much more than
Speaker 3: people think that we can be, perhaps more than we
Speaker 3: think that we can be.
Speaker 4: It's really significant that the work that you're doing, the
Speaker 4: roots work that you're doing, has led to significant change
Speaker 4: in the past.
Speaker 1: What makes you hopeful in this fight?
Speaker 3: I think it's important to remain hopeful but also remain realistic.
Speaker 3: And I think I feel hopeful in the sense that
Speaker 3: I trust in the perseverance and the resilience and the
Speaker 3: tenacity of my community. I know we will not stop.
Speaker 3: It's almost like that adage, you know, if you don't quit,
Speaker 3: you won't fail. It's like we will get the work done.
Speaker 3: It's just a matter of time. So I feel hopeful
Speaker 3: because I trust in us as a group to keep
Speaker 3: pushing and keep fighting for change. I also feel hopeful
Speaker 3: because I think that leaders recognize that now they're like,
Speaker 3: oh gosh, they're not going anywhere. Oh these disabled people,
Speaker 3: they won't quit and we won't quit. So yeah, I
Speaker 3: do feel hopeful, but caasri on another day when I'm
Speaker 3: struggling to get my emails responded to and the fight
Speaker 3: is hard, and sometimes I do get the advocacy burnout
Speaker 3: and it's but today it feels good.
Speaker 4: We need to take another short break. We'll be right
Speaker 4: back with Sophie Morgan. We're back with Sophie Morgan, disability
Speaker 4: rights activist and host of this year's Paralympics on NBC.
Speaker 2: Everybody is going to be watching you cover the Paralympics,
Speaker 2: which is so exciting and it's really happening because of
Speaker 2: making space that there will be an unprecedented amount of
Speaker 2: disabled people covering all of the competitions, Like you fought
Speaker 2: really hard to make this happen.
Speaker 3: Yeah, they had never had a disabled person host the Paralympics,
Speaker 3: and now there are several of us hosting, so that
Speaker 3: that's crazy. So what they have had is they've had experts.
Speaker 3: So former paralympians who have retired or who haven't retired
Speaker 3: but aren't competing, come into the studio and do like
Speaker 3: punditry right, talk about what you're going to see in
Speaker 3: the sport. They've had that, but they've never had a
Speaker 3: host with a disability on the games, which is why
Speaker 3: I feel so incredibly lucky to be where I am.
Speaker 3: I'm so proud. So Making Space partnered with NBC about
Speaker 3: a year ago with the intention of finding and upskilling
Speaker 3: new and existing disabled talent to see if they could
Speaker 3: fit into that host role because NBC are really passionate
Speaker 3: about getting representation right and they know that people with
Speaker 3: disabilities will bring another lens to the broadcasting. I mean,
Speaker 3: that's why our company is called Making Space. We made
Speaker 3: space for disabled talent so to be able to see
Speaker 3: her shine and thrive. It's brilliant, feels great.
Speaker 2: One of the best marketing campaigns that I've seen in
Speaker 2: the last five years came out of the Paralympics. They
Speaker 2: went viral on Instagram. A ton of Paralympians posted a
Speaker 2: photo of them in motion of whatever sport that they
Speaker 2: were in, and they wrote, I am competing, and the
Speaker 2: idea of it it is that I am competing versus
Speaker 2: I am participating. Because when people speak about the Paralympics,
Speaker 2: they often speak about it as participation and they're like, no,
Speaker 2: I am a competitor, what did you think about this?
Speaker 3: I love it. I love it when Paralympians get feisty
Speaker 3: and just say stop underestimating us. There's a perception that
Speaker 3: Paralympians don't bring the same level of athleticism or you know,
Speaker 3: elite talent and skill and sportsmanship to what they're doing,
Speaker 3: and they do. Trust me, like, I've been following these
Speaker 3: this movement now since I started in twenty twelve, and
Speaker 3: I have been in so many different games, whether the
Speaker 3: summer or winter. I honestly, I know this is a
Speaker 3: naughty thing to say. We're going to say it anyway.
Speaker 3: I think the Olympics is kind of boring compared to
Speaker 3: the Paralympics. I'm just going to say it because I swear.
Speaker 3: I mean, watching somebody who is blind skiing behind a
Speaker 3: guide at I mean, how many miles an hour? Like
Speaker 3: seventy eighty miles an hour? You tell me that is
Speaker 3: not more interesting to watch than just somebody who's regular skiing.
Speaker 3: I know I'm biased because I'm disabled, but I just
Speaker 3: think it just adds a whole nother layer of like
Speaker 3: badass to the sport. And I also know how hard
Speaker 3: it is to be a disabled person in this world
Speaker 3: and to actually be able to just do the basics.
Speaker 3: I mean even just getting to a gym, even getting
Speaker 3: to equipment, even getting access to fitness and training and
Speaker 3: all of those things. It's really challenging. So those layers
Speaker 3: and layers that they have to break through the barriers,
Speaker 3: they come through and then they go and do their sport.
Speaker 3: And so I think the Paralympics just blows the Olympics
Speaker 3: in a sense out of the water for me. And
Speaker 3: I just want more audiences to come to the games
Speaker 3: because I think they'll love it, if not as much,
Speaker 3: maybe more. That's all I'm saying.
Speaker 2: So the twenty twenty four Paralympic Games wrap up this weekend.
Speaker 2: Who has been some of the outstanding competitors this year?
Speaker 3: So Alie Truett has an amazing story. She was a
Speaker 3: swimmer in college. She went on holiday with her girlfriends
Speaker 3: and when she was out swimming in Tucks and Caicos,
Speaker 3: she got attacked by a shark. The shark bit off
Speaker 3: her foot and she basically swum through the boat to
Speaker 3: this boat. She had her foot tourniquade by a friend
Speaker 3: of hers who was swimming with her. They saved her
Speaker 3: life and less than a year later she's competing at
Speaker 3: the Paralympics and she is incredible, Like I mean, talk
Speaker 3: about a story of overcoming adversity. She's an extraordinary young woman.
Speaker 3: There's also another woman called Sarah Adam who is the
Speaker 3: first woman to ever compete in wheelchair rugby. And again
Speaker 3: for people who aren't familiar with wheelchair rubby, it's got
Speaker 3: a nickname murdible because it's really hardcore. So it's great
Speaker 3: to see a woman in that space. Like she's in
Speaker 3: a really inspiring athlete too. She's just had a diagnosis
Speaker 3: of MS and she's found the sport as this like
Speaker 3: release for her, and it's just again another really incredible story.
Speaker 3: And then there's the greats, the kind of the perhaps
Speaker 3: more well known athlete. It's you know, Tatiana McFadden, Jessica Long.
Speaker 3: I mean, the list goes on and on and on.
Speaker 3: There's loads to watch.
Speaker 1: Amazing.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Sophie, you're leading a campaign, you released a documentary,
Speaker 2: and you're hosting the Paralympics this year. Like I said before,
Speaker 2: you have many titles, So before you go, can you
Speaker 2: tell us where that fire, that you have to figure
Speaker 2: something out or push against something when people tell you no.
Speaker 1: Where does that come from?
Speaker 3: I don't know. My mum gets asked this all the time.
Speaker 3: Was she always like that? People always ask her Anna?
Speaker 3: I I sometimes ask her too, I'm like, Mom, Was
Speaker 3: I always like this? I think I was to an
Speaker 3: extent as a young girl, I was always a little
Speaker 3: bit like pushy and difficult. I was a difficult girl.
Speaker 3: You know those girls that we get that word difficult,
Speaker 3: like I was that word. That was my label. And
Speaker 3: I've always said difficult girls make for great women. I
Speaker 3: just think I believe that because there's something in us
Speaker 3: that kind of just goes, well, we're going to think
Speaker 3: outside the box, we're gonna do things our way now.
Speaker 3: That can be a destructive force. And of course I have,
Speaker 3: you know, hurt myself with my actions. My injury was
Speaker 3: caused by myself, and I hold myself responsible. So I
Speaker 3: suppose there is an element to being difficult that is problematic,
Speaker 3: but there's also an element to it that's just It's
Speaker 3: something I celebrate in myself and I fire. I don't know,
Speaker 3: I just I get off on that, like, don't limit us.
Speaker 3: I do think it is heightened by being very visibly disabled,
Speaker 3: and a wheelchair comes with a huge amount of stigma,
Speaker 3: and you know that kind of that gets put on
Speaker 3: me everywhere I go, whether I like it or not.
Speaker 3: It feels good to just prove yourself and prove others
Speaker 3: wrong and at the same time encourage and inspire and
Speaker 3: motivate other people who also live within those confines of
Speaker 3: those imitations to kind of go, oh, I don't know
Speaker 3: if you could do that, Maybe I could do that.
Speaker 3: That feels so good too. It's like a recharger, you know.
Speaker 3: It's like when your battery gets depleted, what fills it
Speaker 3: back up? And those things fill my battery back up.
Speaker 3: They kind of make me go, right, let's go again.
Speaker 3: You're going to tell me no, okay, Well, I'm going
Speaker 3: to find a way to say yes. Like just being
Speaker 3: on TV today, ye maybe somebody watched that and when
Speaker 3: oh h, the stories that I shared of the paralympians
Speaker 3: like Ali Truett, who I'd just talked about. I know
Speaker 3: that the impact is profound on others when they see
Speaker 3: other people doing things that they didn't think that they
Speaker 3: could do. And I want to be an example, I think,
Speaker 3: But yeah, I don't know. I've just got a lot
Speaker 3: of energy.
Speaker 1: Well, Sophie, we love you. Thank you so much for
Speaker 1: bringing your life to the bright side.
Speaker 3: MATHA, thanks babes, thanks for yeah, thank you for having me.
Speaker 2: Sophie Morgan is a BAFTA nominated TV broadcaster, disability rights advocate,
Speaker 2: and author of the memoir Driving Forwards. You can catch
Speaker 2: Sophie hosting this year's Paralympics at Nbcolympics dot com.
Speaker 1: That's it for today's show.
Speaker 4: Tomorrow, we're popping off with Emmy nominated TV host and
Speaker 4: fashion designer Nina Parker.
Speaker 2: Listen and follow the bright Side on the iHeartRadio app,
Speaker 2: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Speaker 1: I'm Simone Boye.
Speaker 4: You can find me at Simone Voice on Instagram and TikTok.
Speaker 2: I'm Danielle Robe on Instagram and TikTok.
Speaker 1: That's r O b A. Y. See you tomorrow, folks.
Speaker 4: Keep looking on the bright side.