Jaded opinion

[davidn]

The Internet provides us with all the news we want and some we don't - and after being alerted to Tony Hart's death a few weeks ago by a set of Youtube comments pouring into my inbox, it was a bit of a surprise this weekend to be invited to a Facebook group called "RIP Jade Goody".

This situation is different, of course. If you're among the half of my friends list who will have no idea who she is, rather than the half who wished they had no idea who she was, it's a bit difficult to explain her role on television, largely because she didn't really have one. She was one of the breed of lack-of-personalities that became famous for no real reason after the fallout of one of the Big Brother series - remaining in the public eye because of what the Telegraph called "her observations, which were often amusingly wide of the mark and sometimes downright silly", which is their way of saying that she was famous for being a complete idiot.

But there is a tremendous guilt there, when somebody who you've wished (however secretly) would just disappear from the world suddenly does so - I now realize that this had been going on for some time, but I hadn't been following it until recently when I heard she was near death. It's a cause of great confusion to me - until recently I would have described her as an entirely worthless human being, but in her cancer at the height of her celebrity status, and as a result of the love affair that the equally execrable tabloids had with her, she's improved the awareness of the disease for the rest of the country. Her death really makes me think - certainly much more than her life ever did.

Comments

[e-to-the-ipi.livejournal.com]

I was actually thinking something along the same lines up until recently, but The Guardian's obituary (http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2009/mar/22/lucy-mangan-on-jade-goody) makes a lot of very good points. Among other things, I've realised that her life story is actually a pretty good plot, and that a Jade biopic may well be inevitable, and good.

Because once you get past how annoying she was, the way she kept her fame, and used it (which I'm almost certain wasn't her original intent), and how annoying it's been watching her die gradually in the tabloids over the last few weeks (it's odd standing on the tube, watching people read papers updating the public on a deathbed), the sympathy awarded to her husband, who's currently in prison for beating a 16 year old with a golf club, the ridiculousness of Gordon paying tribute to her she's actually a fairly interesting character, and a mother who decided to die publically (sort of, but not too much) to provide for her sons, and has fundamentally done well for herself. The racism incident with CBB, the bullying/class discrimination on her initial spell in the BB house, the fact she's held onto her fame and, well, the general details of her life do add up to an interesting story. Which is a lot more interesting, lets face it, when you know she's not going to be around being annoying any more.

Convinced there's an interesting story in there: a film is probably inevitable, and it's worth noting that she's almost certainly going to be remembered as the most prominent reality TV star, or the first epitome of the type.

I don't think you can really call her a lack of personality. She had one, but it was just grating. Anyway, she sums up Britain of this decade more than anyone else, I suppose.

[bonappetite.livejournal.com]

I've been thinking that she is the perfect reason why "if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say it at all."
If people knew then what they know now, they wouldn't have exploited her and called her names those years ago. "Don't speak ill of the dead"?-- no, don't speak ill because we'll all be dead someday.


What a cheerful subject this is, isn't it?