Less about weddings…

…more about prevention.

On the day that reality TV “star” Jade Goody married her boyfriend, who was (actually – checking the time) is being allowed to have the night off from his curfew as part of his sentence for assaulting a teenager with a golf club*, I’m left wondering what has gone wrong with the world.

Sky News has had the wedding as their top story for the past three days and even previously sensible newspaper’s columns have fallen over themselves fawning over Goody’s behaviour since she found out that she is dying of cancer.

The wedding is being conducted in the shadow of a funeral. The funeral is forthcoming, and it will be the bride’s. That fact feels crass and cruel to state outright, so accustomed are we to the comforting fictions that habitually weave themselves around terminal cancer.
It is a bitter reflection on reality that it has taken the very worst of times to make us glimpse the best in Jade Goody, but she finally has our respect now.

Not mine, I’m afraid. I haven’t followed this story from the beginning – I’m happy to admit that. But as Jade Goody’s biggest (pay)day draws to a close, I can’t help but think that there has been precious little actually said about how such a fate could be prevented. Not her wedding – although that might not be such a bad idea – I mean her imminent demise from cervical cancer.

Apparently, looking around the internet, her plight has “raised awareness of the disease amongst young women”. Good. But where – as the newspapers, magazines, international television crews et al. for some reason gathered in Hertfordshire or Essex (the Independent gets very confused) for the wedding of a dying racist and a violent criminal – was the message that cervical cancer can be prevented.

That message could have been plastered all over every TV screen in Essex (and beyond), be on every front page tomorrow and on every coffee table in Essex (again) by the end of the week. Instead, we get tightly closed hotel gates and the obnoxious Max Clifford. I think I count that as a missed opportunity. 

* nice guy.

13 thoughts on “Less about weddings…

  1. I know you are right. Does she even know it is preventable? No one gets taught this at school. It should be up there with AIDS.

    But the pictures of her all over the newspapers just kill me. It is freaking sad, no matter who and what she is.

    And it is everywhere, ALL the time.

    Po´s last blog post was: Strange Shores 4, or Monty Po-thon’s flying circus (Note: 6000 miles… is not responsible for the content of external internet sites)

  2. Dude, your link is broken.

    Also, who the heck is this woman and why do I care?

    And another thing…yeah you’re right.

    Goblin´s last blog post was: Here be Oscar spoilers. (Note: 6000 miles… is not responsible for the content of external internet sites)

  3. Po > I don’t mind that she has her big day – fine by me, although why it is a “news” item is beyond me. But she could have used the media scrum to get an importnant message across.

    Dave M > He’s slimey. *shudder*

    DW > Oi! Watch it. I have completely non-chavvy friends and family over there!

    Goblin > Link fixed (missing “:”). And firestorm for having a pop at dying bride somehow avoided.

  4. Hey what’s that? A flying pig!

    Hmm, lets see if you are telling porkies..

    Have you or any member of your family ever bought a pie/pastie/sarnie from Greggs? lol

  5. DW > Naughty! Incidentally, while Gregg’s may have a dodgy reputation elsewhere in the country, in Tyneside it’s an institution. Don’t knock it!

  6. I’m not, I used to frequent the Greggs in Grainger Market when I worked up that way. They did a lovely cheese & onion pasty. Perfect for lining the guts before a swift half or 20 at the union rooms. 😀

    But it just goes to show there’s a bit of chav in all of us.. 😉

  7. You’re right – the message of the actual cancer seems to have been lost in all this. We’re not focusing on the fact that this could have been completely avoided but more in the very public death of someone that we haven’t liked much in the past.

    I’m not saying that we should have been ignoring her BUT the fact that we’re raising her to saint hood after almost crucifying her after the Big Brother incident fascinates me.

    I also can’t help but think of the other people, the other families, who are travelling miles in the cold to get treatment that they can’t afford and who are dying without any of this pomp and circumstance, just because they weren’t mad for being in the gossip columns.

    MAN OUR MEDIA MAKES ME ILL!

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