What Jade Goody teaches us about ourselves posted by Richard Seymour

Guest post by April Fulsday

Tragedy has not gripped the nation so tightly by its trauma glands since Princess Diana glanced at her lover and asked, "where do you want to crash tonight?" Why did we pay good money to watch Jade Goody die? Is it because this Diana of the white working class thrust a semi-automatic to the temple of our unconscious and blew out the pinkish goo of our self-righteousness? Or is it because in our pettifogging nanny-state culture of fear, we resent someone so ebulliently indifferent to political-correctness? Look at the smoking ban. Another example of our government taking away our simple pleasures. But it didn't help Jade, did it? And did she not also symbolise society's fear of the white working class? Why should she be persecuted for casual racism when antiwar protesters are allowed to vilify Israel? The liberal chattering classes love to have a go at someone for failing to worship multiculturalism, but when someone makes the effort and actually moves in with a Bollywood star for weeks on end, what does she get? Abuse. This country hates ambition. For Goody had a simple dream - to move to East Angular and do photoshoots for Heat magazine. And what was her reward? Political correctness. Intolerance. And envy. The politics of envy scar our culture like the overseer's whip. Why? Because in our smallness, we are frightened of success. This "I'm alright Jack" "stay in your place" culture of resentment has already contributed to a massive fall in house prices, but typically no one cares. Goody helped to define us as a nation, but has now died for our sins. The hypocrisy of Britain at the turn of the third millenium could hardly be more starkly illustrated... [continued elsewhere, ad infinitum]

Labels: another stupid fucking state of the nation article about jade goody that uses her untimely death to ramble on about whatever issues the hack feels like mouth off about