Who’d be a celebrity in this day and age? You can keep your money, fame and the adoration of star-struck fans, give me the quiet life any day.
Today’s unscrupulous media treat famous people like public property, delighting in ruining reputations with the sole purpose of selling newspapers.
Not a day goes by without some pop star, actor, TV personality or footballer being the target of some wild accusation as reporters intrude into their private lives with gusto, each paper trying to outdo the other in the shock-factor stakes – without a care in the world as to whether their lurid stories contain even a grain of truth.
Only this week there were the ‘exclusive’ stories of how Heath Ledger committed suicide by overdosing on prescription drugs (how it can be an exclusive if the same story appears in almost every newspaper is beyond me).
The tabloid reporter’s favourite four words, ‘A source close to…’ were trotted out in every article (who are these mystery people? Do they actually exist?), appearing to show Ledger’s mind was in turmoil before his death, while exposes of his tangled love life filled adjoining columns.
A few days later, autopsy results on the Oscar-nominated actor appeared to show his death was accidental. Ooops!
The fact is we still don’t know the truth. But that didn’t stop the papers jumping to their own conclusions and hazarding a guess before Ledger’s body had even arrived at the morgue. Their motto: Why let the truth get in the way of a good story?
Which brings me onto the Ashley Cole saga (finally, a vague sport thread in what’s supposed to be a sport blog, I hear you moan), and the week’s other juicy story for the gossip magazines – sorry, the tabloids.
They claim public interest as justification for their invasions into the private lives of celebrities, of whom Premiership footballers are their favourite prey.
But surely their defence breaks down if the stories are fabricated or exaggerated beyond belief.
Now I’m not saying Mr Cole is a saint - and I doubt most of you reading this would claim to be either - but are we really expected to believe everything 22-year-old Aimee Walton has told us is the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth?
Closer to the truth is probably that Cole can’t remember what happened that fateful night, he was that paraletic.
And yet Walton is allowed to dish out whatever accusations she wants to three million readers, with the sole stipulation that the more shocking the revelation the more money she will get.
Even if he did spend the night with her, she is most certainly not the victim, which seems to be the opinion of The Sun newspaper.
Taking the moral high ground as ever, the articles are so one-sided they defy belief, laying the boot into Cole while sticking up for a woman who, by selling her story, is basically being paid to have sex.
Does this woman not care that she is destroying her own reputation by claiming she had a one-night stand with a near comatose man who could not stop vomiting during their night of passion?
It is all very depraved, and at the end of another sensational week (in every respect) in the tabloids it is the unethical British press and the ‘poor, unfortunate’ Miss Walton who come out of the whole sorry episode stinking more than Ashley Cole’s breath.