From the gutter to the sewer

You won’t believe what Beverley Hills 90210’s Shannen Doherty looks like now,” gasps Sun columnist Georgina Littlejohn. “The Charmed actress is not as youthful as she used to be… and she’s not even that old.”

And Littlejohn continued:

“She was the fresh-faced teenager with the heartthrob brother and the desirable Los Angeles postcode – but those days are sadly long gone for Shannen Doherty. Because while she is not exactly old at 45, she looked older than her years as she attended a Q&A in Sydney, Australia. The actress, who was 19 when she landed the role in the hit teen US drama, looked unkempt and haggard as she addressed the audience at Supernova Sydney. Gone is her smooth porcelain complexion and shiny dark hair and in their place are a tired-looking face and a mess and unbrushed mane.”

Par for the course, you might say. A woman is a bit older, doesn’t look like she used to. That’s hardly news, is it? You could say the very same thing about everyone else on the planet. I know with the red tops that sex is an issue. The newspapers are owned and edited by men and women have long been mere objects who can only be judged on what they look like. And anyway: what would you expect from a journalist called Littlejohn?

And of course Georgina Littlejohn is the daughter of Richard Littlejohn, the pound shop polemicist now residing in Florida. Ms Doherty is fair game, isn’t she? She’s a woman.

What neither the Sun nor Littlejohn have managed to point out – and this is not exactly a secret – is that Ms Doherty has been fighting breast cancer.

I wonder exactly how it is you are meant to look when you have cancer. When you are 45, you are hardly likely to resemble the “fresh-faced teenager” you used to be and if you are so ill you might die who wouldn’t have a “tired-looking face and a mess and unbrushed mane.” (I am not sure what a “mess and unbrushed mane” actually means.)

Looking “unkempt and haggard” is not surprising for someone fighting such a serious illness, is it? I read elsewhere that Ms Doherty cannot have children because of the treatment she is undergoing. What is she supposed to look like? If you are fearing from your life and discover that you can’t have children, is having a “smooth porcelain complexion” at the top of your list of priorities? I don’t think so.

Littlejohn by name, Littlejohn by nature, Georgina appears to be a chip of the nasty old block. Her father has made a very good living out of producing piss poor populist poison for a willing audience and now his offspring tries to emulate him. I would be deeply ashamed if any child of mine produced such an ugly piece of writing, but Littlejohn himself is probably as proud as punch. In the race from the gutter to the sewers of journalism, the Littlejohn family lead the pack.