I was sitting in the Barbican Centre on Friday evening when the push notification came through my phone. Kate has got cancer. I picked up my phone, rolled my eyes, and continued what I was doing. A moment later, two teenagers sat down next to me, loudly discussing the news. It went like this:
Girl: ‘Oh my god she’s got cancer. That’s so sad. Maybe we shouldn’t have been so mean about her.’
Boy: ‘I know.’
Girl: ‘So she didn’t have a hysterectomy then?’
Boy: ‘Well why not? She could have had a hysterectomy and then they found the cancer.’
Girl: ‘Yeah so true, good point.’
I looked around me, my mouth hanging open ever so slightly, trying to convince myself that this wasn’t happening. That conversations like this only happened in corners of social media where people are obviously stupid. Not sane, average, everyday-looking people sitting next to me in the Barbican Centre in Central London. I was also doing my utmost to mind my business and not throw my laptop across the foyer at these two teenagers, because in that moment, I hated everyone. The people on social media, the people stupid enough to believe the people on social media, and the people I share an industry with; the media.
Let me be absolutely clear here; this isn’t about Kate. She has no impact on my life, I don’t know her. She’s as distant and inconsequential to me as the woman I passed on the street last week. A stranger. A nobody to me. This is about our responsibility, both in the media and as consumers of media.