Sarah Harding - Rest in Peace

If only the newspapers would let her...

It was only on Friday that I wrote my first substack post. The subject? The rewriting of women’s stories by men. And yet two days later, we see a very ugly example of this in one of our most respected newspapers. The news that Sarah Harding had passed away at just 39 from breast cancer was tragic.

Now, I’m going to go out on a limb here and guess that the obituary The Times published on Sunday of Sarah Harding was written by a man. What makes me come to that conclusion? Because it included this paragraph: ‘Cynics might argue that her talent was unexceptional and her celebrity was based more on style than substance. Yet such a judgment would be harsh…’

It is true, only a cynic would make such a statement, particularly just hours after this poor girl’s death was announced by her heartbroken mother. So why did The Times find it necessary to do so? It is not the obituary writer’s job to pre-empt bitchy comments from their readers, but to report someone’s death and list their achievements.