It’s a tried and tested argument that high profile personalities should know that having their private lives splashed across the front-pages is an inevitable part of their existence, and thus should have no reason to be surprised when this happens.
In the age of the internet and 24 hours news nothing really can be kept secret, so it’s best to make sure that you have nothing to hide that could be used against you. Reputation can be protected only on the basis of integrity and honesty.
Now Nigella Lawson is not by any stretch of the imagination a low profile figure. She is an attractive and intelligent celebrity chef, who has a huge TV following on both sides of the Atlantic ,and whose cook books grace the kitchens of millions of middle and upper class kitchens.
This week Nigella told a widely reported public court case involving her former employees that she had snorted a few lines of cocaine and smoked a few joints during her life, an admission that has been devoured by the tabloids and even some broadsheets. On the way to court she had to run the gauntlet of press cameras. It was courageous and loyal of her brother Dominic to be with her-true brotherhood.
I have to say that on balance I feel sorry for Nigella – a woman whose two marriages have hardly been beds of roses, whose past drug taking while not exactly saintly never became a habit and who finds herself in the limelight, envied by some, resented by others, struggling to be treated as an ordinary human being. Society can do with more compassion , not least in this season of Advent.
