Can We Please Stop Cruel Attacks on Older Stars?
Certain phrases are catnip to today’s headline writers.
- “Breaks His/Her Silence”
- “So-and-So Celebrity Stuns”
- “Star Claps Back”
We know the drill. Heck, this site has wallowed in that clickbait swamp a time or two. It’s a brutal business and it’s a challenge to cut through the digital haze.
Some news outlets go beyond these buzzwords. Their headlines dive straight into the gutter. And it’s time someone called them out.
Take The Sun. The UK outlet recently reported on an appearance by Journey rocker Steve Perry. The music icon is now 76, and thus doesn’t look quite like he did during his ‘80s heyday.
Rarely seen 80s rock legend unrecognizable [emphasis added] as he’s spotted on day out in LA – 44 years after smash hit song
Perry wasn’t hitting the stage in an unflattering rock ensemble. He was going about his daily business. And some photographer caught him in the act.
The worst part? It’s Fake News. Any self-respecting Journey fan would recognize Perry in an instant from the photos. Yes, he appears older, has gained weight and his formerly jet black hair is now silver.
The face is the same, as is the hair style.
The Daily Mail got into the act by insulting actress Pamela Anderson. The former “Baywatch” star is 57 and often eschews makeup in public. Oh, and she received the best notices of her career for her starring role in last year’s drama “The Last Showgirl.”
None of that mattered to The Daily Mail. The British publication dubbed Anderson “Frumpy” in its withering headline and corresponding X post.
Someone at the publication had second thoughts, though. The site swapped out its framing on both the original story and pulled the initial Tweet with the “frumpy” adjective.
It never should have run in the first place.
The Daily Mail was at it again recently. The site described a 65-year-old Oscar winner as “unrecognizable.” The star in question was Allison Janney, and the image featured her in a ballcap and sunglasses.
We might not recognize our own mother if she was wearing both.
An Oscar-winning actress had fans doing a double take as she stepped out for a rare outing in Los Angeles on Wednesday.
The 65-year-old icon — who earned Academy Award gold for playing Tonya Harding’s tough-as-nails mother in 2017’s I, Tonya — kept a low profile in sunglasses and a baseball cap as she picked up some pastries at a coffee shop in upscale Santa Monica.
It turns out celebrities are just like us! They age.
Some do so more gracefully than others. A few fight Father Time with plastic surgery. Calling attention to it for no reason other than clicks isn’t journalism. It’s just cruel.
The monkey trick: So and so celebrity is “unrecognizable.”
We saw that in recent years whenever Bridget Fonda appears in public. The former actress once wowed audiences in films like “Single White Female” and “Jackie Brown.” She’s now 61 years old and apparently in retirement. Her last IMDB credit came with 2002’s “Snow Queen” miniseries.
Page Six tried to soften its messaging with this description:
She kept her look casual for the outing, wearing an oversized white sweater, a pair of black capri pants and blue sneakers.
Fonda didn’t call attention to herself. She was just living her life when some shutterbug snapped her picture.
It’s understandable that fans notice how their favorite stars age. We marvel when some, like Ralph Macchio, appear mostly unchanged from their initial glory days.
And we consider our own mortality when we watch beautiful stars age before our eyes. That’s understandable.
It’s far less so for media outlets to cruelly pile on for a few sour clicks.
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