tribute

this was a place holder - for a blog i never wrote – below is the basic idea of it and at the time i would have posted it in a fuller and more rounded form. but you should get the gist.
(posted august 2 2016)
essentially the blog was going to be about the differing coverage of two celebrity deaths that had just occurred.
on the one hand ronnie corbett's death was covered with acres of newsprint all pretty much praising him for being a giant of british comedy. when i used to watch the two ronnies it was always mr. barker that i thought was the funny one, years later i realised that mr. corbett contributed a great deal to the package and was funny in and of himself.
as a tv star he received the standard many page coverage extolling his virtues.

also dead around the same time was zaha hadid, a world renowned architect (in fact a starchitect) - most famous for her swooping lines and the aquatic centre at the london 2012 olympics. her death was accompanied by a few pages here and there.

while i was never a fan of her work it struck me that she deserved a bit more coverage than she got.

i am not sure that sexism was at the root of it, more that we are a celebrity driven culture and the celebrity we like are those who entertain.

the shame of the lack of coverage of hadid was that it meant that an interesting and important career, one that can bring fame and fortune, was glossed over.
that she was a woman would have been interesting in that it could have served to encourage more girls to study maths, science and engineering - all subjects we could do with more practitioners of whether they be male or female, rather than more contestants for reality shows.
even in death celebrity trumps achievement in other fields.
more needs to be done to make other choices just as interesting for kids to make.