When anybody asks a trainee journalist what sort of direction they want to go in with their career, most people answer by trying to sound intelligent
“I want to write for the Wall Street Journal or the Financial Times.”
“I want to tell the truth.”
“I want to write hard-hitting stories that will change the world.”
Me? Well I want to write for a gossip magazine, interviewing celebrities and producing features about which high-heeled shoe looks like best. I wouldn’t even mind being a journalist for a red-top like The Sun or The Daily Mirror either.
Whenever anybody asks me, I always wonder whether to answer the question truthfully. Tabloidisation and so-called ‘trashy’ celebrity gossip magazines are often looked down on in the world of journalism. Many professionals deem them to be soft, pointless or unintellectual and some people just don’t see the appeal of knowing what Cheryl Cole eats for breakfast. I on the other hand, couldn’t disagree more. I think the future lies in ‘trashy’ magazines and tabloid newspapers.
People ask me why I want to go into this area of journalism and the only answer I can really give is that I love it. I buy all the gossip magazines, I have a yearly subscription to Heat, I get alerts and updates sent to my phone whenever something new happens in the world of show business, I write my own celebrity blog and I can’t go a day without continually refreshing the Daily Mail Showbiz online app. Call me obsessed, but I am simply just fascinated with the lives of people living in the public-eye.
I am fixated on knowing everything and anything about famous people and I tend to get really involved with situations. I’ll talk about Taylor Swift and Harry Styles’ relationship as though I am mutual friend of the pair, I’ll criticise a decision somebody made on The Only Way is Essex as though they should have consulted me first, and I’ll shout and scream at the TV when the X Factor is on, as though I think I should have been one of the judges.
Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think I’d like to be famous myself but interviewing and writing about famous people seems like the next best thing. I’d much rather work for a magazine or tabloid paper that focuses on lighthearted, trivial matters, rather than be stressing over an article about the rises and falls of the stock market (if I knew what that even meant). Those journalists who claim to look down on such things should take a step back and open their minds to things of perhaps lesser importance, but create a whole lot more public interest. The Sun sells the most daily copies out of any newspaper in the UK, so they must be doing something right.
So when somebody asks me now what sort of journalist I want to be, I don’t care if they think I sound stupid, I still answer truthfully because I know what I want to do suits me perfectly.