We all have our faults, so be kind

RECENTLY, I’ve read a lot about the latest series of The Crown.

Perhaps you can’t wait for the latest dramatisation of the lives of our Royal Family.

I heard the early, historic episodes (with Claire Foy as the Queen) were excellent, but Olivia Colman as Elizabeth II? What a piece of sad — even insulting — miscasting.

As for watching the tragic Diana story unfold in fiction . . . no thank you. You might think I sound holier-than-thou (I’m not!) but I’ve no time for cheap gossip aimed at hurting living people.

In 2012, the excellent Meryl Streep won the Best Actress Oscar for portraying Margaret Thatcher in The Iron Lady. Oh, it was a good performance, if you relished a cruel impersonation of one of the most effective Prime Ministers of the 20th century, reduced to a friendless wreck with dementia.

Lady Thatcher was still alive. Yet she had no redress, no voice — and was shown no mercy. Nor were those who loved her.

At the time, in the cinema, I felt soiled by it. It was full of lies, as well as a gross invasion of somebody’s privacy. Oh, but when ‘creatives’ make TV or films, they can get away with murdering the truth.

That’s why I won’t be watching the Royal Family I love mimicked into monsters in The Crown.

You might wonder what all this has to do with an advice column.

Well, we live in an age made crass and callous by 24-hour news (true and ‘fake’) and social media, and there isn’t a day when some snide comment, some abuse, some vile insinuation (not about me, but about others) doesn’t horrify me.

Hurting people is a public sport — and this inevitably spills over into private life.

In problem l et t ers , I notice an increase in confrontation and harsh judgment, while responses often lack any empathy.

As a sinner myself, I believe we grow by acknowledging our own faults and by realising that even the famous are human.

BEL answers readers’ questions on emotional and relationship problems each week. Write to Bel Mooney, Scottish Daily Mail, 20 Waterloo Street, Glasgow G2 6DB, or email bel.mooney@ dailymail.co.uk. Names are changed to protect identities. Bel reads all letters but regrets she cannot enter into personal correspondence.