Turning human tragedy into hysterical fantasy insults the grief of those, like me, who've known the loss of a baby

By BEL MOONEY FOR THE DAILY MAIL
Updated: 05:18 EST, 7 January 2011

People often sneer at fans of TV soaps for ­ believing that the characters are ‘real’. But isn’t that the power of a good story — captivating the imagination ever since men and women huddled round fires in caves? Just for that short time, the characters are alive.

And what happens to them matters.

After all, people wrote in their hundreds to Charles Dickens when he ‘let’ Little Nell die in The Old Curiosity Shop. Some never forgave him. That’s because stories may entertain, but they still carry much more punch than mere entertainment. That’s why the current controversy over the East­Enders cot death plot is so significant.

Almost 6,000 viewers complained to the BBC over the controversial storyline

I should confess right away that I’m not a regular soap-watcher. I tend to avoid them — not because I’m snooty about the genre, but because I know I’d get addicted. But, intrigued by the furore, I settled down with BBC iPlayer to catch up on EastEnders and see what it is that has got even dedicated fans up in arms.

So far 6,200 angry viewers have complained to the BBC that the storyline — in which the character Ronnie Branning is seen discovering her baby son dead in his crib and then swapping him for barmaid Kat Moon’s newborn boy — is ­offensive and sensational.

The actress Samantha ­Womack (who plays Ronnie) reportedly had grave mis­givings about the upsetting storyline. She will be leaving the show shortly, with claims that she told one associate: ‘I’m a mother first and an actress second.’

Online message boards describe the plot as exploitative, unrealistic and hurtful to mothers who have lost babies.

Having now watched the New Year’s Eve episode, and the ones which followed, with growing disbelief, I know why.

To my mind, this is yet another example of TV ­‘creatives’ going for maximum shock value, then dishonestly dressing up their crassness as serious concern for the truth.

Although the soap prides itself on gritty realism, the ­scenario was, above all else, simply unbelievable in the most literal sense of the term. Think about it for a moment.

So two babies would be put to bed wearing identical outfits? So a brand new mother (Kat), who starts haemorrhaging, would be bundled back to ­hospital without her newborn?

Quit: Womack has made the decision to leave EastEnders following the soap's controversial cot death storyline

So the other brand new mother, discovering her baby dead, would say to her infant’s body: ‘Please don’t do this to me’ (which has to be one of the worst lines ever written) and then wander dazed through the New Year revellers and just happen to go upstairs to find the other baby unattended? Then do the swap and wander dazedly back home?
It was all too ludicrous for words — piling on the agony in a deliberate effort to sear ­viewers’ sensibilities. Which is ­precisely what makes it so ­outrageous.

The fact that the ­storyline is so implausible trivialises the very real agony of parents (especially mothers) who have lost a baby, either to Sudden Infant Death Syndrome or any other tragic accident of fate. Turning human tragedy into preposterous melodrama in this way insults the grief which changes a life for ever.

Of course human misjudgments, weakness and loss are the stuff of drama and it’s not television’s job to protect us from sadness or shock. The executive producer of ­EastEnders, Bryan Kirkwood, has defended this plot by ­saying that his show has a 25-year ­history of delivering ‘big gritty stories which chime with the audience’.

Difficult: Ronnie switches her dead baby with Kat and Alfie Moon's son Tommy

I wouldn’t dream of judging the soap’s record, and I know it has legions of devoted fans, some of whom have rallied to the show’s defence.

They point out on online forums that ­‘storylines like this make people aware of issues they wouldn’t otherwise think about, which is a good thing . . . it does not take away from the real pain and suffering that parents have experienced when losing a child’.

Well, I’m very sorry, but ­turning that pain and suffering into a ­hysterical fantasy does ­diminish it.

To avoid accusations of ­sensationalism, EastEnders producers claim to have worked with the charity, the Foundation for the Study of Infant Deaths.

But its website states: ‘Despite the continuing statement . . . by the BBC that “the FSID was consulted on the storyline”, FSID had no involvement in the planning or adoption of the specific “baby-swap” plotline.

‘The behaviour and actions of Ronnie are in no way “endorsed” by FSID as a ­typical, or even likely, reaction of a bereaved parent.’

Mother first, actress second: Womack with her two children Lily-Sue and Benjamin

And here lies the heart of why I found the episodes so troubling.

For if storylines such as this are defended because they ‘make people aware of issues’ then goodness knows how many ­uninformed viewers will be thinking of newly bereaved mothers as deranged babysnatchers to be avoided at all costs.

This is what is so damaging. Far from helping understanding, it turns bereavement into some kind of freak show.

To have included a cot death in the storyline, yet dealt with it sensitively and realistically, would have been one thing. But what I watched unfold on screen was neither sensitive nor realistic: it was shameless greed for publicity and ratings, which saw responsibility fly out of the window.

As someone who deals with readers’ problems every ­Saturday in the Mail, I’m all too aware of my responsibility when addressing real-life issues. Sometimes I deliberately adopt a slightly sharper tone than usual, because I feel the writer of the problem letter does need a slight shock to change a mind-set. But I always worry about getting the tone wrong, because words have great power to hurt.

Similarly, no one who writes scripts for mainstream TV can ever afford to forget that images have a greater power even than words, and that the combination can be deeply ­disturbing. They have to get it right.

I confess to a personal ­interest in this issue. Many years ago I gave birth to a ­stillborn son. For weeks afterwards, I wandered the streets like a zombie (all credit to Samantha Womack and Jessie Wallace for enacting that so brilliantly), feeling a knife through my heart every time I saw a mother with a pram. But I didn’t want their babies — I wanted my own.

Over the years, I’ve talked to countless bereaved mothers and know they would agree with me. We know that women do snatch babies, but (thankfully) this is very rare indeed.

To imply it’s an immediate, almost knee-jerk response to finding your precious baby dead in his cot tells a ­pernicious lie, distorting the terrible pain of those who must live with the truth of their loss.

That’s not ‘good drama’. It’s insensitive, insulting and deeply irresponsible.