Beyonce and Jay-Z care more about their fame than letting Blue Ivy be herself
I SUPPOSE there’s been some clues since day one that Beyonce and Jay Z’s daughter, Blue Ivy Carter, isn’t ever going to lead a “normal” life.
Perhaps the main one is that she’s had her own personal stylist and shopper since she could toddle her way on to the red carpet, and she is only seven years old.
At one Grammy Awards, for example, she wore a white Valery Kovalska tuxedo pantsuit with sparkling silver shoes and a beaded black clutch.
That was the time — remember? — when at the age of six she shushed her parents from clapping too loudly when Camila Cabello introduced U2 to the stage.
A couple of years ago she was actually named “best dressed” at the Grammy’s thanks to her pink Gucci power suit.
Sitting on the front row watching her mother perform, she had the poise of someone five times her age.
While other celebrities tend to shield their children from the public eye, Jay Z and Beyonce seem to have positively ushered their daughter towards it.
PUSHING AN AGENDA
They have been bringing her with them on tour and to various award shows and events at which, thanks to her stylist, she often looks more fashionable than her parents.
So there’s that.
But if it’s hard to fathom a child in a Gucci suit, try getting your head around this: At the age of seven, when most children are still harbouring fantasies of being an astronaut, or a unicorn, little Blue Ivy, it turns out, wants to be recognised as a “cultural icon”.
Well, I say Blue Ivy, but clearly it is her parents who are pushing this agenda.
Beyonce and Jay Z have been seeking to trademark either “Blue Ivy” or “Blue Ivy Carter” for several years.
The problem is that someone else has already trademarked the name. Beyonce has been involved in a trade-mark dispute for years against Wendy Morales, whose wedding planning business goes by the same name.
Beyonce is outraged at the idea that Blue Ivy Carter, “the daughter of two of the most famous performers in the world”, might be confused with a boutique wedding event planning business.
Which is unlikely, when you really think about it.
So you might wonder why — really — Beyonce gives a flying fig about the fact that it has the same name as her daughter.
But I guess — unless you are the mother of a cultural icon — it’s hard for mere mortals like us to understand.
Beyonce has accused Morales of riding her coattails. Who knows, maybe she is. But so what?
What seems more relevant is the degree to which these parents apparently view their daughter as an extension of themselves.
CARE MORE ABOUT FAME
They care more about their fame and reputation than they do about letting Blue Ivy forge her own path, find her own identity and be herself.
Yes, we all pass on our values and, to a degree, our aspirations to our children.
But we all owe it to our kids to be aware of where we stop and they begin.
And it seems to me that Beyonce and Jay Z are robbing their daughter of her childhood and suffocating her with their own aspirations.
We only have to take one look around at those who haven’t been allowed proper childhoods — Michael Jackson, Macaulay Culkin, Aaron Carter — to see how badly things can go wrong.
Forget designer clothes and cultural icon status, the best thing Blue Ivy’s parents could give her is a proper childhood.
We all think our kids are special. Most of us do our best NOT to spoil our kids and keep them grounded, they seem to want the opposite.
They need to teach her that money and status is not as important as family, values, morals, kindness — and friends.
Jezza is the worst of all deals
THIS week I am mainly feeling fed up with politicians.
I voted Remain because the chaos of leaving far outweighed any problems of staying in.
But the country voted Leave and I accepted that. What’s the point in asking the country to vote if the result is ignored?
Three years on and we are still waiting to leave. Boris Johnson is at least trying to honour the people’s decision.
Jo Swinson for the Lib Debs, who is held up as a shining new light in politics, has said that if her party wins an election – most unlikely – she will cancel Brexit on the basis that on the first vote the margin for Leave was so small and people didn’t know what they were voting for.
But those are just excuses. She, and others, think they know best and would no doubt keep having the vote until they get the result they want – to remain in Europe.
Politicians are trying to force a Remain outcome, through delays to Brexit, not calling a general election and following their own views on the EU rather than that of the country.
WORRYING
But crashing out without a deal is not what really worries me. It’s the prospect of a Jeremy Corbyn government.
Here is a man who sympathises with Russia – although they came here and killed people, including poisoning a police officer.
A man who sympathises with the IRA, met with Hamas and Hezbollah and refused to sing the National Anthem.
A man who wants to close private schools and implement a four-day week (how would this work in the NHS, police, fire service, schools and all emergency services, let alone small businesses?).
This is a man who wants to introduce a right-to-buy scheme for private tenants and force landlords to sell their buy-to-rent properties for less than they are worth, leaving them in debt – then also clobber them with higher taxes.
DANGEROUS MAN
He wants to nationalise industry and confiscate £300billion of shares in 7,000 large companies and hand them to workers.
He is a very dangerous man.
As Margaret Thatcher said, the problem with socialism is you eventually run out of other people’s money.
I hope politicians knock their heads together, compromise, get out of Europe and focus on the future outside of the EU – new trade deals, new investments, jobs and innovation.
This is a great country, let’s hope it remains so.
She's worth it
I KNOW Phoebe Waller- Bridge is not for everyone – although her telly show Fleabag is pretty damned funny.
But whether you like her or not, she is currently on a serious roll.
TV awards left, right and centre including Emmys and Baftas – and now she has just signed a £50million deal with Amazon.
In my view she deserves every penny.
Her talent is incredible.
IN her new memoirs, Demi Moore has criticised ex-husband Ashton Kutcher for “shaming” her by sharing a picture of her in her underwear during their marriage.
Apparently, he justified it at the time by saying that sharing a snap of Demi half-naked was just a “good-natured joke”.
Really?
A load of buff and nonsense
ACTOR Christopher Eccleston has revealed his lifelong battle with anorexia – which some, who think of it as a woman’s affliction, may have found shocking.
Meanwhile, F1’s Lewis Hamilton has revealed he’s not happy with his body and has clearly spent his lifetime trying to become so.
Both stories are reminders that men are becoming as fixated with their physiques as women have been all these years.
Which, really, is not the kind of equality we’ve been fighting for all these years.
What we are left with is a reality that no one – man or woman – is ever 100-per-cent happy with their looks.
I most certainly am not.
It's back
THIS Wednesday sees the return of The Apprentice at 9pm on BBC1 .
The show starts with a bang when Lord Sugar sends candidates off to South Africa to run a safari tour.
When they don’t know the difference between an elephant and a rhino, you know it spells disaster . . . but in a good way.
This series is the best ever, so I hope you watch it and enjoy it as much as we did making it.
Tricky decision
THIS week, a transgender man who gave birth but does not want to be described as “mother” on the birth certificate lost his High Court fight, prompting speculation you cannot have it both ways.
Freddy McConnell, 32, from Kent, wants to be registered as “father” or “parent”, despite having physically given birth to the baby – but a judge ruled against him.
This is tricky, but the judge’s decision has to be the right one. Despite the wonders of modern science, men cannot, yet, give birth.
That’s a fact.
He was physically a woman when he gave birth and, although he may be legally male now, that’s another issue.
WHATEVER Christie Brinkley is doing, she looks fantastic for 65.
As she posed in a denim jumpsuit, looking decades younger she left me thinking I would love to know what she’s had done – as I would certainly do it.
MOST READ IN OPINION
She obviously eats well and exercises – but she has also had surgery, which she is very honest about.
Others have had it and look strange, but Christie looks fresh and youthful.
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