Reality TV Star Jane Goody Dies After Prolonged Cancer Battle

After a prolonged and highly-public battle with cervical cancer, former British reality television star Jane Goody died of cancer yesterday at the age of 27. Good first rose to national and international prominence after starring on the British installment of "Big Brother," where her brash ways, racial slurs and lower class upbringing were pushed into the spotlight. In the summer of 2008, during filming for the Indian version of "Celebrity Big Brother," Goody received a cancer diagnosis by phone and in front of the cameras. That video has been replayed ad nauseam by the curious, and Goody’s battle with cancer has made headlines for months.

Last month Goody married fiancée Jack Tweed and was criticized when she sold the photos. Said Goody at the time, "People will say I’m doing this for money. And they’re right, I am. But not to buy flash cars or big houses – it’s for my sons’ future if I’m not here. I don’t want my kids to have the same miserable, drug-blighted, poverty stricken childhood I did." Goody referred, of course, to her heroin addict father, who served time in jail and died in 2005, and her mother, a former crack addict who lost the use of an arm after a motorcycle accident.

Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, speaking of Goody’s bravery during her ordeal, noted, "If in her earlier career it was all about her, than I think at the end it was about something else." Said Prime Minister Gordon Brown of Goody, "She was a courageous woman both in life and death, and the whole country have admired her determination to provide a bright future for her children."